33 



Soils and Fertilizers. 



In the choice of a spot in which to grow quinces, one is usually very 

 much restricted, since they generally form a small and relatively un- 

 important part of the home fruit plantation, which is located only 

 with regard to its convenience from the house. Yet if one is allowed 

 a choice, as is usually the case when one is setting a really commercial 

 plantation, soils, windbreaks, exposures, etc., may all be considered. 



I do not think the quince is an exacting fruit as to soils. Certainly 

 we have all seen it growing on a great variety of soils with excellent 

 success (when one considers the utter neglect to which it is generally 

 subjected). I recall, in particular, a rbw of old quince trees growing 

 along a roadside in decidedly sandy soil which have year after year 

 given a crop of fruit. I will not say it was a good crop or that it was 

 good fruit, but considering their handicap these old trees did wonders, 

 so no one need give up having quince marmalade because the soil is 

 sandy. Yet most authorities agree, and the writer's observations tally 

 therewith, that the ideal quince soil is a reasonably heavy clay loam, 

 which is sufficiently well drained so that the water does not stand 

 either in or upon the soil, and yet which is of such a nature and has 

 been handled in such a way as to make it retentive of moisture. This 

 may seem a somewhat difficult combination of characters to secure, 

 but it is not unreasonably so. A good clay loam which has not too 

 retentive a subsoil will give the first requisites. If the subsoil is heavy, 

 then the land should be tile-drained; and of course the lay of the land 

 should be such as to allow surface water to drain off. It only remains 

 to keep up a good supply of humus in the soil and to cultivate the land 

 instead of allowing the trees to stand in sod, as is usually done. Both 

 these are of prime importance in getting the water into the soil and in 

 holding it there. Of course, quinces will do something in sod; that 

 has been too abundantly proved in Massachusetts to be disputed, for 

 about all the quinces we grow are produced in that way; but with 

 the soil requirements suggested,' every one (except possibly the ex- 

 treme sod crank) will agree that cultivation is by all means the best 

 method of soil management, since it allows incorporating plenty of 

 humus in the soil and keeping up the earth mulch to prevent evapora- 

 tion. 



With a soil such as we have selected, and with the treatment we 

 have suggested (cultivation and cover crops), I do not beheve any ap- 

 plication of nitrogen will be necessary after the first two years. For 

 these two years I have found that an ounce of nitrate of soda to each 

 tree will give all the growth necessary, even in decidedly poor soil. 

 This should be scattered about the trees as soon as growth gets fairly 

 under way in the spring. The first year it ought to cover a circle with 

 a diameter of say three feet (the tree of course being the center of the 

 circle), and the second year a circle perhaps five feet in diameter. 



