SOILS OE MASSACHUSETTS AttD CONNECTICUT. 57 



growth under uniform conditions of moisture and thus produce the 

 firm yet crisp texture and the remarkable juiciness for which this 

 variety is noted. 



A dealer in cider apples who has bought the fruit from two 

 orchards on the same farm in northeastern Massachusetts for many 

 years testifies that the apples from the orchard with subsoil of heavy 

 loam to clay loam yield from 5 to 7 per cent more juice than apples 

 from the orchard on sandy soil and subsoil. On the State farm at 

 Bridgewater, Ehode Island Greening is very successfully grown on 

 a rich, heavy loam from 10 to 16 inches deep. The fruit is large 

 and is said to keep well until January in common storage. On the 

 sandy soils in the same region it is usually described as a fall apple. 

 If a high blush is desired, however, to meet other market require- 

 ment, a soil somewhat warmer than that described should be se- 

 lected — a deep, light, mellow loam or productive fine sandy loam 

 being favorable. To secure a " finish " of this character, soils 

 approaching more nearly to the Baldwin standard are best adapted. 



Plate XV shows Rhode Island Greening on heavy Gloucester 

 loam. Fruit is large and green. Plate XVI shows a tree yielding 

 heavily at six years of age on Wethersfield loam — a soil somewhat 

 lighter than the Gloucester loam in the preceding plate. 



In northwestern Massachusetts on the heavy phase of Gloucester 

 loam Rhode Island Greening bears heavily. The fruit is firm in 

 texture, of excellent quality, and keeps well until late winter. The 

 blush is usually well developed. The variety is highly profitable in 

 this locality, but the call for red apples among the buj^ers who come 

 there is so strong that no Rhode Island Greenings are included in 

 the younger plantings. 



The loam and silt loam of the Bernardston series of the Western 

 Highlands are also especially well adapted to the Rhode Island 

 Greening, giving greener fruit than the Gloucester loam. 



In eastern Massachusetts the variety drops from the trees earlier 

 than in the western part, but this is undoubtedly due largely to the 

 difference in elevation. This tendency would doubtless be retarded 

 somewhat by planting on heavier soils. 



In southern Connecticut and somewhat farther north in the Con- 

 necticut Valley, Rhode Island Greening is generally found less 

 satisfactory than in Massachusetts. In many cases the fruit is not 

 a deep, dark green even at harvest time, but rather a pale green, with 

 sometimes a suggestion of yellow. As the fruit ripens it rapidly be- 

 comes more yellow and the apple is much less desirable than that 

 grown in western Massachusetts or at good altitudes in Litchfield 

 County, Conn. The flavor is not well developed, the texture is not 

 as fine, and the keeping quality is poorer, most of the fruit being 

 consumed before New Years. In fact, the variety as grown in south- 



