m 



More and*B 





Where to Plant the Stone Fruits 



WHILE the apples and pears are the best tree 

 fruits for the Northern States, we would not 

 wish to do without the stone fruits. The trees 

 bearing the stone fruits, as compared with the 

 apple and pear trees, are shorter-lived, and the 

 fruit more quickly perishes after ripening, but the 

 trees come into bearing sooner and require less land, 

 so that they are therefore better adapted to garden 

 culture than the standard 

 apples and pears. 



Do not make the mistake of 

 planting foreign varieties, hab- 

 ituated to a warm region, in 

 our cold climate. If I had 

 taken the advice of experienced 

 and conservative fruit growers, 

 it would have kept me from 

 making costly errors. A New 

 York nurseryman recommend- 

 ed Japan plums for general 

 planting in New York State. 

 I bought a lot of trees, and 

 planted them on rather low rich 

 ground, where some European 

 plums were doing fairly well. 

 The trees grew rapidly for 

 four or five years, and were 

 entirely satisfactory, then began 

 to gradually die, and two years 

 later every one was dead. I 

 also lost some sweet cherries 

 and peach trees which the 

 nurseryman told me I could 

 grow. 



The English Morello generally thrives well, but 

 the Montmorency cherry may be placed at the head 

 of all sour cherries. It makes a very symmetrical 

 and handsome tree. 



A block of sour cherries on our farm is the most 

 profitable fruit of many kinds grown. These trees 

 were planted on a slope. The soil was loamy 

 red sandstone, had grown corn and clover, and 

 was only moderately rich. The trees were planted 

 twenty feet apart each way, and cultivated crops 



CHERRIES 



From personal experience it 

 is perfectly safe to plant sour 

 cherries anywhere in New York, 



and in most of the Northern States. I know of no 

 stone fruit I would plant with more confidence than 

 the Earlv Richmond and Montmorency cherries. 



Plant Japanese plums on high ground. The trees bear large crops if early blossoms are 



not killed, by the frost 



Turn the chickens into the plum orchard, 

 will help destroy the curculio 



They 



were grown between them for two or three years, 

 after which the ground was seeded to clover and 

 other grasses. 



The proper way to grow a cherry tree is to clip 

 the end of the branches each year to aid nature a 

 little in keeping the correct form, and an occasional 

 slight thinning of the branches to let in sunshine. 

 This is all the pruning the cherry tree needs. Grow 

 in moderately rich soil. The cherry tree is more 

 hardy and longer-lived when planted on an eleva- 

 tion, in well-drained soil that is not too rich in 

 nitrogen. A slow but steady growth makes the 

 best tree. 



It is my experience that the sweet cherries are 

 too tender to live many years, outside of the peach 

 belt, unless given special culture. In the peach belt 

 Black Tartarian, Windsor and Bing are good 

 varieties of black cherries, and Yellow Spanish 

 and Napoleon of yellow cherries. These will 

 thrive in about the same conditions as does the 

 peach. 



CONCERNING PLUMS 



For a plum tree that will give fruit when the 

 foreign varieties are all dead, plant the American 

 or native plums of the Wild Goose type. Few 

 nurserymen catalogue the native plums because 

 as yet there is no demand for them and because 

 it is easier to grow the European and Japanese 

 trees. However if you live in the peach belt and 

 want an abundance of plums of rather inferior 

 quality but which are very good for canning, plant 

 the Japan varieties. 



243 



In Southeastern New York (which is outside the 

 peach belt) where the temperature sometimes falls 

 to 20 degrees below zero, I plant the Japan plums 

 on high land, and not in very rich soil and the trees 

 do not winter-kill. A number of the Japan plum 

 trees I have mentioned, that finally winter-killed on 

 low rich soil, were entirely hardy in the same locality 

 when planted on high ground; but they have 

 blossomed so early in the season that the fruit has 

 been killed, anc the trees have produced a crop. 

 only about every third year 

 I think if I wanted Japan 

 plums I would plant the Bur- 

 bank, with a few trees of 

 Abundance and Red June. 



The European plums can 

 be grown fairly well in all 

 parts of New York, and in 

 latitudes not colder, but re- 

 member the principle that a 

 tree or plant is made hardy or 

 tender by its environment, 

 and so plant them on an 

 elevation, when possible, and 

 in not over-rich soil. On the 

 farm the best place for all fruit 

 trees, and especially the stone 

 fruits, is on an exposed hill- 

 side, or on elevations and 

 knolls, where there is natural 

 drainage. Do not force the 

 growth of the trees with 

 nitrogen; exposure and slow 

 growth, I maintain, will make 

 a tree hardy and long-lived. 

 The most of the European 

 plums will live a few years and 

 bear fine fruit when planted 

 on low ground in the alluvial 

 soils that are rich in humus, 

 and are worth planting under 

 such conditions if one can do no better. 



European plums are .subject to the curculio and 

 black knot, which invest these more than the Japanese 



This shows the right height and form of orchard 

 trees. The fru*it is within reach 



