The Canadian Horticultun^ 



Floral Edition 



Vol. XXXIX 



PETERBORO. APRIJ., 1916 



No. 4 



Essentials to Success in Fruit Growing 



THE growing of fruit, when, proper- 

 ly conducted, is a business Avhieh 

 requires all the brains, all the 

 patience, all the care and sometimes all 

 the money a man has, to carry it on 

 successfully. The old idea that it took 

 a "smart" man to be a lawyer, a doctor, 

 or a merchant, but that any fool could 

 be a farmer, has at last been exploded, 

 and in its place has come the realization 

 that in the successful farmer and fruit- 

 grower must be combined the shrewd- 

 ness of the lawyer, the sympathetic in- 

 sight of the physician, and the practical 

 wisdom and foresight of the merchant 

 and manufacturer. 



To be a successful fruitgrower, a man 

 must know how to prune his trees ; how 

 and when to spray them, and how to 

 thin whenever that is necessary or ad- 

 visable. He should know his soil and 



Seth J. T. Bush, Morton, N.Y. 



what it needs to properly nourish and 

 sustain the trees and mature the fruit. 

 He should know the relative value of 

 different varieties ; their bearing, carry- 

 ing and keeping qualities. I would not 

 recommend the raising of a great many 

 varieties, and it is always important to 

 plant only the varieties suited to your 

 soil and climatic conditions. The man 

 who raises any kind of fruit on a ear- 

 lot basis has a distinct advantage over 

 the man who, perhaps, raises more fruit 

 but can not load solid cars of one 

 variety. The question of fertilizer for 

 our orchards is a vital one. The man 

 who depends wholly on ^commercial 

 fertilizers for his orchards, or any other 

 part of his farm for that matter, is 

 making a serious mistake. If I could 

 get all the good barnyard manure and 

 all the good cover crops I need, I would 



not buy a pound of commercial fertil- 

 izer, with the exception of nitrate of 

 soda as a top-dressing for pastures, 

 meadows, and wheat in the spring. 



With the right kind of cover crop to 

 plow under, and proper cultivation 

 afterwards, you will need mighty little 

 else, and you may have to eliminate the 

 cover crop occasionally. I am not, how- 

 ever, advocating barnyard manure for 

 peaches. A fruit grower should walk 

 through his orchards at least once every 

 week through the summer, and be on 

 the lookout constantly for the various 

 diseases and ills that the tree is heir to. 



In the case of peaches, the "grub- 

 bing" of the trees is one of the most 

 essential things, and should be done 

 thoroughly at least once each year — in 

 May or June. The "Grubs" must be 

 removed or they will ruin the trees in 



k 



New Brunswick within a few years should rank up well &a a fruit bearine proaincc. The orchard here shown is that of R 



■Rurton. N.B. MAny more orohard.s vrlll .«*hortly come Into hearlne. 



Barker 



