Sept. 



THE POMOLOGIST. 



119 



For the Western Pomologist. 



Stop and Think ! 



History reaches not beyond the time wiien 

 man was engaged la Hortieulture. Ever 

 since the first garden was planted, the skill 

 of the practical Horticulturist and the study 

 of the scientist have been freely used to dis- 

 cover new fruits and to improve old ones, 

 and bring iuto practice better modes of cul- 

 tivation. Century after century has passed 

 away, and now, after all this expenditure of 

 time, skill, and thought, we are obliged to 

 confess, that never were our trees and vines 

 so scourged with disease, or tormented with 

 devouring insects as at the present day. 

 Blight, scab, rotten root, mildew, gum, bark 

 killing, yellows, grape rot, black knot, win- 

 ter killing, premature decay, unproductive- 

 ness, defoliating, cureulio, borer, codling 

 moth, canker worm, currant worm, &c., &c., 

 ifcc, make a combination of troubles that 

 may well appall the stoutest heart. What is 

 the cause ? What is the remedy ? 



Stop and think ! Is it not possible that 

 there has been something radically wrong in 

 our practice that has gradually led us iuto 

 this condition ? Some of our wise ones tell 

 us that the destruction of the forests and the 

 impoverishment of the soil will account for 

 all OTir woes. Yet, at the same time, the 

 pine, unaided by the skill of man, raises its 

 evergreen top an hundred feet or more, and 

 generation after generation of men listen to 

 the soughing of the wind among its million 

 leaves. 



The Black Walnut, planted by the i^rovi- 

 dent squirrel, two hundred years ago, and 

 till only by an annual mulch of its own 

 leaves, in perfect health still drops its annual 

 crop of perfect nuts to feed its planter's des- 

 cendants. The beech, the birch, the oak, the 

 spruce, planted and tilled by the Great Gar- 

 dener himself, in accordance with His own 

 laws, still grow in pristine vigor unharmed 

 by disease and bear their regular crojis of 

 fruit perfect in its kind. 



Originally — we have a riglit to suppose — 

 apple and pear trees were healthy as the 

 pine and birch ; but while the one, under 

 the skilful manipulations of man has become 

 fearfully diseased, the other, subject only to 

 the irrepealable laws of nature, thrives in 

 perfect health. Stop and think ! 



What have we done to these plants that 

 we have taken under our special guardian- 

 ship and so carefully fostered, that has 

 proved so disastrous ? Is it possible that in 

 our anxiety to grow fine fruits and flowers 

 and thrifty trees, we have all along been 

 thwarting nature, and breaking nature's 

 laws, and that we are now paying the pen- 

 alty? 



Is it not possible that, by our constant dig- 

 ging of the soil, our constant f irciiig to un- 

 natural growth, by stimulating manures, 

 our constant cutting with knives and saws, 

 our constant efforts to secure a plethoric 



growth in season and out of .season, we have 

 in the course of successive generations, pro- 

 duced a condition so monstrous that nature 

 takes these methods to remove the mons- 

 trocity from the face of the earth. Are we 

 sure that because a tree grows vigorou.sly 

 under the influence of high stimulants that 

 it is in the best possible condition to ensure 

 permanent health or produce healthy des- 

 cendants? Does not the contrary rule hold 

 good in the animal kingdom? may it not 

 in the vegetable ? 



Take a goose, place it in a dark box, nail 

 its feet to the floor, and force rich food down 

 its neck with a stick and the bird will fatten 

 with wonderful rapidity ; yet who would 

 advocate such conditions as calculated to 

 maintain the stock in health for successive 

 generations ? 



So with trees. An apple tree or grape 

 vine forced by a liberal application of man- 

 ure and by thorough culture of the soil 

 through summer and fall will usually make 

 a magnificent (?) growth, and its dark green 

 foliage and smooth bark ma^ be taken as 

 positive proof that it has had treatment 

 exactly adapted to its wants. It is fat as a 

 goose. 



Yet who shall dare say that such a condi- 

 tion is certainly best for the permanent 

 health of the individual specimen, or for tlie 

 future generations of trees and vines it may 

 produce ? 



It is becoming fashionable to say that na- 

 ture is no guide, for we can beat her all out 

 in growing fine fruit. Yet when we com- 

 pare the trees in our orchard with the trees 

 in the forest, and the plants in our gardens 

 with the plants in the fields and marshes, we 

 are saddened to notice how deficient in 

 health are our pets, and too fully realize if 

 left to themselves, how soon they would be 

 overrun by the sturdy vegetable savages 

 around them. Stop and think ! 



In this age we claim great knowledge and 

 improved means of observation. Can we 

 not then discover some plan by which we 

 can grow fine fruit without, at the same 

 time breeding disease in both tree and fruit? 

 Is there no way by which we can protect 

 our favorites from encroaching vegetation 

 without, at the same time, endangering their 

 own health ? Is there no plan by which a 

 fruit tree can be made to grow symetrical 

 and beautiful and healthful and productive 

 as a walnut,witliout the murderous knife and 

 saw and plough and spade ? 



Is there no way by which we can come to 

 an understanding of the fundamental laws 

 of nature and cease breaking them, and thus 

 cease suff'ering the penalties? 



That we may know these laws and assist in 

 their execution. That we may assist nature 

 instead of superseding her, let us stop and 

 think ! 



D. W. ADAilS. 



Wawken, Iowa. 



For the Western Pomologist. 



Poultry in the Orchard and Fruit Garden. 



We are having a very, dry, hot time up 

 here in Minnesota, though in some parts of 

 the State it is quite seasonable. Early 

 sowed wheat and oats, so far as I can learn, 

 are about as usual, but other crops are rather 

 light. Newly planted trees and root grafts 

 make but little growth as yet. The drouth 

 was hard on strawberries — a short season 

 and light crop, and equally so on the rasp- 

 berry ; some varieties dried up before ripen- 

 ing. Of those that done best were Doolittle, 

 Miami, and the Mammoth Cluster. The 

 Green Prolific stands drouth the best of 

 any strawberry I ever grew, and should be 

 in all gardens. Our plum crop is moderate- 

 ly fair, as a whole, but badly thinned on 

 some trees by the cureulio, but least harm 

 done where the poultry range most. We 

 once had our currant patch enclosed from 

 the poultry, but soon threw it open to get 

 rid of a green worm that ate into the berry 

 and webbed whole clusters together, and it 

 was not long before the pest disappeared. — 

 And so with the worm that cats the leaves ; 

 they quickly disappear when you make the 

 patch the feeding place and consequently 

 the resort of the poultry — the turkey doing 

 the best service. Indeed, at this era of 

 insect progress I would give up farming 

 and fruit growing, were it not for the aid of 

 my poultry. Though the currant and goose- 

 berry patch was the chief range of the 

 poultry, of which there were over 200 fowls, 

 and scarce that many bushes, yet could 

 scarce miss the fruit on the lowest limbs. — 

 We had troughs of mixed feed — corn meal, 

 shorts, and wheat bran for them to go to 

 as soon as they left the roost in the morn- 

 ing, and later in the day, dry corn and 

 mill-screanings. Fill up with such feed, and 

 all kinds of fruit is safe from poultry depre- 

 dations ; but be sure they have plenty as 

 soon as they leave the roost. High feed 

 don't prevent their devouring insects. The 

 greater the incentive to range and scratch 

 the better, and he who keeps the large 

 Shanghai or Brama don't know his needs. — 

 I have done by poultry as I have by fruit ; 

 have tried nearly all varieties of note, and 

 find, all things considered, the Dominique 

 the best. They are good layers, good set- 

 ters, unsurpassed for the table, and will 

 scratch and range over more space than any 



others that I am familiar with. 



Peter M. Gideon. 



Excdiior, Minn. 



The Bigabo CnERRV. — The Noi'thwestem 

 Farmer, (Indianapolis, Ind.,) says Mr. John- 

 son, of the Citizens National Bank, of that 

 city, has a tree of this variety of cherries, 

 which is the fullest tree of cherries we ever 

 saw, and where not too much crowded, the 

 fruit is enormous in size. It is a rare fruit in 

 this State, but a most excellent one. The 

 seeds are very small, flesh solid, and flavor 

 excellent. 



