416 
The conditions must be favorable beyond 
expectation when ten per cent of the 
flowers set fruit. A correspondent asks 
why more apples were borne on the 
north side than on the south of his 
trees in the summer of 1901. Taking the 
bloom chart for 1901 and comparing the 
directions of the wind during the days 
when the trees were in bloom, it will be 
seen that the wind held steadily south- 
west, blowing from five to 20 miles per 
hour. The question then arose as to 
why the blossoms on the south side of 
the tree were not fertilized by the wind 
carrying pollen from the tree directly 
south of it in the same row, if the wind 
is an agent of pollination. The theory 
was advanced at the time that perhaps 
bees did most of the work of pollina- 
tion and worked out of the wind. Later 
experiments have gone to show that this 
is largely true, though they do work in 
the wind. During the blooming period 
of Huntsman, when it was not blowing 
a gale, the wind was south or east. To 
find out how much truth there was in 
the above theory, the bees were counted 
on each side of the tree in a hasty way 
so as to count as few as possible twice. 
During the time when Huntsman was in 
full bloom, with an east wind and the 
sun shining warmly, there were counted 
20 bees on the west side and eight on 
the east. Taking the same tree with a 
wind blowing at a rate of about seven 
or eight miles an hour from the south 
and small “choppy” clouds flying, there 
were counted 16 bees on the north side 
and five on the south. On April 30 
Kinnaird was in full bloom and an east 
wind was blowing at a rate of 10 or 12 
miles an hour. The day was warm and 
sunny and the bees were out in force. 
Five bees were counted on the east side 
and 10 on the west of one tree and on 
another of the same variety four bees 
were counted on the east side and 16 
on the west. These figures cannot be 
laid to the bees’ preference to sunshine 
or shade as they worked in the full sun- 
shine in one case and in the shade on 
another. There was not much difference 
in the temperature for the different days. 
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF PRACTICAL HORTICULTURE 
By waiching the bees dung the time 
when the work of pollinating the flowers 
was being carried on, it was noticed 
that in every case the bees chose the 
Side of the tree most )iotected from the 
wind. The honey bee was the principal 
visitor, though other bees were noticed 
to be at work. But two bumble bers 
were noticed during the whole week that 
the work was being cairied on. Six 
species of bees were noticed at one time 
at one tree. Bees were noticed to visit 
the same flower five or six times during 
the course of 15 or 20 minutes, and it is 
safe to say that each flower was visited 
25 or 80 times during the day, and could 
scarcely have escaped pollination from 
this source. Many other insects were 
seen to visit the flowers to eat the pollen, 
to gather honey or to prey on other in- 
sects. In any case they may have, to 
some extent, aided in pollination. The 
greatest agent of pollination is undoubt- 
edly the honey bee, though in its ab- 
sence other species would carry on the 
work to such an extent as to insure a 
crop of apples were the weather favor-. 
able for the work of bees during the 
blooming period. 
To ascertain the extent to which the 
wind is an agent of pollination, mucro- 
scope slides were set in the orchard to 
catch pollen. These slides were pre- 
pared by smearing them with pure glyc- 
erine. The slides were numbered and 
the height and distances were recorded 
for that number. Afterwards these slides 
were taken in and examined with a 
microscope to find how many pollen 
grains had been caught. The days when 
these slides were put in the orchard 
were ideal for pollination. The sun was 
Shining and a great many anthers were 
dehiscing. The wind was blowing at a 
rate of about five or six miles an hour. 
The slides set very near a full blooming 
Rome Beauty were left four hours. Num- 
ber one was set at a height of about six 
feet and 20 feet away from the tree, but 
one grain of pollen was found to adhere 
to it; number two at eight feet high and 
12 feet from the tree caught but one 
pollen grain; number three at a height 
