56 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



orchard and the hens, and a liking for the business. Of the value 

 of hens over and above any other animals in taking care of the inju- 

 rious insects which infest fruit trees, much might with justice be 

 claimed. This will suffice. The man who stocks his orchards with 

 poultry will grow larger and better fruit, while the per cent of choice 

 stock will be greater than his neighbor can possibly secure in any 

 other way. Not an enemy to the fruit or tree, which flies or crawls, 

 but the hens will look after, unless it be the tent caterpillar. With 

 all these facts before us, is not this an industry to be encouraged by 

 any and all the agricultural bodies, or those working in harmony 

 with them ? The economic side of this question is what gives it so 

 much importance at the present time. Here are the rocky hills, the 

 light soils, the so-called abandoned farms. Here are all the conditions 

 for successful fruit growing, and here is another industry which may be 

 combined, with but little expense, and while saving in so many 

 ways, be made a source of great revenue. 



Young men, you can buy for one thousand dollars a farm of fifty 

 or more acres, with coniforiable buildings, in a fairly good location ; 

 the poultry houses will cost you from twenty- five to thirty-five dol- 

 lars each, if you hire the labor done, and they will accommodate fifty 

 hens, and the hens can be bought for from thirty to forty cents each. 

 The standard apple trees can be secured for from fifteen to eighteen 

 dollars a hundred, so that the entire outlay for farm, buildings, for 

 1,000 hens and fifty trees, will not exceed $2,000. Your hens will 

 be worth what they cost to kill at any time. The net income from 

 the flocks should be at least one thousand dollars, and from that to 

 fifteen hundred, while at the end of ten or twelve years your twelve 

 acres of orchard which sell for at least three hundred dollars an acre, 

 the hens having attended to the question of fertilizing without expense 

 to you. The returns from the orchard meanwhile will surely take 

 care of the interest account, taxes and labor item, leaving the income 

 from the hens net to the farmer. This is not an unreal picture, but 

 may be made real to the young men of Maine who fancy the work, 

 and have a high ideal toward which they are constantl}^ climbing. In 

 any line of work to-day, under present exacting conditions, the cost 

 of production must be carefully considered. This necessitates the 

 introduction of economic methods and practices. And right here I 

 rest my claim for inexpensive fertilization of the orchard through the 

 introduction of sheep, swine and poultry, with the balance strongly 

 in favor of the poultry, because b}^ and with it more can be accom- 



