404 DECATUR COUNTY, IOWA. 



could drain a piece of wet land, I did so. Drain tile are 

 high here, as there are no facilities for making them, but I 

 intend to drain two sloughs, one and a half mile long, next 

 Summer, for the benefit of the land, and the use of the water 

 in each pasture. The wet land is of little use without drain- 

 ing, and the water obtained is worth all the labor, as it is not 

 like a windmill, which requires oil and repairs often. 



My land is watered with a fine running stream, open Win- 

 ter and Summer, protected from the snow by a white pine 

 grove, making it pleasant for stock to stand around. I have 

 also another first rate watering place, (in use ten years,) a 

 large, stoned well, eleven feet across and six feet deep, with an 

 approach planked for the stock to go down to drink. 



GEORGE W. SHAW, 



' - ^ GARDEN GROVE, DECATUR COUNTY. 



A Fruit Farm That has Paid Ten Per Cent. Interest on the 

 Investment — Planting and Pruning Pear Orchard — Cherries 

 — Currants — Grapes. 



In treating a subject that volumes have been written about» 

 I can only briefly touch on such varieties of fruit as have paid 

 ten per cent, on time and money employed. The peach, goose- 

 berry, strawberry, raspberry and blackberry, though profitable 

 with others, have not been remunerative with me, probably 

 for the want of proper care. 



APPLES. 



In planting our early apple orchards, up to the hard 

 Winters of 1855, '56 and '57, the old stjde of growing trees 

 had been adopted ; planting far apart, and trimming the trees 

 up, six or eight feet from the ground. Those terrible hard 

 winds and destruction of trees, caused a change in growing 

 fruits. The cry then was, low heads and no pruning. Conse- 



