22 APPALACHIAN AND WHITE MOtJNTAIH WATEESHEDS. 



The success of apple orchards on. soils and locations as already 

 described, however, caused plantings to be made at greater and 

 greater elerations, on very steep lands. As a result, orchards in 

 such places are much less profitable than twenty years ago, simply 

 from the increase in cost of labor, and eventually this item will, and 

 in fact does already, make it impossible to compete in the production 

 of apples with other areas where the decrease in the amount of labor 

 necessary wall more than offset the additional cost of land more 

 economically worked. But even more striking is the problem of 

 insect and fungus attacks. It is not economically feasible to plant 

 orchards in the eastern United States where the land is so steep that 

 the orchards can not be effectively sprayed at a reasonable expense, 

 and the fact that this has been done in some cases in the past argues 

 nothing for its probable success in the future. 



Again, on some of these steep lands orchards have been planted 

 at so great an elevation that the yield of fruit has been much lessened, 

 the bloom having been destroyed or the trees winter-killed more 

 often than at a more moderate elevation. The climate, then, goes 

 hand in hand with the steep and rugged features and the character 

 of the soils of large areas in this region to render their use for other 

 than forest purposes impracticable. 



The Great Smoky Mountains lying to the west and southwest of 

 the Blue Ridge are generally roiigh and valueless for am' purpose 

 except the growing of timber. Throughout the higher mountains 

 cultivation is impracticable because the soils rapidly erode when 

 cleared and farmed. The sand and gravel washed from the moun- 

 tain fields are carried down in large quantities to the lower courses- 

 of the streams in the piedmont region and deposited on valuable 

 agricultural lands, rendering them valueless. Single floods will 

 occasionally leave deposits several feet in thickness. 



CirilBEELAXD JIOUXTAIXS. 



In the Cumberland ilountain region the soils are naturally much 

 less productive than on and east of the Blue Ridge. They are more 

 similar to the soils of the Great Smol?y Mountains, being derived 

 principally from sandstone. On the top of the escarpment which 

 borders the Tennessee Yalley on the west, the character of the topog- 

 raphy is less rugged. The soils spread out more in the form of table- 

 lands, wliich often include areas of level to moderately rolling land. 

 The underlying rock, however, is so resistant to weathering that the 

 soil has seldom accumulated to much depth, and often it is very 

 stony from the fragments of sandstone. As a result, in many places 

 these soils are ill suited to agriculture. When of sufficient depth to 

 constitute agricultural land, moderate crops can be grown, but the 

 soil is not naturally very productive and requires a good deal of fer- 

 tilization. Transportation in this region also presents a difficiilt 

 problem. The railroads have followed the little valleys, leaving the 

 broad uplands between them, from which they are separated by a 

 steep escarpment of 1 ,000 feet or more, in an isolated location ; hence 

 the possibilities for practicable and profitable agricultural develop- 

 ment in tills region are ver^^ limited. 



