11 



can give it his individual attention, and who stays in the game 

 through the ups and downs that are almost certain to occur. 

 And those who have the welfare of fruit growing at heart like 

 to see a large number of individual owners actually engaged 

 in the growing of fruit. 



Mr. Blake. Perhaps I could interest you more if we could 

 have a discussion of any of the questions which may come to 

 your mind. The peach-growing industry in New Jersey is one 

 in which all phases bring questions forward, and the modern 

 developments at the present time seem to me largely those of 

 the question of getting started right and the details of carrying 

 on the work. Sometimes I think a certain fact or a certain 

 principle is new, comparatively new. Then I will run across 

 some old report of a State horticultural society or an old gar- 

 den magazine and find that some man fifty or sixty or one hun- 

 dred years ago said the same thing, so it is hard to tell where 

 the old leaves off and the new begins. 



Mr. Parsons. On the foliage spray, does it pay to put it 

 on in the years when the buds are frozen? 



Mr. Blake. Why, if you have an orchard in good condition, 

 I think it would certainly pay to protect that against leaf curl, 

 if you are likely to have leaf curl. 



Mr. Parsons. That would be the dormant spray? 



Mr. Blake. That would be the dormant spray. In the 

 summer time, if there was no crop, I do not think that would 

 be necessary ordinarily. You could save that. But some cul- 

 ture and fertilization to keep up the vigor would be desirable. 



A Member. The brown rot is apt to affect the foliage, I 

 understand; and what spray would you spray for that? We 

 find the small twigs dead, caused by brown rot. 



Mr. Blake. Yes. I think if your orchard is without a crop, 

 I do not think it would be necessary to go through a thorough 

 system of summer spraying. Now, I suppose that some of the 

 plant pathologists and others would disagree with me there, — 

 the idea is to spray and keep spraying, but we carried on an or- 

 chard in a commercial way in connection with our work, and I 

 also looked at it from the economical and money side; and if 

 I had an orchard, even in New Jersey, where the rot is un- 



