NEW ENGLAND APPLE-GROWING 8i 



HOW CAN NEW ENGLAND APPLE-GROWERS 

 COMPETE WITH OTHER SECTIONS? 



By EDWIN HOYT 



FARMING in Connecticut has reached a critical period. 

 The farmers are inquiring what they can do to get a 

 living from their farms. Western competition in grain, 

 beef, pork, butter and hay has not only weakened our home 

 markets, but has also depreciated the value and almost 

 destroyed the sale of many of our farms. The outlook for 

 Connecticut farmers who continue to cultivate their farms 

 as in the past is truly a dark one ; and farmers may well 

 ask, "What can we do with our land to make it both 

 profitable and salable ? " 



There must be some radical changes made in our sys- 

 tem of farming, and that soon, or conditions will grow still 

 worse as the years pass. The impoverished condition of 

 our soil causes so much expense for manure or fertilizers 

 to grow a crop that only those crops should be grown 

 which yield larger profits for the growing. 



Now the question is, "What crop can we raise that 

 will give larger profits for the outlay than those we raise 

 now?" My answer is, "Fruit, but more especially apples." 

 It is conceded by the best judges of fruit that New Eng- 

 land apples, well grown, are superior to those grown in 

 any other section of the country. This is true not only of 

 the apple, but also of the peach. But can apples and 

 other fruit be grown in Connecticut at a profit? They 

 can be ; and, in my opinion, this is about the only crop 

 we can cultivate with a good profit. 



We must not delay too long in merely thinking about 

 the matter. The West has already had a taste of the large 

 profits realized from orcharding, and its fruit-growers are 

 setting out whole counties in apple trees. In T/ie Ameri- 

 can Fruit- Grower for January 7, 1899, my eyes caught the 

 following: "State Senator H. M. Dunlap, of Springfield, 

 is circulating a handsome little pamphlet on the Illinois 



