1T2 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



ill the spring of 1851, and planted with corn, with one shovel- 

 ful of compost manure to the hill. In 1852 planted with corn, 

 and eight hills potatoes around each tree, with stable manure 

 under the potatoes ; corn manured same as last year. In 1853 

 and 1854, planted and manured same as in 1852 ; in 1855 

 sowed with wheat and clover ; in 1856 cut a crop of clover the 

 last of June, and ploughed in a crop of clover in September. 

 During the last two years I have kept the grass and weeds clear 

 from the trees. I think the clover had a good effect on the 

 trees, but the year it was in wheat my trees made the least 

 growth of any, after the first year of transplanting. In 1857 

 I planted with corn, manured with guano and phosphate of 

 lime, and eight hills of potatoes under each tree, manured 

 with stable manure. In 1858 planted same as last year, except 

 the corn was manured with one shovelful of compost manure 

 to the hill. I have washed my trees with lye made from wood 

 ashes, hardly strong enough to bear an egg, with some soap 

 stirred in. I think this as good a wash as I can apply to my 

 trees. I have had considerable trouble with the apple borer ; I 

 find that my only remedy is to follow him with the knife ; I 

 examine every tree two or three times each season. I do not 

 think washing the trees will destroy the borers after they have 

 got under the bark. I have tried banking up my trees two 

 winters to prevent the mice eating the bark, but I have come 

 to the conclusion that it is a bad practice ; I think I have lost 

 seven or eight good trees in consequence of the dirt freezing 

 and thawing, so as to kill the bark entirely round the trees 

 some four or five inches wide, while I have lost but one tree in 

 six years by the mice. 



The pear orchard which your committee examined when at 

 my place, consists of sixty-eight trees ; sixty standard trees 

 and eight on quince stocks, of some twenty different varieties, 

 viz. : ten Flemish Beauty, eight Bartlett, four Buffums, four 

 Dunmores, three Andrews, three Seckel, three Lawrence, two 

 Napoleon, two Winter Nelis, two Bleecker, two St. Gishlin, two 

 Louise bonne de Jersey, two St. Michael, two Glout Morceau, 

 one Belle Lucrative, one Madeleine, two Rosticzer, and several 

 other varieties that I do not recollect. I got forty of my trees 

 of Messrs. Bond & Damon, of North Brookfield, and trans- 



