98 THE NEW HORTICULTURE. 



surface-feeding roots, which is to so weaken the trees that 

 they are unable to resist the disorganizing action of a late spring 

 freeze and retain their blossoms or young fruit, which all sod 

 trees easily do. This was plainly demonstrated in the case of 

 the eight hundred peach trees alluded to previously by Mr. 

 Durham, and the conduct of all fence-corner and back-yard 

 fruit trees. 



A third remarkable effect of the integrity of the surface 

 roots is to improve and perfect the eating qualities^ all 

 fruit ; that on trees in uncultivated ground being far superior to 

 the other, as is plainly shown by the well-known inferiority of 

 all the highly cultivated California fruit, so beautiful to the 

 eye, yet so disappointing to the taste. And yet, with her rain- 

 less summer, that state ought to, and could, grow fruit of all 

 kinds as perfect in quality as it is in appearance, if her people 

 would only open their eyes to these plain natural laws of 

 orchard management. 



A fourth effect of cultivation, contrary to the present gen- 

 eral but erroneous belief, is to decrease the size of the fruit, 

 where sod trees stand on good soil, or a top-dressing of ferti- 

 lizer is applied equal to that on cultivated trees. For years, 

 as is well known in Texas, my sod-pears, though picked from 

 trees bearing fifteen to twenty bushels, carried off first pre- 

 mium at the Dallas State Fair. On one occasion three Kief- 

 fers were weighed by Mr. Sydney Smith, secretary, that 

 amounted to seven and three-quarter pounds, and Le Conte 

 twenty-eight ounces each, while my World's Fair peaches 

 and plums were among the largest. In further proof, Mr. 

 F. T. Ramsey, the well-known Austin nurseryman and erst- 

 while clean culturist, but now a sod man, exhibited at the 1-ast 

 Texas Farmers' Congress Governor Lanham peaches grown 

 in a Bermuda sod that measured eleven and one-half inches 

 around. 



A sixth most important effect of sod culture is that it en- 

 ables all fruit trees to mature their fruit slowly and naturally, 

 as well as hold on to it tenaciously even in high winds and 

 after it is fully ripe. My peaches and plums always hang, if 

 left, a month or more from maturity ; yet it is well known that 



