STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 43 



amount. I don't know that I was very careful to spread it all over 

 the ground, as I supposed by what I read, that I certainly should 

 have a nice crop of plums the next year. I think it was in Novem- 

 ber that I put it on. The trees never leaved out after that; it 

 seemed to kill them at once. 



D. P. True. I have always been careful not to allow salt to 

 touch the trunk ot the tree. I apply brine and salt in about the 

 same amount, in proportion to the number of trees, that Mr. Nelson 

 speaks of, but I take the precaution to dig a small hole and cover 

 the salt afterwards. I am satisfied that too much salt, or a very 

 little salt put directly around the trunk of a tree will be fatal. 



Mr. Augur. We have applied salt to plum trees. How much 

 did you apply to a tree? A bushel to twelve trees would be less 

 than three quarts to a tree. I should have no very great fear to 

 apply that amount of salt to plum trees, if it was thrown quite evenly 

 over the whole ground and without any brine. Brine, a saturated 

 solution of salt, is very strong and if that came in contact with the 

 roots it would be pretty apt to work mischief. I think salt is of 

 such a nature that it should always be used with extreme caution, 

 particularly when it comes in close proximity to the roots. Prof. 

 Johnson, of our State, says there is no plant that needs salt, that it 

 is not a fertilizer; and the question is, what benefit then is salt? 

 There has been an idea, and I entertained it at one time, that salt 

 was valuable as a remedy for the curculio ; but I am satisfied that 

 there isn't any ground for that. The amount of salt that it will be 

 safe to use would not be sufficient to destroy the larvae of the cur- 

 -culio. If it was used in sufficient strength to destroy them, it would 

 be a damage to the tree. But there is this beneficial action to salt, 

 I think: its action as a re- agent in the soil, in its chemical action, 

 iind possibly in releasing potash and making it available for the 

 benefit of the plum. A certain amount applied to the soil will in- 

 crease the crop of beets, onions or potatoes, and I have an idea that 

 it works in the same way with plums ; not because the salt is a 

 plant food, but because it brings the other elements of the soil into 

 condition to be available. In a state of solution, as a brine, I 

 should most positive!}' object to using it in any quantity, because it 

 so soon comes in contact with the tissue of the plant, whatever it 

 ma}' be. 



There are two or three points in connection with this matter that 

 I will just allude to. Several have spoken of the advisability of 



