-2- 



have been a lot of Baldwin drops on the auction v/hlch in most caces 

 were put up for the governnent, and then turned down bj'- the in- 

 spectorc. This c;tuff sells hard at 25 to 50 centc. There have 

 been hardly any good Baldwinc. Ac nany farmers were frozen out 

 last spring, then washed out in July o.nd blown out in September, 

 it looks like a quiet season on the auction. Have plenty of buy- 

 ers for good quality apples, but do not want any more elder or 

 cull stock. " 



Two Fruit Conferenc es 



Fruit matters of interest to growers throughout the state 

 will be considered at tv/o committee meetings to be held at Stock- 

 bridge House in Amherst, I.Ionday, November 7- At 10 A.I.I, there v/ill 

 be a session of the Fruit Industry Committee to discuss the fruit 

 extension program for the coming year. Representatives of the 

 various College departments having to do in one way or another 

 with the fruit industry will attend. The recent hurricane hps 

 introduced some real pioblems in the fruit industry and an rT;te"'pt 

 will be made to adapt the extension program to a changing ^r ':■,'' ■/'y- 

 Problems of tree salvage, replanting, di: -^rcif icatlon, credit, src. , 

 will be taken up. The second conference t'MI bring toge'chi'.:' ji^ni - 

 bers of three College departments, Pomology, Entomology an"- Eo'^r-^y, 

 and a few county agricultural agents to discuss needed changes in 

 the fruit spray and dust schedules. This conference is an annual 

 affair, out of which is developed the printed spray schedule for 

 the various fruits so familiar to fruit grovers in Massachusetts. 

 The entire afternoon will be spent in assembling all available 

 evidence on experimental work, new materials and new methods of 

 pest control, in order that the 1939 spray schedule may again repre- 

 sent the latest word in reliable fruit pest control informa.tion. 



What Does "Clonal" Mean? 



The word "clone" was : -troduced several years ago by Dr. 

 H. J. Webber, and it has come iiito common use among research pom- 

 ologists. To thf^ fruit grower, it means the same as "variety," 

 that is, a type of fruit that can be propagated by buds, but not 

 by seeds. This is in sharp distinction to the term " var 1 e tj"" " as 

 used for most vegetables ar.d flowers which are grown from, seeds. 

 All fruit varieties are clones, but fruit stocks are sharply di- 

 vided into clones a-nd seedlings. The seedling apple stocks, com- 

 monly used, are grov/n from seeds obtained from cider mills in the 

 United States and certain European countries. A clonal stock comes 

 originally from a seed just as do the original trees of named var- 

 ieties, and like them it is propagated asexually, that is by buds. 

 A clonal stock once obtained, however, is propaga.ted by layering, 

 that is by heaping moist soil around the base of green shoots 

 which induces them to form roots, thus producing rooted stocks 

 suitable for budding. 



Most clons,l stocks can also bo i^ropa gated by root cuttings 

 or by "nurse root grafts." In the latter case, a scion of the 

 clonal stock is whip grafted on a seedling root and planted in the 

 usual way. After a year or two in the nursery, the little trees 

 are dug. By this time the clonal scions will have produced roots 

 of their own. The seed].ing root pieces can therefore be cut off 



