NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



193 



sized animal with a bright, lively countenance, 

 but at the same time gentle. Feed her upon up- 

 land hay where a ton or a ton and a half to the 

 acre is cut, and give her the slops of the family 

 mixed with a quart of sweet shorts twice a day, 

 and she will probably yield you an average of four 

 quarts of milk a day for the year. When she is 

 sis years old, if kept in the manner described, she 

 may yield you an average of six quarts a day for 

 four years. She ought not to go dry more than 

 three or four weeks. 



Such a cow will sell for forty dollars, quick, in 

 most of the towns in this vicinity. 



You can form no reliable opinion by inquiring, 

 as to what breed is best for milking qualities. 

 One will tell you the Ayrshire, another the Dur- 

 ham, a third the Devon, and a fourth our native 

 breed. The point is not settled as to what breed 

 is best for milk. 



NINTH AGRICULTURAL MEETING, 



At the State House, March 16, 1852. 

 Subject — The cultivation and preservation of Fruit. 



Hon. Marshall P. Wilder presided at the meet- 

 ing on Tuesday evening. On taking the chair, he 

 said that he regretted his inability to be present at 

 the last meeting. He concurred in the sentiments 

 then expressed, as he saw them reported in the 

 papers, in regard to the feasibility and capability 

 of our country for the growth of fruit, and also to 

 the profitable character of the crop, and the ne- 

 cessity of a thorough pulverization of the soil, for 

 its successful culture. He then entered upon a 

 consideration of the subject before the meeting, 

 and as his remarks were prepared with much care, 

 and embody the experience of one of our most ex- 

 tensive and successful fruit growers, we feel that 

 we can do our readers no greater favor than to lay 

 before them his address in full. He said — 



There are three considerations which are abso- 

 lutely necessary to the successful cultivation of 

 fruit trees, viz.: 



The appropriate soil and location ; 



The proper preparation of the soil; and 



The judicious selection of varieties. 



By the appropriate soil, and location, is meant 

 that which is naturally suited to any particular 

 class of fruits. Nearly all our fruits will succeed 

 in a deep mellow loam, but the cherry, the peach, 

 and even some kinds of the apple, will flourish on 

 a soil where the pear will survive but for a short 

 time. Some varieties require a warm soil and 

 southern exposure ; others will succeed with a 

 northern aspect, and under less genial influences. 

 Some prosper in the Eastern, Middle and Western 

 States; others only in one of these regions. But 

 the subject of soils and location occupies so wide a 

 field of research, that we cannot enter upon it at 

 length during this discussion. 



In relation to the proper preparation of the soil, 



all intelligent cultivators agree that thorough sub- 

 soiling, or trenching, is not only the most judicious 

 system, but in reality the most economical, in the 

 end. The first great principle, however, to be at- 

 tended to, is complete and perfect drainage; for 

 wherever water is permitted to remain, no tree 

 can long continue in health. Stagnant water is 

 as injurious to vegetable life, as the miasma and 

 malaria of pools and marshes to animal life. The 

 drainage must not only be perfect, but its depth 

 must be such as to prevent entirely the roots from 

 reaching beyond it in search of food. This being 

 accomplished, the soil should be thoroughly 

 worked with manure to the depth of 15 inches at 

 least; and if trenched, the upper soil should be 

 placed at the bottom, and the lower soil on the 

 surface, where it will become disintegrated and 

 prepared by the influences of the atmosphere as 

 food, or can be enriched, as necessity may require. 

 Under such circumstances, the roots of trees will 

 have room to search for nutrition, as wanted, and 

 the loose and friable condition of the soil will en- 

 able the atmosphere to permeate through it, and 

 the rains to percolate, and pass off, when too pro- 

 fuse, into the drainage, so that no water can ever 

 remain to injure the roots, the disastrous effects of 

 which on trees are everywhere visible in low moist 

 lands. 



For the want of the proper location and prepa- 

 tion of the soil, I am of opinion that more than 

 one-half of all the fruit trees which have been 

 planted in New England for the last twenty-five 

 years, have either died out, or have failed to pro- 

 duce vigorous and durable subjects ; and I hesitate 

 not to express as my belief, that those which have 

 survived would, with the requisitions above-named 

 and care in transplanting, have attained double 

 their present size and productiveness. Without a 

 compliance with these principles, our advice would 

 be not to plant, and thus save both time and mo- 

 ney. 



We cannot refrain also from alluding to the great 

 care which is requisite in the removal of trees from 

 the nursery. Of all careless things done in the 

 way of cultivation, nothing is more to be censured 

 than the barbarous manner with which trees are 

 too frequently raised, or rather stripped out by 

 main force without digging, thus destroying not 

 only the small, tender roots, but splitting and van-, 

 tilating the main ones. I rejoice in the belief that 

 this practice is less common than formerly, and 

 that it has in some of our best nurseries been re- 

 formed altogether. 



Now it is principally on the young fibrous roots 

 that newly transplanted trees must depend for re- 

 ceiving nourishment, and just in proportion as 

 these have been destroyed will be the development 

 of new wood, and the ratio of its growth ; for ev- 

 ery branch has its correlative in the root, and 

 wherever a tree has been deprived of its roots, the 



