METHODS OF FRUIT CULTURE AND FORESTRY. 101 



moved, I employed a man last spring who could dig two hundred aud 

 fift}' holes for apple and peach trees in a day. This was rather more 

 than I wanted to do mj-self, but I did succeed in keeping up with 

 him for about two days. From this experience I am satisfied that 

 in much of our old pasture land an ordinary laborer would dig 

 more than that number per da}^ After the trees have been 

 planted, the brush and other coarse material should be drawn 

 close up under them, and if the soil is very poor it would 

 probably be found a good investment to use from a quarter to half 

 a ton of fine ground bone to the acre at the time of planting. 



The second method of utilizing the above-described lands is 

 b}- planting them with fruit trees. Of all the various branches of 

 agriculture or horticulture in New England, fruit culture, I believe, 

 offers the greatest inducements for the future. Nowhere in the 

 world can fruit of such quality and beauty be grown as our apples, 

 pears, plums, peaches, and cherries, and the improved transporta- 

 tion facilities, and methods of preservation, have very largely in- 

 creased the market for it. 



The history of the cultivation of all fruits shows us that ''the 

 more good fruit the people have, the more they want ; " and there 

 is almost a certainty that good fruit in the future will bring pay- 

 ing prices. 



For several ^-ears past I have taken the position, that, with the 

 use of chemical fertilizers, and the brush, grass, and other coarse 

 material growing upon much of our stony land that cannot be 

 cultivated, such land can be made to produce paying crops of 

 fruit ; while the land that can be cultivated, should be used for 

 other purposes. I am still almost alone in this position ; yet I 

 can see some marks of progress, and am more and more convinced 

 that a system can be worked out by which entirely satisfactory 

 results may be obtained. 



After an extended examination of the apple trees of many sec- 

 tions of the State I find, as a rule, that the oldest, most healthy, 

 and productive trees are generall}' growing in turf, and that in 

 a great man}' old pastures seedling trees are springing up, and 

 growing with great vigor. There seems to be little difference in 

 the vigor aud hardiness of trees growing in turf, whether they 

 started from seed where the}' are now growing, or were trans- 

 planted, the condition of the soil being the same. 



In orchards that have been cultivated for a few years and then 

 seeded down for a time, aud this process kept up, the trees soon 



