HOW TO GROW AND MARKET FRUIT 



Before trees are planted, the soil should be "subdued" thor- 

 oughly. 



Dynamite tree holes, also break up hard pan and subsoil 

 with dynamite, whenever possible. 



Mix the soil that's the thing. Stir it up. 



Get rid of all large air-spaces a few inches down. 



Begin cultivation of young trees as early in spring as possible. 

 A penny's worth of work done in March or April is worth a 

 nickel's worth in June. 



Cover ground for a few feet about young trees with a heavy 

 mulch. Leave a six- to twelve-inch space about the trunks (and 

 heap up soil slightly) as a guard against mice. 



Keep young trees hustling till time to bear, then make them 

 yield without growing much excess wood. 



Always cease cultivation in time to allow trees to ripen 

 wood thoroughly before frost. 



When done right, the sod-mulch system is good where there 

 is plenty of rainfall. 



No farmer will think of raising an orchard without growing 

 between-tree crops that will pay from the start. 



Study your trees and give them the treatment that they 

 ought to have for best results. That is what orchard culture 

 means, no matter what the methods used to effect the desired 

 purposes. 



Jack Frost 



TO give this old gentleman the credit due him, it must be 

 admitted that his children cool and cold weather put 

 quality into fruit. Northern sections and higher eleva- 

 tions produce better fruit than southern sections and low 

 regions; and those parts of the world where the nights are cool 

 and days not too hot are famous for the quality of their fruit. 



Take advantage of this fact whenever it is possible. If there 

 is a choice, put your trees on high land for this reason, although 

 there are others. Certain varieties thrive down low, but within 

 the latitude adapted to any one kind the higher it is grown 

 the better it will taste and keep. Take the York Imperial 

 Apple, for instance. Grown below an altitude of three hundred 

 feet in Pennsylvania, it is large, bright red, handsome, pithy, 

 tasteless, and dry; grown at eight hundred feet, it is small, 

 red-and-yellow striped, crisp, juicy, rich and "just fine." The 

 same applies to variations North and South. 



In this connection, we should pause and consider elevation. 

 Of course, the higher we get, the less total amount of heat there 

 is in a season. High lands usually have cooler nights than low 

 lands, and the warm part of the day generally is shorter. The 

 elevation at which the total of heat in a season falls below the 

 requirements for growing and ripening a fruit cannot be given 

 in definite figures that apply to all sections, because, as we go 

 south, that line goes higher. 



44 



