Proceedings of the Farmers' Club. 335 



American States. The orange is the most beautiful of all fruit trees. 

 It grows with a round, symmetrical head to the height of thirty feet, 

 has a bright, glossy green leaf with an apron or wing upon the stem. 

 The bark is of an ash or steel-gray color, and the twigs, which are of 

 a dark green, are profusely bestudded with the most aggravating 

 thorns. The sweet and mild trees may readily be distinguished by 

 the leaf. The sweet leaf is of a darker green, and the apron upon 

 the^stem is larger in proportion to the main leaf. The tree flowers 

 in January and February ; the fruit begins to change its color in 

 September, but cannot be said to have fully ripened until, the follow- 

 ing spring. It clings to the tree with great tenacity for many months, 

 improving as it hangs, until during the following season it becomes 

 perfectly delicious. One who has not gathered directly from the 

 tree an orange thus ripened, knows little of its true flavor. Upon 

 the wild trees the flowers, the gum fruit, and the ripe oranges, one 

 and two years old, may often be found. 



) It is stoutly affirmed in Florida that the orange seed will always be 

 true to its kind, but in the Hearth and Home, of Nov. 4th, I find the 

 remark that " there is no certainty that the varieties of the orange 

 will reproduce themselves from the seed. If a particular variety is 

 desired it must be budded." I cannot agree with the writer. I have 

 seen, in the vicinity of Daytona, seed lingorange trees in full bearing 

 eight years old, the fruit the exact counterpart of that in Mr. Sutton's 

 grove, whence the seedling were taken. But the wild groves found 

 in the true orange belt show most conclusively to my mind the seed 

 is true to its variety. At Daytona we have very large groves of 

 bitter, sweet and sour oranges. Now, if the seed is not true, and, as is 

 affirmed, the sweet orange is an accidental offshoot from the wild orange, 

 we should find in these groves an endless variety of oranges. There 

 should be sweet and sour, bitter sweet, bitter sour, and bitter pure and 

 simple, with every conceivable variation of form, color and flavor. I 

 admit all that is done in the way of improving fruits by budding and 

 crossing in various ways, but when " in the beginning the earth brought 

 forth grass and herd yielding seed after his kind and the tree yielding 

 fruit whose seed was in itself after his kind, and God saw it was good," 

 I think it was part of the divine plan that every seed should be true 

 to its variety. 



In selecting a location for an orange grove, I think regard must 

 be had to climate. North of about latitude twenty-nine and one- 

 half degrees, the winters are too severe, and render the crops unreli- 

 able. Last winter, orange trees were killed at Jacksonville and in 



