The Canadian Horticulturist. 



229 



fortably in good soil. These lie places 

 in partial shade and keeps them well 

 watered, and as a result he has better 

 plants than those which are grown in 

 full exposure. These plants are ready 

 for setting in the end of August, and 

 will become sufficiently established to 

 bear a fair crop the following year, and 

 a tull crop the year after. This is as 

 long as he would keep his bed, for he 

 finds it less troublj to plant a fresh than 

 to keep an old bed clean after its second 

 crop. 



The Fruit Prospfxts do not 

 IMPROVE. — There is a great outer}' in 

 the Grimsby section tliat the grapes 

 are dropping from the stems, and that 

 this misfortune is so serious that in 

 some cases almost the whole crop is 

 already lost. One gentleman who 

 has a vineyard of Niagaras, a kind 

 which appears to be suffering more 

 than any other, says that a few weeks 

 ago, liad any one offered him S700 

 for his crop he would have scorned 

 it ; now, he says, his whole crop will 

 not be worth five cents. Even the 

 Concord is suffering ver}' much in 

 some vineyards. We can give no 

 satisfactory explanation, unless it is 

 the excessive rains which occurred 

 at blossoming time. 



The apple scab has returned with 

 more destructiveness than ever, 

 especially upon the Early Harvest 

 and the snow. Many of the yourig 

 apples are literally covered with the 

 fusicladium, and are cracked from 

 stem to calyx. Greenings and Kings 

 are also much affected. 



Popular Gardciiiiifif publishes a 

 report of the respective fruit crop in 

 the United States in a chart in which 

 5 indicates a very heavy crop, 4 

 above the average, 3 the average, 2 

 under, i poor, and o a total failure. 

 As a result it is computed that all 

 fruits will be under the average except 

 Raspberries, Blackberries and Straw- 

 berries, and these are very little more 

 than an average. 



Thinning Fruit. — This is a prac- 

 tise more often neglected than ob- 



served. Most of us acknowledge the 

 utility of it, but we have yet failed to 

 meet with the Canadian orchardist 

 who regularly thins his fruit. Nodoubt 

 it can be proved that it pays in dollars 

 and cents, for, when a tree or vine 

 is overloaded with fruit, much of it 

 will be too small to gather, and the 

 whole will sell at a low price. As 

 for the extra labor, this is not to be 

 considered, for if a tree has on it two 

 hundred peaches what difference is 

 there whether we gather one hundred 

 now and one hundred in October, or 

 the two hundred in the latter month ? 

 Many of our apples and pear trees, 

 too, are cumbered with a large am- 

 ount of defective fruit, which is rob- 

 bing them of their vitality in the 

 maturity of the seeds. These should 

 by all means be removed as earl}- as 

 possible, in order that the strength 

 thus being wasted may go to the 

 enlargement of the finer specimens. 

 There is no doubt it will pay well 

 to thin our fruit, and we would like 

 to hear from any one who has given 

 it a fair trial. 



The Pear Blight and the apple 

 twig blight are both playing havoc 

 with many beautiful trees this year. 

 Mr. E. J. Woolverton has a beauti- 

 ful orchard of fine thrifty Duchess 

 dwarf pear trees ; they are of bearing 

 size and were the pride of the owner 

 until early in June, when alas ! this 

 terror of the pear grower, visited that 

 orchard, and now it is a sad spectacle; 

 whole rows of trees with scorched 

 bark and withered leaves, tell the 

 ruinous tale of destruction. The 

 Quince is also suffering very much, 

 though as with the apple, it is chiefly 

 the smaller twigs that suffer. 



Prof. Burrill, of Champaign, 111., 

 says the mystery of the blight is now 

 explained. It is caused, he says, b)' 

 tiny organisms known as bacteria, 

 which are so very small that they 

 can only be seen with the high powers 

 of a compound microscope. To the 

 same group belong most of the so- 

 called disease germs to which are 



