>4 



THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST. 



OUR BRANTFORD MEETING. 



Fa;. 1982. W. M. Orr, Pkesident for 1901. 



.^4^^NE of the best meeting-s we have 

 ' I ever held in point of real work 



\>ZJl '^"^ valuable addresses was held 

 "^S^c in Brantford the 19th, 20th and 

 2 1 St of December last. Not that many 

 members showed up in attendance from 

 the locality, but a fine attendance of 

 our best fruit g'rowers, shippers and repre- 

 sentatives of societies and colleges, and all 

 combined to lend importance to the occasion. 

 After the report of our experimental ship- 

 ments was presented by the secretary, which 

 was given our readers in the December 

 •number, the Hon, John Dryden gave an 

 address containing much encouragement to 

 fruit growers. He dealt chiefly with the San 

 Jose scale and his efforts to perfect a system 

 of continuous cold storage transporta ion of 

 tender fruits to England. Among all the 

 branches of agriculture, he said, there was 

 none of more importance than fruit growing, 

 and he instanced the success of the Ontario 



exhibits at Chicago and Paris. Their re- 

 sults had been achieved by time and eflfort. 

 The fruit farmers, he said, have had to learn 

 that fruit trees could not be used as forest 

 trees, and that they had to be continually 

 tended, that fruit suitable to one section was 

 not suitable to another. In that work the 

 Government experimental stations had aided. 

 Insect pests, he urged, had to be fought by 

 the farmers unitedly. Some people were 

 apt to place too great reliance upon law. It 

 was necessary, but it could only be enforced 

 when backed by public opinion. They could 

 not drive the people generally, and they 

 could not drive farmers especially. When 

 he established the travelling dairy to educate 

 the farmers and farmers' wives to rig"ht 

 methods in the home, he was asked why he 

 did not start cheese factories and cream- 

 eries. They came, as he expected, from the 

 education aflForded from the travelling" dairj'. 

 He was sure that within five years those 

 who had opposed his San Jose scale legisla- 

 tion would say he had been right. He 

 would be the proudest man in Ontario if for 

 twice $100,000 he could have stamped out 

 the scale. Even with the methods being 

 adopted it was found that the pest was get- 

 ting ahead of the inspectors, and that 

 $300,000 would be required to annihilate it. 

 That was more than the legislature would 

 vote. It remained, and would for some 

 time to come. The work done had stamped 

 out the scale in at least 100 districts. The 

 nurseries, he believed, were the chief dan- 

 ger, and he would enforce the proper fumi- 

 gation of stock. No treatment yet adopted 

 have absolutely killed the scale, but he knew 

 no better way of meeting the difficulty than 

 by continuing the present method of spray- 

 ing. 



