66 THE SUBURBANITE'S HANDBOOK 



will bear at an average 1% bushels a year, or 31% bushels, which 

 multiplied by 64 (the number of trees on the 40 feet square allowed 

 for the standard tree) will give 2,400 bushels. Allow mar- 

 gins to suit yourself. Of course we will have the same 

 standard tree bearing for another 25 years, but we will 

 only have to wait for four years to plant another lot of 64 trees, 

 and have them catch up and pass the old standard and repeat the 

 experience which we can very well afford to do. But this is not all, 

 for it must be remembered that the dwarf apples are superior in 

 size, beauty, quality and selling price to those grown on standard 

 trees, and every apple on these little bushes is within reach of one's 

 hand from the ground and may be thinned without difficulty ; there 

 are no windfalls to amount to anything ; the work of spraying is re- 

 duced to a minimum. You all know what a tiresome job it is gazing 

 up to the sky looking for tent caterpillars' eggs on a 40-foot tree, 

 while the same is only pastime on those small bushes. No packing of 

 awkward ladders in pruning time, or climbing trees in picking time. 

 Of course 64 trees require more attention than one and cost more for 

 a start, but the work is light in character and such as any boy, girl 

 or woman can do, and most of it a real pleasure. Anyhow, who 

 would begrudge the work when the returns are so liberal. In the 

 above comparison my remarks referred to the dwarf apple in the 

 bush form, and as profitable even as it shows up with bushes at four 

 i'eet apart or occupying 16 square feet each, how much better results 

 may be expected if we use cordons either upright or oblique or 

 U form, which may be planted in rows four to six feet apart 

 and only two feet apart in the row, occupying eight to twelve 

 feet in area, and yet are individually as productive as the 

 bushes or nearly so. In this case, instead of 64 trees 

 occupying the area of one standard tree, we would have 96; 

 or instead of 1,628 bush trees per acre, we would have 4,224 oblique 

 or upright cordons. These figures may be astounding, but no more 

 than if we compare the old stage coach with railway trains of the 

 present day, or comparing the old-fashioned plough with the up-to- 

 date steam plough, or the reaping hook with our best harvesters. 

 Our little dwarf fruit trees offer the same gigantic stride in advance 

 in the horticultural field, combined with intensive culture. Nor is 

 there anything visionary in the statements, as they are established 

 facts, though not yet exploited to the same degree, but will be in 

 the near future, when we secure the irresistable combination of grit, 



