TWENTY-FIRST ANNUAL MEETING. loi 



mirable work of Hedrick. described in Bulletin 289 of the 

 New York Station. 



The orchard was on upland, sloping to the south, a heav>% 

 clay loam 12 to 18 inches thick, on a heavier compact clay 

 subsoil. The trees (Baldwins, Greenings, Roxburys, Northern 

 Spy and Pippin) were thirteen years old, on sod land, and had 

 made g^ood growth and fruitage, but the fruit was small, color 

 defective, and often did not properly mature. Then the test 

 began. During the twelve years of experiment the whole 

 had clean culture with cover crops. It was divided into eight 

 plots, four of which had no fertiHzer, while the other four 

 had a yearly dressing of 100 pounds of wood ashes per tree 

 for the whole eleven years, and eight and one-half pounds of 

 acid phosphate per tree during the last seven years of the 

 test, which together supplied 129 pounds of phosphoric acid 

 and 169 pounds of potash per acre. 



Now let me read the conclusions, which, it seems to me, 

 might well serve as the last word on the fertilization of or- 

 chards. 



^"The returns obtained in this twelve-year experiment 

 are negative from a practical standpoint. This experiment 

 shows that it is not profitable to apply potash, phosphoric acid, 

 or lime to the soil of the station orchard. Fifty-seven years 

 of orchard cropping has not reduced this soil to the condi- 

 tion where it needs a 'complete fertilizer,' yet the leguminous 

 cover crops plowed under in the orchard have usually pro- 

 duced beneficial efifects the same or the next season. This 

 seems to show that the orchard is having a one-sided wear. 

 It needs nitrogen, or humus, or the physical condition to be 

 obtained by plowing under organic matter. It would be an 

 assumption to say whether it is the food, or the condition of 

 the soil brought about by the organic matter, or both, that 

 has proved beneficial when cover crops are plowed under 



'Tt must not be concluded, because the efifects from the 

 fertilizers applied were scarcely apparent in the Station or- 

 chard, that they would be ineffectual in all orchards, or neces- 

 sarily for all time in this orchard. Plants require food, and 



^ New York State Station Report 1907, p. 320. 



