The Fourteen Essentials 



READ the entire book. Every chapter, and almost every 

 paragraph, is related to every other chapter or paragraph, 

 as each phase of fruit-growing is related to every other 

 phase. The index will direct you to all the pages on which 

 any subject is mentioned. Where a tree, orchard or plant 

 is mentioned in the following pages, the discussion often em- 

 braces any or all kinds of fruit plantations. 



Fourteen elements, or conditions, are necessary for growing 

 all fruit. Each kind needs certain special treatment, yet if 

 any of these fourteen elements or conditions are lacking, the 

 result is failure, complete or partial; when all are present, and 

 the few special attentions are properly given, tremendous 

 crops are reasonably certain year after year crops of highly 

 colored, richly flavored, juicy, firm and flawless apples, peaches, 

 pears, plums, cherries, quinces, grapes or small fruits. 



The maker of wagons, watches, shoes or other articles must 

 have machinery and tools, oil, fuel, power, a supply of raw 

 material, and other essentials a factory and an organization. 

 An orchard is a factory; the product is the fruit. By having 

 the essentials, we can make fruit. The greatest difference 

 between a wagon factory and a fruit factory is this: We can 

 make any style of wagon and use any method, but in produc- 

 ing fruit we must choose the size and characteristics desired 

 from among a few dozen varieties, and secure the finished 

 product by following nature's plans. 



Growing fruit is easy, and almost any one can do it, yet 

 it is more complicated than wagon-making or watch-making. 

 The fruit-grower is forced to adopt or originate ideas and 

 methods which fit the conditions; he cannot make the con- 

 ditions fit the idea or blueprint. This requires study, obser- 

 vation, judgment, work, skill and perseverance. Without these 

 the fruit-grower must fail; with them, he can make of fruit- 

 growing something better than he could make of anything 

 else in the world. 



The fourteen requirements of a fruit factory are suitable 

 soil, nitrogen, potash, phosphorus, lime, decaying vegetable 

 matter and water, light and warmth in the right proportions, 

 the absence of enemies, the right varieties, good trees, good 

 marketing and personally applied know-how on the part of 

 the grower. 



Every process described here is intended to help the pro- 

 ducer secure some of these vital elements with the least pos- 

 sible labor and cost. That is the fruit-grower's ^problem; his 

 degree of success depends upon how he solves it, no matter 

 what kind of fruit he grows or in what quantities. 



