COMMERCIAL PEAR ORCHARDS. 131 



the roots of the tree and the fact that salt will retain moisture is suf- 

 ficient to recommend it as a preventive of that disease. I do not 

 think salt has any other virtue in preventing blight than its proper- 

 ties of retaining moisture. 



Day — I had a friend from the east visiting with me and he said in 

 his country pear growers used a great deal of salt to prevent blight. 



Masters — Well, it does in a measure prevent it, but it is not a sure 

 cure by any means ; its only virtue is what I have stated. 



Williams, of Iowa — Several years ago I planted out three 

 hundred pear trees and now I have four left. I tried filings, scraps, 

 everything in fact but salt, and I don't think that would have saved 

 them unless it had been " White Oak" soil. 



Carpenter — I don't think " White Oak " soil has anything to do 

 with it. Out in Utah they raise good pears and they do not have a 

 soil much different from ours here. 



President — Probably they have a " White Oak " climate. 

 Samuel Barnard — I have got over my hallucination in regard 

 to pears. I grow some but do not pretend to make a business of it ; 

 have six or eight trees growing near some evergreens, so the pears are 

 shaded on the south and west ; this keeps the ground cool and pre- 

 vents the hot winds from drying up and killing the trees. I gener- 

 ally have some fruit from my pear trees, and I think probably we 

 might raise pears to a considerable extent if we could shade the orch- 

 ard with evergreens so to keep the ground always cool. I sell a few 

 pear trees because my customers wish them, but I never recommend 

 them as they are a very uncertain tree. Of course it will do no harm 

 to plant a few trees just to experiment with, but I would not advise 

 planting them to any considerable extent, as their cultivation is sure 

 to result in loss. I think, as a Society, we should not advise pears 

 for general planting, but we might recommend them for trial. 



Stephens — The Yankee always wants to do the impossible, and if 

 you tell him that any certain thing cannot be done, that is the very 

 thing he wants to try ; and he generally succeeds in the end. Although 

 pear growing at present seems to be rather an " up-hill" business, I 

 think eventually we shall overcome the obstacles now in our way, and 

 raise them successfully and profitably. The prices at which pears 

 sell warrant me in saying that if we could raise anything like a full 

 crop, say every other year, we could then make more money from a 



