40 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



small fruits and vegetables. The knowledge thus gained will surely 

 lead to the raising of the fruits at home, and thus to a business at 

 once satisf actor}' and remunerative. 



I cannot close without once more calling your attention to the 

 resources of our own goodly State. Why will our capitalists insist 

 on investing their surplus in Western lands, or the orange groves 

 and peach orchards of the South, when our hillsides, adapted by 

 nature to orcharding, wait for occupation? It is not onl}^ a safe, 

 but sure foundation these investments in Maine rest upon, for they 

 will yield sure returns. We agree with some of her recreant sons 

 that Maine is a good State to be born in, but we also firmly believe 

 that she is still a better one to live in, and that in no State we can 

 receive surer returns than she gives to the industrious and intelligent 

 orchardist. 



BETTER CARE OF ORCHARDS. 

 By J. W. True, New Gloucester. 



A recent agricultural writer has taken a great deal of pains to 

 study up the world's supply of foods, cotton, petroleum, &c., and 

 tell us that within five years "good land anywhere in the United 

 States will be worth 8100 per acre," and that all food products will 

 be in quick demand at good prices ; but it seems to us that such 

 statements should be guarded against, that they may not lead us 

 astray, for cannot ^e all think of countless acres that can be made 

 to double their yield with intelligent and thorough cultivation. The 

 more the great farms of the West, within a certain limit, are cut up 

 the more cattle they will produce, the more food products the}' will 

 furnish ; therefore it stands us in hand to be on our guard, to be 

 on duty and see to it that we get the most from our acres, doubling 

 the product by a little timely care, and in no other branch of our 

 farm operations is this more true than of our orchards and fruit 

 trees. 



In the first place, how many in planting an orchard properly pre- 

 pare the ground before the trees are set? Probably not one in ten. 

 At least a vast majority of our fruit trees are put into the ground and 

 the planter virtually bids them "good by," and the tree is expected 

 to do all the rest of the work from that time onward, making its 

 annual growth, and in the regulation time loading itself with large 

 quantities of No. 1 fancy fruit. How many of such trees set in that 



