^ ^oii)g<? of (!)fl7^p ^oci^ti^s. ^ 



QUEBEC FRUIT GROWERS. 



Annual Winter Meeting of the Society at Lachute. 



^ p^HE fifth annual winter meeting 



of the Pomological and Fruit 



,_i GrowingSociety of the province 



of Quebec was held in Lachute, 



recently. Mr. R. Brodie, president of 



the Society, occupied the chair, and there 



was a large attendance of those interested 



in the development of horticulture in 



the province. 



The president, in his annual address, 

 said that the past year was one of almost 

 famine in fruit production, following a 

 year of plenty. The plum crop in 

 Kamouraska and LTslet had been a 

 failure, and in the Montreal district a 

 great many apple trees were killed out- 

 right. He urged that the Quebec Gov- 

 ernment should follow the example of 

 the Ontario Government, and employ 

 experts to instruct the farmers how to 

 spray and care for their trees in general. 

 He praised the energy of Mr. Fisher, 

 Minister of Agriculture, in making the 

 shipping of fruit in cold storage a suc- 

 cess. Now Quebec fruit growers could 

 place choice autumn and early winter 

 apples in good condition on the English 

 market, which was not possible without 

 cold storage. 



Mr. Auguste Dupuis, the well-known 

 horticulturist, of LTslet, read an instruc- 

 tive paper on the effects of the winter of 

 1896 and 1897 on the orchards of the 

 eastern portion of the province of Que- 

 bec. He made the regrettable state- 

 ment that in this district one-third of the 

 f.pple trees and three-fouiths of the plum 

 rees had been killed last winter. Some 

 jf the latter were brought from France 

 by the earliest settlers of the province 



of Quebec and had perpetuated them- 

 selves since but were now almost eradi- 

 cated. Mr. Dechene, provincial secre- 

 tary of agriculture, had promised to give 

 three thousand plum tree, to the fruit 

 growers in the district, and the Dominion 

 Minister of Agriculture had promised to 

 assist. Mr. Dupuis thought it possible 

 that they might be able to secure from 

 France some of the old varieties of 

 plums, which had proven so profitable 

 below Quebec. 



Mr. Percy H. Selwyn, Ottawa, and 

 Mr. Gilbert Wintle, two experts in 

 agriculture, read interesting papers on 

 bees and bee-keeping. During the dis- 

 cussion which these papers called forth, 

 a motion was passed in favor of legisla- 

 tion similar to that now existing in 

 Ontario to protect bee men from the 

 danger involved in spraying fruit trees 

 during bloom — a practice which is de- 

 structive to bee life, and injurious to the 

 fruit trees themselves. 



An interesting address was given by 

 Dr. Fletcher, botanist and entomologist 

 of the Experimental Farms, on insects 

 injurious to fruits in 1897. The speaker 

 dwelt on the importance of proper spray- 

 ing as the only means of preventing the 

 depredations of insects on fruits and 

 fruit trees. He agreed with the resolu- 

 tion of the society that trees should not 

 be sprayed in bloom as it injured the 

 honey bees. He dilated on the advan- 

 tages of cold storage for fruit, and pre- 

 dicted great profit from it to fruit growers 

 and farmers. 



Dr. Fletcher produced a specimen of 

 San Jose scale and reminded the meet- 



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