14 FIRST FRUITS OF THE LAND. 



respect we were confronted with a condition, not a theory; 

 and while leaving this condition an open subject for fur- 

 ther reference before concluding, I pass on to a new era 

 premising that the establishment of one, two, and three 

 transcontinental railways, the rapidly growing population 

 of the Northwest extending back to the valley of the Mis- 

 sissippi, the limited fruit area for the few hardy varieties, 

 present conditions to which we must now adjust ourselves. 

 The Department of the Interior, recognizing the fact 

 that the vast "waste places" of the great Northwest, des- 

 tined to be the homes of thousands upon thousands of 

 hardy and adventurous home-builders, would be found 

 unsuitable for the propagation of our fruits, ordered the 

 importation of apples and other fruits acclimated to the 

 regions of Russia and Siberia and arranged for the estab- 

 lishment of experiment stations to plant and test these 

 trees in the cold, desolate regions north of us. Prof. J. L. 

 Budd, of the Iowa Agricultural College, and Mr. Charles 

 Gibb traveled through Russia and made a very full col- 

 lection, consisting of hundreds of varieties of wild and 

 cultivated fruits. These were distributed widely over the 

 Northwest and were also tested by Professor Budd on the 

 college grounds. All experiments, practically, have proven 

 failures. To give some idea of the result of these experi- 

 ments, and the present status of "orcharding" in the West 

 and North'west, I quote from an article in the November 

 American Garden, from the pen of Prof. J. L. Budd : 



The summers and winters during the past six years have been the 

 most trying known to the history of the West on orchard fruits. So 

 far as I know, the wreck of western orchards had known DO parallel 

 in the world's history. On the college grounds, the old orchard of 

 1,200 trees, planted prior to -our experimental work with Russian 

 fruits, was totally wrecked, and is now a clover field. Of the 118 

 varieties, the hardiest of the old list, the Duchess, Whitney's No. 20, 

 and Tetofsky were the only really sound trees left when the orchard 

 was grubbed out. In Like manner our pear, European plum, and 



