THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST 



Kloral Edition. 



A well-loaded Triumph peach tree In the 

 orchard of Jas. Marshall, Hamilton, Ont. 



each and throw the soil towards the 

 trees, which affords better surface 

 drainage, as it is injurious to the trees 

 for the water to lie around them. 



I contend that peach trees thrive bet- 

 ter where they are on an elevation, with 

 a deep gorge, mountain face, or a large 

 tract of land lying down much lower 

 than the orchard, as the cold, frosty, 

 night air runs down off the ridges and 

 leaves the warmer air on the higher 

 land. Any person may notice this con- 

 dition when driving through a hilly 

 country at night during most of the 

 year. 



There are about 5,500 peach trees in 

 one of my orchards, and about 500 pear, 

 plum and cherry trees in one corner, 

 where the land is low, and sloping to- 

 wards the south, there being a little 

 over 6,000 trees in the orchard. All 

 told, I have about 11,000 trees. Some 

 early kinds of peaches, such as May 

 Flower, Sneed Triumph, Admiral 

 Dewey, Belle-of-Georgia, and others, 

 bear well when planted two or three 

 years. Early Crawfords, and those of 

 the Crawford type, bear well when 

 planted four or five years. 



The spring frosts do little or no in- 

 jury to the peach trees or fruit buds. 

 The time when they are injured is in 

 the winter, chiefly in February, when 

 we have low temperatures. Ten or 

 twelve degrees below zero does not seem 



to injure them, and even if it goes fif- 

 teen degrees below, we may have a good 

 crop; but in 1914, when the tempera- 

 ture was twenty degrees below zero, 

 the peach crop was a failure, and the 

 only failure in eight years. 



We allow corn, or even weeds, to 

 grow in the orchard the latter part of 

 the summer, in order to ripen up the 

 trees and check the later growth. (We 

 do not grow corn or other produce af- 

 ter trees begin to bear.) This hardens 

 and prepares the trees for winter, as in- 

 tense frost and dry weather in winter 

 will injure any late or tender growth. 

 We nearly always plow down weeds or 

 grassy growth late in the fall and do 

 not leave a cover crop to protect the 

 trees, as it is only a harbor for mice. 

 The plowing of soil prevents root freez- 

 ing, as it breaks the connection between 

 the frosty atmosphere and the subsoil, 

 and the air spaces caused by plowing 

 also prevent the frost from injuring the 

 roots. I very seldom have trees winter- 

 killed, in fact, only one year when I did 



not plow in the fall, and there not being 

 much snow, the hard clay ground froze 

 deeply. 



Mice often girdle fruit trees in the 

 winter under the snow. Some recom- 

 mend tramping the snow firmly around 

 the trees after every snowstorm, but 1 

 consider it an absurd proposition. It 

 might do where a person has only a few 

 trees, but if there were on an average 

 fourteen snowstorms each winter, and 

 if a person walked fast and tramped 

 the snow hard after each snowstorm in 

 an orchard such as mine, it would taks 

 fifty-six days to do the tramping, and 

 the mice would very likely often get 

 ahead of the tramper. It is a good way 

 to tar-paper around the trunk of each 

 tree, but I think it is much better to 

 take a spade and bank the soil firmly 

 around each tree in the fall, soon 

 enough to let the soil settle firmly 

 around tree. This also prevents water 

 from standing around trees, and it can 

 be worked down in the spring and thus 

 cover weeds or grass. 



The Production of Vegetables from Seed* 



A. J. Logsdail, B.S.A., Experimental Farm, Ottawa 



favorable season at Ottawa, it seems to 

 me that there is an excellent opening 

 for many a man with a good practical 

 knowledge of market gardening and a 

 realization of the essential factors in 

 seed production to initiate and ultim- 

 ately build up an exceedingly profitable 

 business in home seed production. 



Acclimatized seed produces better re- 

 sults, nine times out of ten, than similar 

 seed introduced from distant countries. 

 By the term of "seed" I refer strictly to 

 seed, not to roots, scions or cuttings, 

 though even in these instances there are 

 many examples of the superiority of 

 home-grown stock. The exception that 

 I have in mind is that of potatoes, but 

 a potato is nothing more or less than a 

 root cutting. 



Sweet corn is another crop that is 

 particularly worthy of attention by 

 Canadian growers. The majority of 

 our sweet corn seed has been and is pro- 

 duced in areas to the south of us, which 

 possess longer summer seasons than our 

 own. 



The continual importation of seed 

 year by year excludes the possibility of 

 ultimately acclimatizing and appreci- 

 ably shortening the season of growth of 

 these varieties. At the same time it 

 also precludes the possibility of pro- 

 ducing earlier maturing varieties than 

 are generally found on the market. 



Sweet corn seed has been successfully 

 matured, improved, and selected at 

 Ottawa for a number of years. If this 



fN growing the seed of root crops, 

 I care should be taken to select 

 roots that are uniform in shape, 

 tjrpical of the variety that they 

 represent, and in sound mature condi- 

 tion. With such roots as turnip, it is 

 advisable to twist rather than cut off 

 the tops when storing, for by cutting 

 off the tops too near the crown of the 

 root, one is liable to remove the ej'es 

 from which the flower shoots grow in 

 the spring. With beets and nmngels 

 this is not so likely to occur, as the eyes 

 are deeply set. Such roots, after they 

 have been selected, can be stored in 

 either a root cellar or pit. The pit is 

 often the more convenient, as it can be 

 made in a corner of the root field. 

 - In pitting roots, the pit should be so 

 constructed as to afford a dry bottom, 

 good drainage, and good ventilation. 

 Successive layers of straw and soil 

 should cover the roots. Straw drafts 

 along the top of the pit should be made 

 for ventilation, and such precautions 

 as possible to keep rats and mice from 

 making the pit their winter quarters. 



Seed of certain market garden crops, 

 such as the seed of Paris Golden Yellow 

 Celery, is now quoted at between 

 twenty and thirty dollars a pound. 

 Such is only an example of the present 

 market quotation of many of our seeds. 

 Judging by the experimental work in 

 our small trial lots during the past un- 



•A paper read at the last annual conven- 

 tion held In Toronto of the Ontario Vegetable 

 Growers' Association. 



