152 



The Canadian Horticulturist. 



fall or winter, but in the months of January, February and March, a well grown 

 Ben Davis is just as nice an apple as I want to eat, and I am very particular in 

 my choice of an apple, too. As for profit, I believe there is no apple grown 

 that will give you as much." Mr. Stenson, of Peterboro', said, " I planted 

 seventeen trees of the Ben Davis sixteen years ago. They began bearing in six 

 yearsj and have been bearing ever since. This last year I took eighty-six 

 bushels off those trees— eighty of them good salable apples. I would sooner 

 grow the Ben Davis at 50 cents a bushel than any other apple at $1.00." 

 Mr. Stenson's method of handling them is to store them until the 20th of May, 

 when he ships them to England, and gets the top price in the market. 



On the other hand, it is urged by some apple growers, whose experience is 

 equally reliable, that when planting an orchard we should choose varieties of 

 better quality than the Ben Davis, because the time will come when quality 

 must rule in the markets. At our meeting in Windsor, Mr. Elliot spoke as 

 follows concerning this apple, " No doubt the Ben Davis sells well, but I think 

 a man who charges his neighbor $2.00 for a barrel of Ben Davis robs him of 

 $1.75. It may do very well for hotel keepers, for one barrel of them will last a 

 first class hotel as a dessert apple about three months, whereas a really sjood 

 apple will not last a week. If you send a boy into the cellar for an eating apple, 

 he never brings a Ben Davis, and if your wife wants to please you with an apple 

 dumpling, she does not choose the Ben Davis." 



Mr. A. McD. Allan said at the same meeting, ''Although good prices are 

 now paid in England for the Ben Davis, it is bound to come down in value 

 before very long. The fact is they are looking into the quality of apples in 

 those markets more closely than the consumers in our own markets." 



The estimation in which this apple was held by our fruit committee is 

 shown by the rating they gave it, viz., dessert o, cooking i, home market 8, 

 foreign market 9 ; — only 18 points out of a maximum of 40. 



At Chicago the Ben Davis was one of the finest looking apples shown by 

 Idaho, Oregon and British Columbia. As grown in those quarters, the apple is 

 twice the size of those grown in Ontario, and more highly colored ; while the 

 Spy, one of our best quality apples, is a miserable failure. No wonder that the 

 Ben Davis is the great apple of the west. 



Our colored plate shows a large sample of the Ben Davis, too large to be 

 grown in Ontario, but scarcely as large as those shown at the World's Fair by 

 British Columbia. We cannot better describe this variety than by quoting from 

 A. J. Downing's great work. He says, "The origin of this apple is unknown. 

 J S. Downer, of Kentucky, writes that old trees are there found from which 

 suckers are taken in way of propagating. The tree is very hardy, a free grower, 

 with very dark reddish brown, slightly grayish young wood, forming an erect 

 round head, bearing early and abundantly. In quality it is not first rate, but 

 from its early productiveness, habit of blooming late in spring after late frosts, 

 good size, fair even fruit, keeping and carrying well, it is very popular in all the 

 ?outh-west and west. 



