Tenth Annual Meeting 63 



storage system, and this fine -flavored fruit is kept in perfect 

 condition to put upon the market day by day in a season when 

 it brings the largest price and when it is most attractive to 

 the consumer. 



Then, there is the rural mail delivery that has developed 

 so rapidly throughout our country, which carries the market 

 reports to the farmer every morning. This, with the telephone 

 and rapid transit, puts the countryman in close touch with his 

 fellows and enables him to take the same advantage of knowl- 

 edge that his city brother does in the business of the town. 

 The carrying facilities have been very rapidly perfected during 

 the more recent years. At the World's Fair we had a per- 

 fect exhibit of Australian apples, that compared favorably with 

 anything we put upon the tables from the states; and I saw 

 in the London markets as perfect barrels of apples from 

 Australia as were delivered from France, notwithstanding the 

 wide expanse of sea to be traversed. 



Suitable combinations are of no inconsiderable importance 

 in arranging a business in horticulture. I find, for instance, 

 that winter eggs are profitable. In order to have winter eggs, 

 hens must have green produce. For years there was a waste 

 of green produce from my truck houses, so the winter egg 

 was combined with the winter lettuce, and the combination 

 proved to be profitable. 



We found, in the growing of cucumbers, that in order to 

 have a perfect set upon the plant within the forcing house, a 

 great deal of work was required with the brush to perfect the 

 fertilization of the blossoms. We added a few swarms of 

 bees, and found that they not only did the work of fertiliza- 

 tion in the greenhouse in a most perfect manner, but they 

 fitted in nicely with the other branches of horticulture pursued 

 on the farm. 



The utilizing of waste places is a matter of importance in 

 connection with the prosecution of horticulture. I recall a 

 simple instance now so common of utilizing all of the room 

 under the benches in the forcing house for the growing of such 

 plants as need little light. Our plaster caves at Grand Rapids 

 were considered to be utterly worthless holes in the ground until 

 some one of resource started mushroom beds in them and has 



