406 DECATUR COUNTY, IOWA. 



since such high authority as D. B. Wicr claims that it costs 

 five hundred dollars to raise a bushel of pears in Iowa or 

 Illinois. I had thought that five dollars per bushel was pretty 

 good pay for raising this fruit, say, fifty bushels of oats for one 

 of pears. It did seem like a good price, not like a bank presi- 

 dent's salary, or the warden's of a penitentiary, yet a fair way 

 for a laboring man to earn a livelihood. 



DEEP PLANTING. 



I respect the plan of deep planting, plowing the dirt to 

 the trees, but prune little, aiming to get an early growth of 

 not more than ten or twelve inches annually, and giving no 

 cultivation after coming into bearing, except to put a wheel- 

 barrow load of manure around each tree in July, working it 

 into the ground next Spring, if the tree has failed to make its 

 twelve inches of growth during the previous year. Otherwise* 

 I simply leave it to act as a mulch, thus keeping the ground 

 cool and damp in Summer, and warm and moist in Winter. 



^ PRUNING. 



Let the limbs grow from the ground up ; prune with the 

 thumb nail ; remove dead limbs with the saw ; cover saw cuts 

 with grafting wax. 



RIPENING THE FRUIT. 



Gather the fruit when hard, but while it will separate readily 

 from the stem when lifted up. There are frequently several 

 weeks' difference in the ripening of pears on the same tree. 

 My plan of ripening is to place several bushels on an upper 

 floor, with a blanket under and one over them. They color up 

 better, and are much more delicious and melting than when 

 left to ripen on the tree. 



Beurre Giffard, which I gathered on the thirtieth of July, 

 were thoroughly ripe by the ninth of August, after treated as 

 above. Louise Bonne de Jersey and Sheldon, gathered Sep- 

 tember first, were delicious by the tenth. The Lawrence is my 

 only Winter pear that yields much ; but with the above treat- 

 ment, it does not ripen as well as the others. 



I have planted pears thirty-five years, probably not more 



