54 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



the Baldwin and Greenings of Franklin county havejbeen eagerly- 

 sought for at five to six dollars a barrel. While the officials of the 

 State are calling attention to and advertising the abandoned farms, 

 simply to gratify the curiosity of the curios, throwing the uncon- 

 scious influence of the State against its best growth and prosperity, 

 we must be alive and alert. The farms of Maine for the boys of 

 Maine should be our rallying cry, and by positive work the steps of 

 successful farm husbandrj- indicated. We do not want to turn our 

 farms over to a foreign population, but rather build up within our own 

 borders, out of our own blood, the wonderful resources of hillside 

 and valley. Here is where our most earnest efforts must be directed ; 

 and when we move out of the grooves of habit, it will be to consider 

 how these waste places and abandoned farms can best be made to 

 blossom and bear fruit. 



This leads directly to the question of fertilization. If any attempt 

 is to be made to reclaim the rocky hills and knolls lying all about us, 

 it must be by an inexpensive system of fertilizing. Three sources 

 are open to us, which wnll insure results and yield profit in and of 

 themselves. I believe the time is coming when we shall turn from 

 the fertile fields so easily cultivated, and, as a business investment, 

 seek rougher soils for the trees. Growing these where the moving 

 of barnyard manure is too expensive, we seek the commercial article, 

 and find a measure of relief. But it is when we open the bars to 

 that little animal "with a golden foot' that we begin to realize that 

 profit comes not only from the sheep, but also from their work about 

 the trees. If the orchard be well established, the soil rocky and 

 hard to work, put in a breaking-up plow in the form of some sharp- 

 nosed porkers. They will open the soil, let in the air and sunlight, 

 fertilize the trees, increase both leaf and fruit, and at the same time 

 render pork-making profitable. A miracle can thus be wrought iu 

 an old orchard in two years' time, at no expense to the owner. 

 But there is another line of successful fertilization and profit com- 

 bined, though not so applicable to older trees, unless in connection 

 with the swine, and that is poultry culture. Give the hens the waste 

 places about the farm. You can't afford to yard them in the mow- 

 ing patch or corn field. Get them into the young orchard, and note 

 how the trees and chickens will become firm friends and helpers of 

 each other. Here is a field at once inviting and profitable, and it is 

 to this I am asked to call your special attention. The poultry indus- 

 try has within the past ten years assumed gigantic proportions. 



