O^' PM'>li«atioM Office Wo. 45 JVortli Sixth street. 



THE FARMERS' CABINET, 



DEVOTED TO AGRICULTURE, HORTICULTURE AND RURAL ECONOMY. 



Vol. II.— Xo. 3.1 



PSiUadelpliia, September 1, 1S37< 



[Whole Ko. 37. 



BligSit ill Pear Trees. 



It will be recollected by many of our 

 readers, that the Horticultural Society of this 

 city, at its last anniversary meeting, offered a 

 premium of Five Hundred Dollars to the per- 

 son who shall discover and make public an 

 effectual remedy for the disease denominated 

 Blight, to which pear trees have been sub- 

 ject for some years past. A number of com- 

 munications, from all sections of the country, 

 have been forwarded to the Society. These 

 communications have been made mostly by 

 intelligent gentlemen, with a view of pre 

 serving and more successfully propagating 

 the pear, — they have been placed in our 

 hands, and we shall from time to time pub- 

 lish such as are deemed interesting, and con- 

 ducive to the great object contemplated by 

 the Society in offering the premium. 



Prince Edward, Va., May, 1837. 

 A Preventive of the Blight in Pear Trees. 



The preventive is the simplest imaginable, 

 — it is not to prune the trees, or break up the 

 ground underneath them ; but on the con- 

 trary, to let the ground be trampled. Tlie 

 facts from which I come to the above conclu- 

 sion are the following : — 



1st. There were in my grandfather's yard 

 two pear trees, which have been bearing trees 

 from my earliest recollection, say forty years. 

 I am now the occupant of his house and yard. 

 These two trees are now as healthy as they 

 ever have been. The yard has always been 

 trampled by calves and horses. 



2d. There was a row of four trees in a lot 

 adjoining the yard, which was occasionally 

 cultivated; these trees have blighted more 

 or less whenever the lot has been cultivated. 

 Two of them have died with the blight; the 

 other two have been several times very much 

 Cab.— Vol. II.— No. 3. 38 



[injured by it, but since I have ceased to cul- 

 itivate tlie lot, they have been flourishing 

 ! trees. 



3d. I grafted in the year 1821 about twen- 

 ty pear trees. They remained in the nur- 

 sery until 1824 ; they were then planted in a 

 lot adjoining my yard, which lot was culti- 

 vated three years in succession in tobacco. 

 Most of the trees during those three years, 

 blighted more or less — some blighted within 

 a foot of the ground. I then levelled the 

 ground on which they were planted, and 

 moved my fence so as to enclose them in the 

 yard. Such as had been nearly destroyed by 

 blight, 1 enclosed with a pen of rails, in or- 

 der to keep off the calves which graze the 

 yard, until the trees had grown sufficiently 

 high not to be injured by tliem. These twen- 

 ty trees are now all healthy, and there has 

 been no appearance of blight since I culti- 

 vated the lot, except in one tree that was en- 

 closed by one of my servants in a garden, in 

 which he cultivated vegetables — that tree 

 blighted and died. 



I would recommend that pear trees be 

 planted in a rich soil, (I would prefer the 

 site of an old dwelling,)— that they be 

 ploughed and worked a few years, even at 

 the risk of blighting; and after that, that they 

 be neither pruned nor ploughed. If they re- 

 quire manure, let it be applied to the surface. 

 Ashes I think an excellent manure. Let 

 the pear orchard be grazed by small cattle, 

 until the trees are of sufficient size to admit 

 of being grazed by larger without injury. I 

 think it would be proper to keep down coarse 

 weeds, briers, sprouts, &c. I am well con- 

 vinced that there are some hardy native pear 

 trees that may be pruned and ploughed with- 

 out being subject to blight; but I feel confi- 

 dent, that most of the finest kinds of pears 



