-3- 



than the "blocl: wiiich liad received so mich attention. Tlie orchard manager, 

 in his efforts to inprove the trees had actually done nore harm th.an good. 

 Th§°*?'Tfee&" looked quite promising. Without underestimating the value of 

 good pruning, it is safe to say that many apple trees, particularly in the 

 smaller orcha,rds, would "be better off today if the owner had never owned 

 a pruning shears or a saw. One of the most comiTion tendencies among growers 

 is to under prune the older, taller trees and to over prune younger trees 

 whic/i can he reached from the ground. 



The Fruit Tree as a Unit 



The fruit tree, and particularly the apple tree, behaves as tho'ugh 

 it were a number of individual plants on the same root system. This fact was 

 brotig'.it very strikingly to our attention a few days ago while trees were in 

 full bloom. A tree in Amherst which liappened to be in the off season was 

 entirely devoid of blossoms except for one small grafted limb of a different 

 variety. This limb was full of blossoms even though the surrounding limbs 

 had no blossoms at all. In our treatment of a tree we fertilize, prune and 

 spray as though it were a unit, and yet the individual branches are more or 

 less independent of each other. A particular root tends to support a parti- 

 cular branch. If a tree is fertilized on one side, it tends to i.:ake better 

 growth on that side. Aaother exaijple is found ^/here one side of the tree 

 is seriously injured by mice or by a cahlier. The limb above th^.t point may 

 be seriously affected. At the same time, water tal:en in on one side of the 

 tree is easily transferred around to the other side of the tree, and it has 

 been found that the fruit growing on a particular limb is able to draw from 

 the leaves at a considerable distance, even as far away as ten feet. It is 

 well to remember, however, that the individual spurs on a tree are competing 

 with each other for water, raincral elements, and sunlight. Pruning, thinning, 

 etc., should therefore be done with these individual parts of the tree in 

 mind. In a sense the tree is a miit made up of many more or less indepen- 

 dent parts. 



T^ie Long LocJz Ahead 



F4.iat are the prospects for. the fruit grower in Massachusetts? This 

 question is asked very often and it deserves a, fair answer. Our answer is 

 this. We live within trucking di stance of many millions of consumers. If 

 these consumers continue to eat fruit, and there is no reason to believe that 

 the coming generation will not differ greatly from the present in that respect, 

 the demand for fruit of one kind or another seer.s assured. And if fruit is 

 to be grown it seems only reasonable that it should be grown where yield and 

 quality are high. ITo one can hope to succeed in strawberry growing if his 

 yield is only h^lf that of his neiglabor, and particularly if his cost of pro- 

 duction is 9<^ per quart while the price is 10^. Neither can a grower succeed 

 in apple .,"rowing if his Mcintosh drops prematurely every year, or if his blos- 

 soms are uninjured by frost only in those years when every one else lias a 

 crop of apples. Briefly, then, we would say thr.t the fruit planting in a 

 poor location stands very little chxince of success. At the sane time, we 

 have in Massachusetts some of the best fruit soils to be found anywhere in 

 the United States and even though our yields are not as high as those in 

 the Horthwost, our lower cost of transportation should help to rxdre the well 

 located enterprise a profitable one over a period of years. 



