No. 4.] OUR AGRICULTURAL ADVANCE. 109 



in apple culture, and the reason is, because the farmers fail 

 to paj the attention to the orchard that they do to the 

 other crops. I believe they set out an orchard and for a 

 few years attend to it and put a good deal of labor upon it, 

 and then they go about their other forming, and leave the 

 trees to take care of themselves. If they lose a few, they 

 don't care. I don't believe they fertilize them. I believe 

 orchards in many cases starve to death. They are neglected ; 

 they show signs of decay, and the}' saw off the decayed 

 limbs ; they trim them almost to death, but don't put on 

 any fertilizer. Farmers our way don't think much of the 

 apple crop, because for the last two years there have been 

 heaps of apples lying on the ground. A man told me he 

 had a lot of apples this year, and he told his son to sell 

 them to the first man that came along. He sold them for 

 75 cents a barrel, but they were not such apples as you 

 raise in this section of the State. There is too much in- 

 difference in Massachusetts in regard to the cultivation of 

 apple trees. 



Prof. F. S. CooLEY (of Amherst). This subject has 

 been taking a wide range. There is a little section in the 

 county of Franklin known as "apple valley," where the 

 best Baldwins in Massachusetts and perhaps the best Bald- 

 wins in New England are raised. They grow so thick 

 there on the trees that great records are made in picking 

 them. There are two men who make particularly good 

 records. Two years ago, when such a big crop was pro- 

 duced, they picked upwards of 50 barrels per day ; this 

 year one picked in one day 61 barrels; the day following, 

 his brother in another orchard picked 64 barrels ; and a 

 little later, one picked 75 barrels in a day, for which he 

 received $9. 



Mr. Joshua Clark (of Lowell). I don't know but this 

 question is entirely off from the subject, but it is an im- 

 portant consideration. Speaking of extensive farming and 

 intensive farming, the great trouble in our section is this, 

 that when we go into extensive and intensive farming we 

 cannot get help enough to gather the crops in. I have 

 heard of quite a number who had apples this fall, and they 



