CORDON AND FAN-GROWN TREES 53 



of $300 each, and thereby increased the value of land and buildings 

 one hundred per cent. Even the widening of a road in front of a prop- 

 erty enhances its value and desirability. As simple a thing as setting 

 back a wall two feet I found not only broadened the sidewalk but 

 added materially to the appearance and value of a house. 



The vital and expensive error of building a house in the wrong 

 location is frequently made. A house built on low land is generally 

 sheltered, often hot, and always damp. 



Fruit Crop. 



The fruit crop on the old farm began and ended with apples, 

 save for a couple of crooked pear trees which yielded a half crop of 

 discolored, nubbined, gnarly fruit ; half a dozen fine peach trees 

 never have eaten as good peaches since and a small patch of rasp- 

 berries. 



Peaches. 



The peach crop from the new plantings averaged for several years 

 about fifteen hundred baskets of highly colored luscious fruit. 



A long, tight board fence facing south inveigled us to distort and 

 mutilate with knife and pruning-saw peach, nectarine, and pear tree 

 along espalier lines, and cordon and fan-grown trees fastened against 

 this fence matured their fruit ahead of time, boosted into ripening by 

 old 3x6 hot-bed sash, braced lengthwise aslant the fence top. 



The short-lived peach trees were set between the long-lived 

 pears, which outlive their planters for generations unless neglected 

 or overtaken by disease; indeed, even the stalwart apple tree crumbles 

 to dust years before this seemingly weaker sister, the pear, ceases 

 to yield. Our pear gamut extended from Clapp's Favorite, that rotted 

 at the heart if left on the tree, to the late ripening Kieffer, and 

 between times the Buerres, including the luscious Bosc, also the winter 

 Nelis, sell at a high price. In apples we prolonged the season from 

 Summer Red Astrachans to wine saps and Winter Spitzenbergs. 



Plums. 



Plum trees were planted in the poultry yard to gain the aid of 

 the industrious hen in the struggle with that mightiest of monopolistic 

 trusts, the insect world. We fought at five a. m. or earlier the 

 curculio, nicknamed the little Turk, because in depositing her eggs 

 she stamps her mark of ownership, a Turkish crescent, on every plum 

 within reach. A sheet was spread each side the trunks, and often 

 before sun-up, while the night chill is still in the air so that she could 

 neither cling to the tree nor fly away, we tapped with mallet on a 

 screw or spike driven into the tree trunk, and, lo, Mrs. Curculio 

 was soon food for an extraordinarily hungry hen or the fire. Infec- 

 tive monilia and shot-hole fungi were fought valiantly with poison- 

 charged squirt guns. Quinces thrived when we checked the bombard- 

 ment of quince curculio, borer, and bag-worm. 



