304 



The Canadian Horticulturist. 



the cultivation of our own orchards 

 and gardens. 



In general, the Wealthy ma}' be 

 described as follows: — Form, medium 

 sized, oblate, or roundish-oblate ; 

 color, whitish yellow ground, shaded 

 with deep rich crimson in the sim, 

 with obscure broken stripes and mot- 

 lings in the shade, sometimes en- 

 tirely covered with crimson ; flesh, 

 white, fine grained, stained with red) 

 tender, juicy, sub-acid, with a small 

 core; quality, very good; season, 

 earl}' winter, keeping, under favor- 

 able circumstances, until the l&st of 

 February. The tree is a fair grower, 

 and the foliage handsome. 



On account of its great beauty, 

 perfectly clear skin, and excellence 

 as a dessert apple, the Wealthy is 

 worthy of commendation for plant- 

 ing in Southern Ontario in place of 

 the Fameuse, which has become 

 worthless through scab, a disease 

 rapidly gaining ground among our 

 very best varieties. How profitable 

 an orchard would be, if planted with 

 such varieties as Astracan, Duchess, 

 Gravenstein, Cranberry Pippin, King 

 and Wealthy, — all fancy apples, 

 clear of this troublesome scab and 

 commanding the very highest prices in 

 both our home and foreign markets. 



One of the special points of excel- 

 lence about the Wealthy is its hardi- 

 ness. Its only lack in this respect 

 is a certain amount of unsoundness, 

 or blight, in the trunk. This fault 



is complained of by Dr. Hoskins, of 

 Vermont, a gentleman of large ex- 

 perience with the so called iron-clad 

 apples, and also by Mr. Shepherd, of 

 Montreal, a prominent member of 

 the Quebec Fruit Growers' Associa- 

 tion, who complains that out of sixty 

 trees of this variety, planted ten 

 years ago, he has lost twenty through 

 this disease. To overcome this 

 trouble it is recommended that the 

 Wealthy be top grafted upon some 

 iron-clad stock, such as the Tetofsky, 

 which is not subject to it. Barring 

 this, the Wealthy is classed among 

 the hardiest and most desirable kinds 

 to plant in our cold north. Mr. A. 

 A. Wright, an ex-director of our As- 

 sociation living at Renfrew, where 

 the thermometer frequently sinks to 

 40° below zero in mid-winter, grows 

 the Wealthy with great success. He 

 writes " Plant any number of Wealth- 

 ies." Mr. J. M. Fisk, of the Montreal 

 Horticultural Society, classes it for 

 hardiness with Haas, the Peach, 

 and the Winter St. Lawrence. 



The Wealthy apple has one other 

 fault, which we must not fail to note, 

 and that is the early dropping of the 

 fruit. This begins in the latitude of 

 New York as early as the month of 

 August, and for this reason it is 

 sometimes classed as a fall apple, 

 especially in New York State, where 

 the Fameuse is also so classed, but, 

 grown farther north, it may be rank- 

 ed as an early winter apple. 



