Photo 104. 



Photo 103 is a cherry tree planted in the fall 

 of 1896. These examples show what good 

 planting and constant attendance will do. 

 Photo 104 shows you late Crawford peaches 

 in the lady's right hand, grown under right 

 conditions, and in her left is the same kind 

 grown under an unfavorable state of things. 

 Photo 105 presents to you a stem of the Cham- 

 pion peach rightly cared for. 



I would suggest this: Take time, pre- 

 pare for the trees rightly, even though you 

 do not plant so many. If you do not prepare 

 the soil aright and plant as you ought, your 

 trees will be only a mockery to you. 



THE PEAR BLIGHT 



has been the greatest mystery. On account 

 of the peculiar constitutional makeup to the 

 tree, it has been hard to comprehend the 

 cause of the dead branches. It is well known 

 that in stepping around on the branches and loosening the bark, when gathering 

 the fruit in hot weather, will kill the leaves on such a branch. Also, a heavy 



freeze in late spring, or excessively hot weather in 

 the summer months, have both the same effect. On 

 the night of the i6th and ijth of May, 1895, there 

 was a very heavy freeze a regular hoar frost. Water 

 in a washtub froze 2 inches thick. Marrowfat peas 4 

 feet high were cut so that they lopped over. Two 

 days before this I had pruned six pear trees ; they 

 were in full leaf and bloom a beautiful sight ! Two 

 days after the frost five-sixths of the leaves were 

 almost black. What had taken place ? Just this, viz. : 

 The freeze had ruptured the little cells that were con- 

 veying the sap, just as a tumbler full of water would 

 be rent by the same force. This took place not only 

 in the leaves, but in the twigs and smaller branches. 

 Circulation stopped. There were no leaves now to 

 throw off the surplus moisture. The pumps had stopped, 

 the miners (rootlets) drowned ! Commerce above (the 

 work of the leaves) had suspended. No cambium was 

 returned to construct the roots. Death by the tens of 

 thousands occurred to those wonderful subterranean 

 workers. Those trees stood there in a state of stagna- 

 tion for a whole year before they could adjust them- 

 selves to this terrible shock. They were on a gentle 

 slope toward the south. Had the same trees been on a 

 northern slope the leaves might not have been expanded 

 and the whole tree would have been in a more sluggish 

 state, and would not have suffered so much, and probably scarcely any. 



SUMMER BLIGHT 



is caused from the opposite extreme excessive heat. A pear tree would never blight in 

 the heat of summer if it had all the moisture it could use. The stunted geranium in 

 photo 159 has suffered from exactly the same cause that kills your pear branches lack 



48 



Photo 105. 



