ORCHARDS. 191 



for a pasture till the year before, when I dug out the rocks — as 

 it was very rocky — and removed them for tlie surrounding 

 walls. I then ploughed the land, and in the fall dug \u les for 

 the trees, from five to six feet wide and twenty inches deep. I 

 placed the best soil by itself, to put around the roots, and using 

 about two bushels of compost to each tree. I took particular 

 pains to have the roots in the same position and same depth 

 that they were before being transplanted. My trees were two 

 years' growth from the bud when set out. I have washed them 

 once with potash water, not very strong, and put hay around 

 them to keep the roots moist in dry weather. The hay I take 

 away in the fall and put manure around instead. The first 

 year, I planted the land with 'potatoes, and the two next with 

 corn, and this year with potatoes, as you see. 



Marlborough, Sept. 18, 1857. 



HAMPSHIRE. 



Statement of Lucius Nutting. 



The young orchard in Leverett, which I enter for premium, 

 consists of two hundred and sixteen trees, principally of the 

 Rhode Island Greening and the Baldwin varieties, which appear 

 to be adapted to our climate and soil for winter use. The trees 

 were procured in the spring of 1850 from the Brookfield nursery. 

 The lot of land upon which they stand, measures twenty-four 

 rods by forty, and is a light, sandy loam. I set the trees, which 

 were of two years' growth from the bud, in eight furrows, the 

 trees at right angles with each other and thirty-three feet apart. 

 I cultivated the land the first season and took off corn and 

 potatoes. The depth of the furrows was about seven inches, 

 and I put nothing about the roots, except the natural earth, 

 well pulverized. All but three or four of the trees have lived 

 and are flourishing. 



I have kept the land under cultivation and laid down to 

 grass in rotation, about one-half at any one time being culti- 

 vated and the other half laid down. The part cultivated has 

 had an average spread of fifteen loads of manure to the acre. 

 In 1852 and 1855 I gave two dressings of compost manure, con- 



