Cooperative Methods of Ascertaining Hardiness 



in Fruits. 



BY PROF. H. L. HUTT, 

 Ontario Agricultural College, Guelph, Ontario. 



Hardiness is largely a matter of locality. In speaking of 

 any particular fruit we may say it is hardy in a certain district, 

 although it might be quite tender in another. For this reason, 

 the determination of hardiness of any kind of fruit is more or 

 less of a local problem and cannot be ascertained at any one ex- 

 periment station for all parts of the country. This question of 

 hardiness and adaptability of the various kinds of fruits to the 

 different sections of the Province was one of the problems which 

 confronted the Ontario fruit-growers a number of years ago, and 

 has been more or less definitely solved by cooperative methods 

 during the past ten or twelve years. When we began this method 

 of testing we already had two Government Experiment Stations, 

 one at Guelph and one at Ottawa, where extensive tests were 

 being carried on with the fruits that could be grown in these 

 localities: but in addition to these, fourteen prominent fruit- 

 growers were selected in as many different parts of the Province 

 to carry on experimental work in the testing of fruits most 

 largely grown in their districts. These Fruit Experiment Sta- 

 tions were not purchased by the Government, but were left in 

 the hands o f the private owners, who were furnished with large 

 collections of varieties of the fruits most grown in their locality 

 upon which they could make careful observations and report 

 results. 



This cooperative experimental work is under the manage- 

 ment of a Board of Control, composed of the President and Hor- 

 ticulturist of the Ontario Agricultural College, the Horticul- 

 turist of the Central Experimental Farm at Ottawa, and three 

 representative fruit-growers appointed by the Provincial Fruit 

 Growers' Association. 



In the selection of the experimenters men were chosen who 



