THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST. 



Baldwin, Golden Russet, and Ben Davis give 

 good results? Please describe it and its g(;od and 

 bad features, both tree and fruit, and oblijije 

 Georgetown, P. E. I. F. G. Borvkr. 



This apple has proved valuable in the 

 United States, but is not f^rown commer- 



cially in Canada, and not yet tested loni^ 

 enough to say whether it is adapted to our 

 country. It is rather large, roundish in 

 form, yellow, with crimson check. It ripens 

 in December. 



©Ipdo^ Ld^^^i?'^ 



Export Packing and Bills of Lading. 



Sir, — On my return home to Guelph I gave Mr. 

 Hutt my name and membership fee of your Asso- 

 ciati n. I would like very much to be kept posted 

 of any meetings you may have, although 1 did not 

 say much at your meeting. I have been very much 

 interested in the business, and have been trying to 

 get this act ab®ut long before your as.sociation had 

 the matter up. 



Vou remember I suggested that our ocean bills 

 of lading should be made out so that should the 

 fruit miss the boat originally intended, for the 

 Foreigh Freight Agent of the delivery Railway 

 Company would hand the apples over for the next 

 steamer sailing, the ocean bills would be made out 

 so as to go per any line of steamer — Allan, Dom- 

 inion, Beaver— so that the insurance policy would 

 be made out accordingly for any of the three lines 

 to Liverpool, and in the same way to other ports, 

 and this would save our apples from la3nng over in 

 the box cars and hot wharf in Montreal over a 

 week sometimes. 



If you have any printed reports of our meeting 

 with the Hon. Sydney Fisher, I would like to get 

 two or three copies so as to send them to receivers 

 interested. 



I would like the Bill to deal with size of the so- 

 called Apple Bushel Box for export ; the California 

 box is one size, and the Australia box another size, 

 and the Ontario varies fiom that of the United 

 States box. 



The Onta io apple case for export, inside measure 

 is 21 inches long, lo.V inches wide and ii inches 

 deep. 



The Australia apple case is made 20 x 9 x 15, out- 

 side measurement, i inch side, top and bottom and 

 f inch ends. 



I believe if the barrel was made 287 inch stave, 

 we would get much better barrels, as that is the 

 size of the stave used for flour for the West Indies, 

 •etc., and I think the flour trade in Canada wnll 

 come to the 287 inch stave bye and bye. 



R. A. BucHART, Guelph. 



A Qood Beginning. 



Sir, — I am starting a fruit garden; of course it 

 is on a small scale, but you know, sir, that from 

 the little acorns the big oaks gi'ow ; and so a few 

 rods of ground planted to frait now, may in time 

 be increased to acres. Last fall I planted about 

 400 berry bushes and intend to plant 500 more 

 this spring; and I intend to plant 40 plum trees 

 next fall. The few plum and pear trees I planted 



some time ago are doing nicely. Besides the fruit 

 garden, I have started a Ginseng plantation ; I 

 have 500 seeds planted in the forest and about 

 2,000 small plants ready to transplant this spring. 

 It takes some time to get stocked with Ginseng, as 

 the seeds require eighteen months to germinate, 

 and then a period of five to eight years before the 

 roots are ready for market. I tried an experiment 

 with peanuts last summer on three different kinds 

 of soils, and I had very good success. I planted a 

 small paper of seeds and had two quarts of pea- 

 nuts when dried. I cannot raise them here for 

 profit, but with care can grow a few in the garden 

 for home use. I am the first one in the township 

 of Franklin that has started a combined garden 

 stocked with fruit, ginseng and peanuts. 



Herbert Frier. 

 Franklin Centre, Province of Quebec. 



Too Many Varieties. 



A subject which is ot great importance to apple 

 growers of this country, particularly at this time 

 of the year when many are ordering trees for 

 spring planting, and one which I intended bring- 

 ing before the meeting at Brantford had there not 

 been such an amount of other business, is the fact 

 that the number of varieties of apples grown gen- 

 erally in Ontario is decidedly detrimental to our 

 export and home trade. A few of the leading 

 varieties are known in Great Britain, and while 

 many other sorts maj^ be equally as good in thtm- 

 selves, the fact that they are not generally known 

 to the public makes them less valuable to the 

 dealer. 



Straight lots of one variety, or carloads contain- 

 ing not more than three or four, always make the 

 best returns. For example, I had at that meeting 

 two sales sheets from Liverpool, one lot was a 

 load of Canadian apples of thirty varieties, and 

 the other a shipment of Maine Baldwins ; the 

 former of course was an exceptional case, but as 

 Messrs. Woodall & Co. wrote me recently, if our 

 growers would get rid of 90 per cent, of the out- 

 side sorts they would all make far more money. 



While I w^ould not wish to sa}- anything to dis- 

 parage the enterprising elTorts of our fruit-growers 

 by seeking new varieties by way of imoroving on 

 the old, I would ask them to bear in mind that 

 Canada has now many varieties which suit our 

 climate, are well known products of our country, 

 are good carriers in their various seasons, and 

 meet with a good demand, and until some varieties 

 are established as improvements on these, it is ad- 

 viFahle to stick dost Iv to the old sorts. 



