86 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



way, and the growth of the limbs and circumference at the surface 

 of the ground. I measured no shoots or sprouts, — there are 

 none in the orchard, — but the ends of the limbs, pulled down 

 from as high as I could reach. The average growth the present 

 season of the sixty-eight trees measured — and they are a fair 

 average of the whole — is twenty and one-fourth inches. The 

 average circumference of the same trees at the ground is a 

 small fraction less than seventeen inches. The largest trees, 

 not falling within the diagonals, were not measured. 



Last year I sold sixty dollars' worth of apples from these 

 trees, besides a large quantity kept for the use of my family, 

 twenty-five in number. At this time about one hundred and 

 twenty-five of the trees have apples upon them, and with ordinary 

 rains I think several of them would produce one barrel each 

 the present year. The principal varieties are the Baldwin, 

 Greening, and Hubbardston Nonesuch. 



The orchard was planted, has been pruned, washed, and for 

 the most part hoed and kept clear of insects, by my own hands. 



The Middlesex Agricultural Society awarded me the third 

 premium in 1849, and the second premium in 1851. 



Framingham, August 23, 1854. 



Statement of H. II. Bigeloio. 



My apple orchard contains one hundred and ninety-two trees, 

 standing on four and one-quarter acres of land. The soil is a 

 deep, dark loam, and was very rocky before the trees were 

 set out. The land was dug and ploughed, the rocks re- 

 moved, and the holes dug for the trees in the fall of 1850, and 

 the trees were set out the April following. The holes were 

 dug about twenty inches deep, and from five to seven feet wide, 

 and two rods apart each way — the best part of the soil being 

 laid by itself, to put around the roots after mixing with it about 

 two bushels of compost manure to each tree. Care was taken 

 that the trees were set at the same depth they were before 

 being transplanted, and that the roots were spread and arranged 

 in their natural position. The land was planted with corn the 

 same year and the following, and hay was put round the trees 



