VI PREFACE 



more accurate than those of the apples, grapes, plums or cherries, and yet 

 these are not as exact as might be wished. Although most carefully- 

 selected, an illustration of one or two fruits does not give an adequate picture 

 of a variety. Neither does the camera take colors quite as the eye sees 

 them nor can the plate-maker quite reproduce what the camera takes. 

 The illustrations are of life-size as the peaches grow on the grounds of this 

 Station and represent specimens of average size and color. The fruits, 

 as shown in the plates, look small for the reason that a flat picture of a round 

 object minifies size. 



In all of these fruit-books it has been difficult to decide what varieties 

 merit color-plates and fiill descriptions. Briefly, the choice of sorts to be 

 illustrated and described in detail has been determined by the following 

 considerations: (i) By the value of the variety for home or commercial 

 orchards; (2) the probable value if the peach is a new sort on probation; 

 (3) its desirability as a parent in breeding new peaches or to show combina- 

 tions of varieties, to illustrate new characters, or to show the range in varia- 

 tion — in a word to enlighten the peach-breeder ; (4) not a few varieties 

 are described and illustrated to show the trend of peach-evolution — for 

 their historical value; (5) to show relationships of varieties. 



The peach is profoundly influenced by soil, climate and culture, and a 

 discussion of its status is not complete without taking full account of the 

 environment in which it is growing. For this reason, chiefly, the peach- 

 regions and peach-growing in New York are discussed as fully as space 

 permits. This part of the book is designed, also, to serve the prospective 

 peach-planter in this State in the selection of locations and soils and in the 

 culture of the peach. Since the cultivation of any plant changes from year 

 to year, though, experiment station bulletins and circulars and treatises 

 on the culture of the peach should supply growers of this fruit with better 

 information on the year-to-year management of the peach-plantation. 



The botany of the peach, as compared with its congeners, the phwa and 

 the cherry, is simple, indeed, and is well agreed upon by botanical writers, 

 so that this book may be said to be almost wholly a horticultural one. 

 Yet the few pages devoted to the botany of the peach may make plainer, 

 to the horticulturist at least, the botany of this fruit. 



The chief contribution The Peaches of New York makes to pomology 

 is in the descriptions of varieties it contains. All who grow or use peaches 

 are dependent on descriptions of fruit and tree for the identification of 

 varieties. From a well-written description one should get an exact mental 



