1 888. 



POPULAR GARDENING. 



thousand years to do what an intelligent 

 horticulturist can accomplish in a life time. 

 Nature's working forces are the element-s, 

 insects, birds and animals. In the work of 

 planting and hybridizing, the elements do 

 their work entirely at hap hazard. Insects, 

 birds and animals e.xercise choice, 

 but not intelligent choice, the mo- 

 tive is the satisfaction of their natu- 

 ral appetites. They hybridize and 

 scatter seeds accidentally; there 

 may result just as good work as the 

 hybridizer can accomplish, but the 

 chances are too remote to leave it to 

 those agencies. We are often pained 

 to see intelligent ladies going the 

 same old round of stitch, stitch, do- 

 ing work that barely keeps soul and 

 body together, while at the same 

 time there is horticultural work for 

 which they have full capacity and 

 every convenience in their own gar- 

 dens in originating, cultivating and 

 selling new fruits, flowers and 

 herbs. Frequently this can be done 

 at odd hours and it will turn a mor- 

 bid, spiritless, dejected drudge into 

 an alert, capable, satisfied woman. 



suckers on the new canes, the sap will cause 

 the fruit buds to blossom. 



To prune the bearing wood, proceed as 

 follows: Leave only one leaf opposite to 

 each bunch of Grapes, and one leaf beyond 

 the last bunch. That is all that is nece.ssary. 

 By this method 

 all superfluous 

 foliage is dis- 

 pensed with. 

 The fruit is 

 exposed to sun, 

 air, and the re- 

 flected earth 

 heat. The new 

 canes are tied 

 up to the pole, 

 and along the 

 latter part of 

 August cut off 

 all that grow 

 above the top 

 of the pole,and 

 the canes will 

 harden well for 

 winter. In the 

 fall the old 



The Single Pole System of 

 Grape Culture. 



A. F. HOFEH, CLAYTON CO., IOWA. 



The single pole system is adapted 

 to any variety or soil, and a 

 southeast slope is capable of produc- 

 ing a finer quality of early Grapes. 

 It is especially adapted in the case of 

 clay with gravel, or the black flinty 

 soil found on many steep hillsides 

 BO valuable for Grapes, as it is 

 easily kept free from weeds and 

 quickly responds to manuring. A 

 southwest slope is less exposed to 

 frosts, receives and retains heat in 

 an enlarged degree. As the single ^^ 

 pole system brings the fruit quite 

 near to the earth, the reflected heat 

 hastens the ripening process. 



Quantity and quality are the objective 

 points of Grape culture, and this system is 

 adapted to achieve the highest success In 

 these points. As there are no "off" years in 

 the Grape crop, a fully planted, single pole 

 vineyard of one acre will contain 2,000 vines, 

 bearing with good treatment 10 to 20 pounds 

 per vine. This is not a mistaken statement, 

 for the writer has helped to raise and har- 

 vest a crop that yielded 30,000 pounds of 

 Grapes to the acre. 



The accompanying illustration is designed 

 to demonstrate our system of Grape culture 

 throughout the entire season. The pole 

 should be six to eight feet above ground, 

 and not less than two inches thick at the 

 top, firmly fixed in the earth, as the pole 

 holds the whole vine against the wind. 

 The bows, or canes B, are the canes grown 

 the previous year, now bent down and tied 

 to the pole for fruiting. There are 24 fruit 

 buds on these bows, on E, F, with fruit in 

 different stages of development. Each of 

 the fruit buds will bring such a cluster with 

 from two to four full bunches of Grapes. 

 The crop is near the earth where it ripens 

 faster, evener and sweeter than when scat- 

 tered higher up among the leafy shades of 

 a trellis. The canes are tied in damp 

 weather after being taken up in the spring, 

 as we cover our vines in winter. 



In the figure, D shows a prospective fruit 

 cane, of which we grow from two to four 

 each year to bear next year's crop. On these 

 growing canes remove all suckers as far up 

 as you want the canes to make a bo w the next 

 year. If you let the suckers grow they will 

 destroy the virility of the fruit bud. From 

 eight to 12 of these suckers should be re- 

 moved, according to the strength of the 

 vine, but no more. If you remove all the 



THE SINGLE POLE SYSTEM OF PRUNING. 



spurs are clipped off and the vine is trimmed 

 and lain down. A few shovelfuls of earth 

 give the best winter protection. 



Peach Yellows Curable. 



W. F. BASSETT, ATLANTIC CO., N. J. 



In a short note, in the August number, I 

 intimated that it was likely soon to be an 

 important question whether the yellows is 

 curable. Some fifteen years ago I had a 

 small Peach orchard of 60 acres attacked 

 by this disease, and after it was nearly 

 destroyed I was induced to try gas lime, 

 which I applied in late winter or early 

 spring, in such quantity that it destroyed 

 the foliage of Currants growing among the 

 Peach trees, and much of the foliage of the 

 trees and as the orchard was so far gone 

 that I finally had it dug out with the excep- 

 tion of one tree, but the foliage of that tree 

 resumed its healthy color and it continued 

 to produce sound fruit for several years. I 

 have since regarded this as a cure of yellows, 

 yet the experiment was so imperfect and 

 likely to carry but little weight that I have 

 hesitated to bring it forward as evidence. 



Within a few feet of where I write stands 

 a large Peach tree which, as I am reliably 

 informed, some five or six years ago ex- 

 hibited all the indications of a decided case 

 of yellows. At the present time the tree is 

 in sound health, with rich dark foliage. It 

 bore a full crop of fruit last year and has 

 some this year. Almost within reach of the 

 branches stands a steam boiler, and the 

 ashes froin the furnace have been thrown 

 under this tree until quite a quantity accimi- 

 ulated. The fuel used was mostly coal 

 but some wood, in this way potash enough 

 was supplied to effect a cure. 



A more recent case has just been shown 

 me by Mr. T. Greiner, the observing editor 

 of Orchard and Garden. One of his neigh- 

 bors had two Peach trees which presented 

 a sickly appearance; some of the fruit 

 rii)ened prematurely, and there were many 

 small wirey shoots. Mr. G. advised the 

 application of two quarts muriate of potash 

 to each tree, which was dug in under the 

 branches in July of this year, and now in 

 September, one of these trees has made a 

 healthy growth of six to eight inches on the 

 ends of all the leading shoots; and the other, 

 which was in worse condition has evidently 

 taken a new lease of life, and has started a 

 new and healthy growth. I might name 

 many other instances of the resuscitation of 

 Peach trees that had the yellows, which 

 have not come under my observation but of 

 which I have satisfactory evidence. 



I understand that our Michigan and New 

 York horticulturists incline to poke fun at 

 their brother fruit growers here in New 

 .Jersey, and express doubts as to the gen- 

 uineness of the disease in these cases. In 

 Thomas' American Fruit Culturist, I find 

 the following items about the Peach yellows: 

 "Infallible indications." " First a 

 premature ripening of fruit some 

 weeks earlier than usual, with an in- 

 sipid flavor of purple discolorations 

 ife^' X of the flesh. Next season numer- 

 sibT 'vs^, oug small wirey shoots arefrequently 

 thrown up from the main branches, 

 the leaves become yellow and the 

 tree eventually dies." The italics 

 are mine. We have had all these^ 

 and I might add that freestone 

 Peaches when thus prematurely 

 ripened become clings, and the roots 

 of the trees when dug up are found 

 to have white lines running along 

 them, somewhat resembling those 

 seen on decaying chips when dug 

 out of a wet mass of such material, 

 but finer and a slight appearance of 

 transparency. 

 Thomas, in his American Fruit 

 Culturist, also says, "In some parts of the 

 country possessing a strong and fertile soil, as 

 for instance, some portions of Western New 

 York this disease has not spread extensively 

 when introduced from abroad. It has gen- 

 erally destroyed a few trees near the affected 

 ones and then disappeared." Yet I am told 

 that the State of New York has a commission 

 appointed for every county in the state to 

 examine all the Peach orchards and destroy 

 all trees which they consider affected with 

 yellows and the affected ones near them, 

 indicating as I infer that this exemption 

 does not now exist. Such a result would be 

 likely to follow the carrying off the potash 

 in successive crops of fniit. Potatoes, etc. 



Dairymen, in the older portions of the 

 country, not unfrequently observe a like 

 result in the case of pastures where cows 

 have been left for a series of years, and the 

 phosphates removed by the sale of the milk 

 products, and especially when the cows are 

 yarded nights; and cows kept in such pas- 

 tures often become prematurely lame from 

 the lack of phosphates in their food. 



My observations have fully con\-inced me 

 that Peach yellows is a fungoid disease, and 

 1 believe that potash applied in sufficient 

 quantity is a specific for it, and some of the 

 closest observers who have been investiga- 

 ting the subject agree with me in this view. 

 There is a fungoid disease common to the 

 Apple, bat does not appear to permanently 

 injure them, and appears to disappear, per- 

 haps as the result of difference in the atmos- 

 pheric conditions of different seasons. Its 

 presence is indicated by spots on the leaves, 

 which under a magnifying glass present a 

 crystalline radiation from the center, the 

 foliage turns yellow, and the same white 

 spots are on the roots as in Peach yellows. 



