120 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



thirty years ago, can no longer be pursued to a profit ; that the 

 business of raising fruit, both pears and apples, has become an 

 intricate, careful and elaborate business, and requires a more 

 thorough understanding of the nature of the soil and climate 

 than almost any other branch of horticulture that can possibly 

 be named. I have recommended, therefore, in various parts of 

 this State, the destruction of old orchards, and I desire to give 

 my reasons here, because I have recently been criticized some- 

 what severely for having advised the farmers of Worcester 

 County to remove their old apple-trees from their farms as ex- 

 crescences and nuisances. The reasons I give are these : that 

 owing either to a change of climate, or a change of soil, or both 

 combined, and the incursions of the canker-worm, the cater- 

 pillar, the core-worm, and the burrowing maggot, to which Mr. 

 Gold has alluded, the contest has become an unequal one, and 

 we cannot carry on the cultivation in the old way. I would 

 have apple-trees planted in the first places upon soil adapted to 

 them. Let horticulturists find out what that is ; probably no 

 two kinds ever could or will flourish equally well upon the same 

 soil. The Baldwin apple of Berkshire and the Baldwin apple 

 of Essex are two different things, not only in texture, but flavor, 

 owing, unquestionably, to the difference in the soils upon which 

 they grow. Let the horticulturists teach us what soil is adapted 

 to the growing of particular kinds of apples and pears. My 

 impression is, that those soils that are deficient in mineral 

 matter are the least adapted to the growing of apples. I know 

 that in our own section, apple-trees grow best upon decayed and 

 decaying ledges ; upon hill-sides that are filled with decaying 

 rocks, where there is an abundance of mineral manure, and an 

 absence of those vegetable, nitrogenous manures which sim- 

 ply stimulate the trees into the growth of wood, but will not 

 produce fruit. The smoothest and best orchards I have ever 

 seen anywhere are those grown on lands rich in mineral 

 manures ; they are the orchards which first come into fruitage 

 and retain their capacity to bear longest. 



Now, with regard to planting trees in such land. The best 

 orchard that I know of (and I would like to have this contro- 

 verted, if possible,) is planted so that the trees protect and 

 nurse each other. I think our trees have become so delicate 

 that the effect of the winds upon them is more sensibly felt than 



