340 REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS. 



DISTRIBUTION OF TREES AND PLANTS. 



I strongly recommend the distribution of trees and plants along the 

 same lines and for the same purposes that the seed is distributed. If 

 it is difficult for settlers to get seed under the present conditions, it is 

 ten times more difficult for them to get plants and trees. We do not 

 know what kind of fruits can be grown in Alaska because none has 

 been tried. There is an old apple tree at Sitka planted by the 

 Russians upward of forty years ago and a young tree at Wrangell. 

 Both of these bear fruit eveiy year, but the fruit is of inferior quality. 

 They are the only fruit trees of bearing age I have heard of. It 

 is of vital importance that experiments should be made in many 

 different parts of the Territory in order to determine the possibilities 

 in fruit growing and the delimitations of the fruit belt, if, indeed, there 

 is one. To do this, I propose, if my plan is approved, to establish a 

 nursery at the headquarters station, propagate all kinds of hard} r fruits 

 and send out trees and plants in limited numbers and under proper 

 restrictions, to settlers free of charge. By this means numerous tests 

 can be made and valuable information secured. Moreover, it will help 

 the development of the Territory. The expense would be but a small 

 matter to the Government, but it would mean a great deal to the 

 pioneers. The work should be begun at once. We are ready to take 

 it up if the appropriation makes it possible. If this feature is added 

 to the experiment station work, it will require about $2,500 additional 

 appropriation to procure a mbdest stock of trees to begin with, to pay 

 for freight and labor, and to pay the salary of a competent, active 

 propagator for one year. 



WHAT THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURE MEANS. 



The development of agriculture in Alaska means the settlement and 

 development of the Territory. The one line of growth is synonymous 

 with the other. It means the building of homes, a permanent popu- 

 lation, a powerful aid to the development of the mineral resources, the 

 creation of wealth, and the building of a state. The mineral resources 

 of the Territory have not been fathomed. We only know that they are 

 vast, and that it must take a long time to exhaust them. But great as 

 is this hidden wealth, it can not build a state unaided. If agriculture 

 can not be, or is not developed in the Territory, Alaska must forever 

 remain what it now is — a distant mining camp, with its base of supplies 

 on an average nearly 2,000 miles awa}^ The population would shift 

 and dwindle in the placer districts with the exhaustion of the mines. 

 Permanent settlements could be possible only in quartz mining dis- 

 tricts, and the mines would of necessity be owned by capitalists who 

 probably would not live there. Alaska would then be a place where 

 the poor man could live only as the servant of the rich. If a pros- 



