No. 3. 



Downing's Book on Fruit Trees, ^c. 



83 



our climate is rude, for we have always ad- 

 mitted that the exposed situation of tlie Long 

 Island and Boston nurseries, rendered the 

 trees grown there very hardy, and peculiarly 

 eligible for removal to any latitude. It is 

 well known that the cold is more intense on 

 the seaboard than in a much higher latitude 

 far from the sea, and that the sudden changes 

 experienced in Boston and Long Island, have 

 a very hardening eflect on those trees which 

 survive it. This seems corroborated by a 

 fact stated on page 260, that the black Mul- 

 berry thrives well and bears good crops at 

 Hyde Park, on the Hudson, 80 miles north 

 of New York, while it is frequently killed 

 on Long Island; and we have almost aban- 

 doned its cultivation. To this part of the 

 author's statement, therefore, we have no 

 objection; but we are much surprised , that 

 without proper inquiry, he has stated, that 

 the soil of Boston and of Long Island is 

 "rather sandy." We do not wish to say 

 that he stated what he knew was wrong, 

 but we think that ignorance is much to be 

 regretted in a work where correctness is in- 

 dispensable. 



I cannot speak advisedly of the whole vi- 

 cinity of Boston, but must leave that to the 

 editors. I am quite decided, however, in 

 the opinion, that the soil in the nurseries of 

 Hovey & Co., — Winships, Kenrick, and 

 others, is quite far from being sandy. Re- 

 specting Long Island, his remarks must be 

 intended not for the south side, but for the 

 rolling country which characterizes all the 

 north side, and where alone nurseries are 

 found, and good fruit to any extent is pro- 

 duced. There, and more particularly in the 

 vicinity of Flushing, exists every variety of 

 soil, excepting sand. The heaviest clay, 

 porous, gravelly soil, and occasionally a spot 

 of sandy loam are found, but the most pre- 

 vailing is a rich loam. In the land attached 

 to our est^lishment — about 250 acres — we 

 have a great variety of soil, a portion being 

 gravelly loam, other parts heavy clay, and a 

 large portion of that planted with trees, a 

 rich loam. Although we have abundance 

 of clay soil for all our purposes, we rarely 

 use it, for our own experience strengthens 

 the opinion of others that a clay soil is supe- 

 rior to a loam for no class of trees, and de- 

 cidedly injurious to many. Mcintosh, the 

 best practical writer on the cultivation of 

 fruits, says that peaches and apricots " re- 

 quire a somewhat rich and mellow soil, 

 richer than that for the apple, and much 

 lighter than that for the pear;" that " apples 

 delight in a soft hazel loam, containing a 

 email portion of sand ;" that " the cherry 

 delights in a dry, light, and rather sandy 

 soil ;" that " plums are found^to flourish best 



in a soil neither too light, nor too heavy and 

 wet;" and that "a dry, deep loam is the 

 best soil for the pear tree, when upon a 

 stock of its own species : a gravelly bottom 

 is good, provided there be sufficient depth of 

 mould over it, and a clayey, wet, spongy 

 bottom is the worst of all." He farther 

 states that climate has much less to do with 

 fruit trees than soil, and that pear trees 

 planted on a lighter soil, are not subject to 

 barrenness. It will, therefore, be seen, that 

 according to this excellent authority, our 

 Boston and Long Island soil in its great va- 

 riety, is well adapted to all kinds of fruit 

 trees, while a stitf retentive clay is scarcely 

 adapted to any. In corroboration of this, we 

 planted a few years since, a square of young 

 pear trees, where the soil was a very heavy 

 clay, but after two years' trial, found them 

 doing so poorly, and making scarcely any 

 growth, that we transplanted them to a 

 loam, where they are now throwing out fine 

 shoots. One of the largest nurserymen on 

 New York Island, informs us that he finds 

 it exceedingly difficult to raise apples on his 

 soil, which is a stiff", retentive clay. A clay 

 soil is peculiarly injurious to cherries, and 

 for these we never use it. Pears and plums 

 will unquestionably do better than any other 

 fruit on a stiff" clay, but our experience is 

 very conclusive to ourselves, that even these 

 succeed far better on a good heavy loam. 

 The author very justly observes on page 

 320, that trees in a damp soil are much 

 more liable to that serious enemy, the frozen 

 saplight ; such being the case, they must 

 peculiarly suff'er in a clay soil, which is 

 well known to be very retentive of moist- 

 ure. It is mentioned, page 62, that R. L. 

 Pell, on the Hudson, has been very success- 

 ful in the cultivation of apples in a strong, 

 deep, sandy loam, on a gravelly subsoil. A 

 Perdigron plum stands behind my house, 

 which has borne fine fruit abundantly for 

 more than 25 years. I have also Seckel and 

 other pear trees that have borne well for 

 the same length of time. In my own or- 

 chard are produced every year as large, 

 fine, and healthy peaches, as in those parts 

 of Delaware, where disease is comparatively 

 unknown. Some of my Crawford's Meloco- 

 ton measured last year more than nine 

 inches in circumference, and of delicious 

 flavor. Judge Strong, of this place, has 

 peach trees that are, I am informed, at least 

 20 years old, if not much more, and still 

 produce fine healthy fruit. I am strongly 

 of the opinion that the most suitable soil for 

 all fruit trees, is a good gravelly loam. All 

 fruit trees discharge from the root more or 

 jess excrementory matter, which, if accu- 

 mulated and retained about the roots, is in- 



