20 THE APPLE CULTURIST. 



grain drills, about as deep as seed-wheat and barley are 

 covered say two inches deep in a mellow seed-bed. We 

 have in mind a friend in Illinois, who wrote that he would 

 drill in forty bushels of apple-seeds in the spring of 1870, 

 distributing that quantity over eighteen acres. 



As there is a tough covering on the outside of apple and 

 pear seeds, they will germinate more readily if they can be 

 planted in autumn, or early in the spring, so that they may 

 be frozen and thawed two or three times before the grow- 

 ing season has commenced. And yet, apple-seeds will ger- 

 minate without having been frozen, provided they are not 

 allowed to become dry after being separated from the core. 

 If seeds be planted as soon as they are taken from the core, 

 they will often germinate, and appear in the seed-leaf in 

 eight to twenty days, according to the moisture and warmth 

 of the seed-bed. We have taken seeds from an apple, plant- 

 ed them in a mellow-bed, in June, some of which germina- 

 ted immediately, and others remained in the ground till the 

 following spring. Some pomologists contend that apple- 

 seeds, and seeds of other fruits, should be buried in the 

 fruit. But as there is usually a chance to select the best 

 kernels if the cores are first dissected, which is quite as 

 important as to choose the most desirable ears of Indian 

 corn for seed, when this is done, the fruit should be cut in 

 quarters, the inferior kernels separated, one or two of the 

 largest and plumpest returned to the core, and the entire 

 apple buried about two inches deep in a mellow seed-bed. 



Raising Seedlings. The practice of raising seedlings, or 

 young stocks, from the seeds by planting the half-developed 

 kernels of the half-grown and half-matured fruit of a miser- 

 able variety of the poorest kinds of cider -apples, which 

 swine would almost refuse to eat, is about like attempting 

 to produce fine cattle from the meanest and most miserable 

 scrub that could be found in the country. Like will pro- 



