2o8 An American Fruit-Farm 



for nitrogen or for phosphoric acid. By comparing 

 the percentages of nitrogen, ammonia, potash, and 

 phosphoric acid, of different fertiHzers, together 

 with a comparison of their prices by the ton, 

 the fruit-grower may readily determine which 

 kind is most economical for him to use. There is 

 no need of rule of thumb here: the data are chemi- 

 cally known and definitely worked out. Com- 

 mercial fertilizers have a tendency to **bum'* the 

 land, unless it contains sufficient humus to min- 

 gle with them in their solution. Burnt land has 

 the hard, barren, dry look familiar to all fruit- 

 growers. 



No man can successfully run a fruit-farm by 

 mere book-knowledge. Experience, actual contact 

 with the problems of horticulture, must be the 

 basis of success; but the data of the business are 

 better established and are more available to-day 

 than ever before. The Department of Agriculture 

 at Washington, and every Experimental Station, 

 and most of the States now support such, issue 

 valuable bulletins and reports, special studies 

 and results of all sorts of investigations. These 

 documents may be had usually for the asking. 

 The works of Burbank are now being made avail- 

 able and Professor Bailey's have long been classic.^ 



But the most impressive facts in fruit-farming 

 are the hard facts of our own experience. One 



' The reader is specially urged to utilize L. H. Bailey's The Principles 

 of Fruit-Growing, as well as other volumes of The Rural Science Series^ 

 edited by him; published by The Macmillan Company, New York City. 



