Wanted Proofs and Got Them 



A subscriber to the "Rural New Yorker" wrote the editor of the 

 paper the following letter : 



Dynamiting for Planting Fruit Trees 



What information can you give as to the use of dynamite for planting fruit trees? I expect 

 to set out quite a few this Spring, and am wondering if it would be the thing to use on my land, 

 which has a shallow topsoil, about 18 inches of gravelly subsoil, underneath which is a very 

 hard, clay hardpan. The dynamite makers claim great things for their product. I would like to 

 hear what others have to say who have used it. 



Connecticut. J. W. M. 



R. N. Y. We want actual experience about this if we can get it. 



In an issue of the Rural New Yorker, published two weeks later, the following letters from 

 subscribers were published in answer to J. W. M.'s inquiry: 



Dynamiting in Tree Planting 



In answer to J. W. M., page 126, in a block of seven-year-old apple trees, about a dozen 

 failed to make a good growth, and one of them died when four years old. Replanting, the tree 

 failed to live throujrn the Summer. The soil is Hagerstown shale loam, and we found the shale 

 very near the surface in this place. Before planting the third time we used about one-third 

 stick of dynamite (say three ounces), making the hole with a bar and putting the charge about 

 two feet under surface. The result was a mass of fine shale of about a cubic yard in extent. 

 The tree was planted and grew and made a good growth, although the season was very dry. 

 J. W. M. would have to get well into that hardpan with his dynamite and use more of it, say 

 one-half pound. I think the cost would be justified in the better drainage secured, as unbroken 

 hardpan within two feet of the surface would hardly be an ideal condition for an apple orchard. 



Pennsylvania. A. T. B. 



I planted 150 trees with dynamite with the best success; they make a much quicker growth. 

 They will grow in two vears as much as the old way will in three years. If the soil is very 

 hard digging, it will be found much cheaper. 



Massachusetts. C. M. O. 



J. W. M., Connecticut, wants actual experience in dynamiting holes for fruit trees. 1 

 tried that last Spring for over 100 peach trees in heavy clay subsoil on land that would 

 raise scarcely more than 20 bushels of corn to the acre. I used an iron rock drill and 

 drilled down about three feet, and used one-third stick 40 per cent, dynamite. The dynamite 

 fuse and caps cost about four cents per tree, which I think is a very cheap way of digging 

 the holes, as all I did after I shot the holes was to shovel out a few shovelfuls and set the 

 tree. As last season was very dry with us the trees made good growth; they were headed 

 back to about 18 inches from the ground and about five-eighths inch in diameter when set, 

 and now they will average seven feet tall and most of them will average two inches in 

 diameter, and some larger than that. This ground was in corn the season before, and the 

 patch was set in straw and tended up to September. One of my neighbors set peach trees 

 last Spring in the spade-dug system and those trees made very little growth. We have 

 a man near New Albany. Ind., who runs a commercial orchard system; he has been trying 

 it 12 years and I heard him say he would set no trees without dynamiting, thinking it paid 

 largely. From what experience I have had and seen from others I would certainly try dyna- 

 mite, for it certainly tears up the subsoil and gives those roots a chance to go down to moisture, 

 and dry as the season was, I never lost a single tree out of 104, which I think is very good. 



R. F. T. BORDEN. 



In the Spring of 1911 I set 52 apple trees in filling in an old orchard where the trees 

 had died. First tried one-fourth pound, but found that too heavy a charge as it made 

 too large a hole; then used one-sixth pound charge. First I bored in about 12 to 15 inches, 

 pushed the stick clear to the bottom, tamped it well and let it go. We could set a tree in 

 the hole easily in five minutes, one holding the tree and treading in the dirt as the other 

 shoveled. Not having enough dynamite, two holes were dug with shovel. Result, one of 

 those trees died and only one of those set in holes that were dynamited. The soil is a 

 sandy loam underlaid by sand rock about three feet below the surface. All trees were 

 heavily mulched with straw early in the season before the drought began. Some of the 

 trees made a new growth of more than two feet on each limb, while the tree set in the dug 

 hole made a growth of three to six inches. An observation of the trees is proof conclusive 

 that it paid to use the dynamite. The trees set were two years old. 



Ohio. H. 



We are using dynamite here for setting grape roots, and it is a good thing for clay or 

 hardpan; do not think that it would do any good in mellow or gravel soil. It would be neces- 

 sary to get the dynamite down in the clay ard to tamp the ground down hard around the 

 dynamite before firing the fuse; the explosion then would loosen the ground in all directions, 

 and would enable the root system to extend more quickly. 



Hammondsport, N. Y. J. W. 



Last Spring in preparing for planting fruit trees I decided to use dvnamite, which was 

 so entirely successful I shall give you my method. For making the holes I used a heavy iron 

 bar, sinking it from 20 to 24 inches, using one-quarter stick dynamite, pulverized, then after 

 placing cap and fuse tamped wet earth into hole. This would loosen the ground four or five 

 feet deep and about four feet on each side, in ordinary freestone soil with heavy yellow clay 

 subsoil. My trees made larger growth last year, where other trees in the neighborhood which 

 were dug in made very small growth or died from the dry weather. Care should be taken 

 to pack soil well around trees when put in. Cost of material for shooting holes was five cents 

 each, not including labor. 



Seebert, W. Va, W. M. I. 



Du PONT EDITOR'S NOTE. Neither the inquirer nor endorsers were known to us. 



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