NINETEENTH ANNUAL MEETING. 189 



how to feed them right to get the best results. So I be- 

 lieve you can knock out a peach orchard. I have seen 

 time and time again cases where barn-yard manure was 

 used. The fruit had no flavor. Too much nitrogen. Still 

 there are lots of things we do not know about fertilizer 

 yet. 



I want to bring up another point. Pruning. That is 

 a point where we fall down at times. I have every known 

 method, or have adopted every known method of pruning 

 on my place. If anybody goes there and looks at my trees 

 I leave it to them if that is not so. There ought to be some 

 best way. I have been feeling my way, and can now see 

 that with some varieties different methods of pruning 

 ought to have been adopted. There are some varieties of 

 peach trees that grow open all right. You do not have to 

 do much inside work on them. I do not do any inside 

 work at all for my first crop, or until the fifth year of 

 growth. From the beginning of the third year, say, with 

 three year old trees, I would leave everything inside. That 

 is where the fruit-wood is. The point is to take out the 

 exceedingly thrifty growth that is sure to interfere with the 

 growth of the fruit wood in the middle of the tree. If 

 you do not get that out, the tree is going to go up too 

 much in the air. 



Q. Perhaps it is all in growing them on the right 

 kind of soil. 



Mr. Lyman : Oh, no, nothing in it. Nearly all land 

 is fine for peaches. You want to get over the notion that 

 you have got to get a particular kind of land. You can 

 get most any land in shape for peaches if the location is 

 right. Go right to work and set them out. I would not 

 cut off a sprout lot and set them right out. because I think 

 there is acid in the soil that has been spread through the 

 ground by the roots. Perhaps it will take two or three 

 years to get the trees to growing right but it can be done. 

 There may be people who have succeeded all right, but I 



