there. On the other hand, while the sessions are on here, we 

 hope you people will patronize the speakers and come in for 

 the sessions. We also hope that you will be able to hear all 

 ol" our speakers. We are going to allow Mr. Conant, our 

 first speaker this afternoon, to start his discussion from the 

 Ifoor here rather than up on this stage. We will see how 

 that works, and if you cannot hear him, we want you to say 

 so and we will either have him speak louder or put him up 

 on the stage or stop the street cars, or something else, to 

 give you a chance to hear him, and we hope at all the ses- 

 sions that the discussion may be heard. Our first speaker 

 this afternoon is Mr. W. H. Conant. President of the Ox- 

 ford Bears Fruit Growers' Association, Buckfield, Me., a 

 man with whom many of you are already familiar. Mr. 

 Conant is also Ex-President of the jNIaine Pomological So- 

 ciety. 



We feel very fortunate in having ]\Ir. Conant to talk to 

 us because he is a man of wide experience and one who 

 speaks from experience, and he is going to talk to us on 

 ' ' Factors Which Influence Annual Bearing of Fruit Trees, ' ' 

 an extremely important subject, in which we are all interest- 

 ( d. If we could always be sure to get as good crops every 

 year as we get some years, the question of profit in fruit 

 growing would be pretty largely solved. INTr. Conant has 

 !-^tudied this matter carefully and I am sure he has some very 

 interesting things to tell us along that line. I have great 

 pleasure in introducing Mr. Conant. (Applause). 



MR. CONANT: IMr. Chairman and members of the 

 Massachusetts Frnit Growers' Association, ladies and gen- 

 tlemen : 



It is always a |)leasure for me to meet the fruit growers 

 vi Massachusetts. I have attended several of your 

 conferences and have always got a great deal of pleasure 

 from them. Doubtless you realize that the subject on which 

 I am to speak this afternoon is a very complicated one. and 

 I shall ha^e to bring to you my observations and experiences 

 i.^garding these factors which seem to influence the annual 



