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THE WESTERN POMOLOGIST. 



[1871 



mence, and the only care they require after that is 

 the proper airing, an occasional weeding and wat- 

 ering. I let them have all the warm rains that fall 

 during February and March. I have always suc- 

 ceeded in ripening fruit about the first of May, or 

 four weeks before it ripens in the open air, and of 

 the largest size and finest fiavor, much larger than I 

 have ever grown the same varieties out of doors. 

 From a frame 8 by 16, 1 picked the fii-st crop 25 

 quarts, the second 23, and the third 15 quarts. 

 From a frame 100 feet long, 8 feet wide, I picked 

 the first crop 120 quarts, which I sold at an average 

 of about two dollars per quart, starting at five dol- 

 lars and down to one dollar, netting two hundred 

 and twenty dollars, and the whole cost of the sash 

 and frame was one hundred and fifty dollars, and 

 they will last for ten or more years. 



Not more than two full crops can be taken from 

 one bed ; in growing for profit, it would probably 

 be advisable not to depend on more than one ; that 

 would only involve the necessity of shifting the 

 frame every season, which is a small matter. The 

 varieties I have found best adapted to this mode of 

 culture are the ' Wilson's Albany,' ' Russell's Pro- 

 lific,' ' Jucunda,' and ' Stinger.' I tried various 

 others without any success ; Triomphe de Gand, 

 Agriculturist, Fillmore and others, and in growing 

 for profit I would discard all but the two first 

 named. The Jucunda and Stinger attain to an 

 enormous size, are moderately productive, but not 

 sufficiently early for profit." 



Does the Stock Influence the Cralt? 



This question being up for discussion at a meet- 

 ing of the Michigan Pomological Society, Mr. B. 

 Hathaway made some statements, predicated upon 

 some years of observation, that strongly favor the 

 affirmative side of the question. 



He said of the truth of the general proposition 

 that the stock influences the graft, there can be no 

 question to a mind trained to close observation up- 

 on this subject. 



That the vigor of the graft is greatly dependent 

 upon the vigor of the stock, can hardly be a matter 

 of controversy. That a vigorous, strong growing 

 variety, like the Northern Spy apple, will infuse 

 something of its own vital force into a weaker 

 growing sort, like the Red Canada, is not a mat- 

 ter of conjecture, but has been abundantly dem- 

 onstrated. 



Probably some kinds of fruit, like the Rhode Isl- 

 and Greening apple, have so strongly marked an 

 individuality, are of so marked and positive a type, 

 that the variation from the influence of stock, 

 would seldom be appreciable; while in another 

 variety, like the Rambo, for instance, that is easily 

 varied by conditions, that it would always be more 

 or less apparent, and often very strikingly manifest; 



and I have not observed any other sort that ex- 

 hibits so great a variation from the influence of 

 stock as this variety, in all the characteristics of 

 size, color and flavor. 



In order to secure a positive, a marked variation, 

 the grafts must be set on trees of such age as to 

 have established a character and individuality of 

 some potency, and the stocks for experiment must 

 discover strongly marked contrasts. 



Yet this variety is not alone. I And those of a 

 more positive character giving every evidence of 

 variation from the influence of stock. The North- 

 ern Spy is one of these. 



I have ten trees of root-graft Northern Spy on 

 which the fruit is always nearly alike as to size and 

 color, except what results from the amount of fruit 

 on a tree ; while on forty trees of this kind put on 

 large seedling stocks, the variation is marked and 

 constant. That is, some trees give more highly 

 colored fruit than others, and do so from year to 

 year without regard to amount of crop, and the 

 same variation is found in size and quality. 



I have one Northern Spy on Rhode Island Green- 

 ing that always gives me my largest specimens for 

 the fairs, though of a pale coler. Two trees, close 

 by, grown on Esopus Spitzenberg, always give fruit 

 highly colored, but not so large. These are only a 

 few of the most noticeable examples that have fal- 

 len under my observation, in which marked differ- 

 ences in the fruit may be justly attributed, as I 

 think, to the influence exerted by the stock. It is 

 conceded that the character of the seed, in which 

 resides the germ of the future tree, is dependent 

 mostly, if not wholly, upon those subtle aromal in- 

 fluences that are instrumental in the fructification 

 of the blossoms. But few, however, have thought 

 to attribute to this cause any portion of difference 

 observable in the size, color and flavor of difierent 

 specimens of the same fruit grown on the same tree 

 and under apparently the same conditions. 



I this year gathered a half-dozen apples from a i 

 J'ambo tree, that were as completely russeted as any i 

 apple can be, and those apples were more crisp and 

 flrm than the ordinary Rambo apples — very like the i 

 Pomme Grise in quality, and no one would suspect i 

 from their appearance that they were not that ap- 

 ple. And I have seen many kindred facts that go ' 

 to show that the subtle influence that affects fructi- 

 fication does not stop with that act, but is traceble 

 in every stage of developement of the fruit from 

 the quickened germ to the ripened pulp. 



And does not this view accord with all the known 

 laws of generation in every department of nature? 

 And while we may not doubt that the stock exerts 

 very often a marked modifying influence in deter- 

 mining the character of the fruit, we must not over- 

 look, in our estimate, the less obvious, but no less 

 powerful principle of infloresence. 



