FRUIT CULTURE. 151 



The pear is one of the most delicious of fruits and the most 

 difficult to cultivate. Many have engaged in the culture with 

 high expectations ; a few have succeeded, most have failed ; 

 some have obtained great profits ; others have met with serious 

 losses. It seems to be foreign in its nature, and it has not yet 

 been fully subjected to our soil and climate. Among the hun- 

 dreds of varieties, there is scarcely one which, in some seasons, 

 though planted in the most favorable soil, is not worthless. In 

 some seasons a pear may be large, in others, small ; in some, it 

 may crack, in others it may be insipid ; and all this under the 

 very best of care. The trees, too, are subject to disease. What 

 some call " sun blight," and others, " winter blight," is fatal to 

 a large number ; and, generally, they are the best trees in the 

 orchard. In July or August, when the trees may be filled with 

 fruit half grown, this disease often makes its appearance by turn- 

 ing all the leaves black, in two or three days, shrivelling the 

 fruit and the bark of the smaller branches. Soon, the bark on 

 the trunk will be found loose, particularly near the ground, and 

 next year, the roots will be rotten. As the blight seldom or 

 never attacks a stunted tree, but one that is rendered tender by 

 vigorous growth, the common theory, that the sap is too much 

 heated in summer, or frozen in winter, is probably the true one. 

 Sometimes it happens that the disease does not prove fatal ; in 

 which case, only part of the bark near the ground will become 

 loose, owing, it may be, to the death of one or more of the large 

 roots. Such are some of the difficulties with which the grower 

 of pears will probably meet, and if he be an inexperienced one, 

 they will be likely to be overwhelming. If he plants a tree in 

 a very sheltered place in his back yard, where the sink drain 

 terminates, he may calculate on success ; if he plants a hun- 

 dred, in an exposed place in his orchard, in nine cases out of 

 ten, seven-eighths of them will probably be worthless. 



The experience of a member of this committee in pear cul- 

 ture is perhaps, that of many others. In 1850, he made up his 

 mind to plant five hundred pear trees, expecting, in his inexpe- 

 rience, to realize some of the glowing descriptions which he 

 had read in the books. They were purchased without judg- 

 ment, planted without skill, cultivated for two or three years 

 without care. He then became aware that an improvement in 

 cultivation was necessary, since which time, the trees have not 



