SOME CONDITIONS OF FRUIT-SETTING 107 



of copper, 3 pounds to 30 gallons of water. I have tested 

 this mixture on 8 or 10 crops, and consider it just as 

 good as Bordeaux. If you could use the potash, the genu- 

 ine potash, instead of the soda, you could add potash to 

 your soil as a fertilizer in a very limited way. This is a 

 little more expensive than Bordeaux. It has the advan- 

 tage of not coating your fruit, if you are spraying late in 

 the season, with a layer of lime, which is objectionable. 

 It is not a perfectly clear solution, but it is close to it and 

 carries but little coloring matter. 



Mr. Plumley : Have you watched the spread of the yel- 

 lows in connection with the rainfall ? 



Prof. Halsted : We had a good deal of peach yellows, 

 instead of good peaches, in New Jersey last year. In 

 Sussex county they have what some call " prematuring of 

 the fruit," also what some call ''forcing of the fruit." All 

 of these three seem to be the same. It seems worse in 

 rainy seasons, when trees are overloaded with fruit. 



CONDITIONS THAT INFLUENCE THE SETTING 

 OF FRUIT 



By N. S. PLATT, State Pomologist 



EVERY fruit grower understands that the embryo fruit 

 of the opening blossom needs something added to it 

 from the outside, independent of the sap it feeds on, 

 to make it stay alive and grow. Not so well understood, 

 however, are the qualities and workings of this outside fac- 

 tor, which in plants we call pollen. This dust, too fine 

 usually to be noticed, but so necessary to continue the life of 

 the fruit, nature provides under varying rules ; sometimes 

 in the same fiower with the embryo fruit, sometimes on a 

 different plant or tree. Sometimes, also, we find that while 

 the pollen of a plant, or a variety of plants, is able to ferti- 

 lize its own fruit, yet it is not so potent as is the pollen of 

 some other allied plant. 



This has proved itself true many times over, so that now 

 no one thinks of planting one variety of strawberry alone 



