26 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Fruit trees and vines degenerate when they do not produce fruit 

 in as large a quantity or of as good a quality as when they were 

 first introduced. An improved strawberry plant is only the result 

 of a higher cultivation than it can receive in its native condition, 

 and its tendency is to go back to its original state, which can only 

 be prevented by keeping up the character of the plant to as high 

 a standard as that from which it was originally produced ; and it 

 is surprising that so man}- plants, considering the treatment they 

 receive, sustain their vitality so long as they do. The cultivated 

 strawberry loses its original characteristics sooner than any fruit 

 we are acquainted with — often without visible neglect. The 

 blossoms are not always abundant fruit bearers ; only a part of 

 their number develop pistils sufficiently to swell into perfect fruit ; 

 and those plants that bear consummate flowers are onl}' more or 

 less fruitful as they produce stamens and pistils in sufficient or 

 adequate proportion to one another. The pistillate flowers of the 

 Hove}' variety have degenerated into perfect flowering plants, so 

 that the pistillate organs that remain do not make a respectable 

 show of fruit. Raspberry and blackberry plantations deteriorate 

 when the dead canes are not removed, and this deterioration is 

 due to the absorption of moisture from the roots by lifeless wood- 

 Wet land is always a cause of feeble growth and winter killing, 

 and severe frosts are enervating to man}- fruit plants. 



This weakness or tendency to disease, called degeneracy, 

 pervades other fruits. The Early Harvest and Seeknofurther 

 apples ; Flemish Beaut}', St. Michael, and Diel pears ; Black Eagle 

 and Black Tartarian cherries ; Isabella and Catawba grapes in Rhode 

 Island ; Canfield and Vandevere apples in New Jerseys and the 

 Spitzenberg apple in the Champlain Valley of Vermont, are onlv a 

 few varieties of the man}' that are now grown with iudiflferent suc- 

 cess. Cultivated fruits will grow their allotted time and supply 

 us plentifully, as long as our plans conform to tiiose conditions of 

 soil and climate which are necessary to the health and vigor of 

 the plant we desire to propagate, and no longer. The best fruits 

 of today will be prolonged, but decline will inevitably come and 

 newer varieties will take their places, to be supplanted in due 

 time by others. 



Many kinds of apples are less reliable in the West than 

 formerly, which is attributed in some degree to forest destruction- 

 Fungous diseases have increased ; pear blight, apple scab, rot and 



