FRUIT GROWING FOR HOME USE IN THE GREAT PLAINS. OD 
some of the small fruits are also frequently found. The orchard 
fruits comprise principally apples, cherries, and native plums. 
Peaches are quite common in some sections, while occasionally pears 
and apricots are seen. 
In a few instances fruit plantations of commercial size have been 
developed entirely without irrigation, 10 to 20 acres—in a very few 
cases more—being devoted by a single individual to fruit growing. 
But such plantations are exceptional. Where they do exist they 
have been developed gradually with the increasing experience of the 
owner. 
The fruit from commercial orchards in this region, and from the 
home fruit gardens whenever there is a surplus, always sells very read- 
ily, buyers sometimes driving 40 and 50 miles across the plains to 
obtain it. 
The possibility of growing fruit at many points in the central and 
southern Great Plains may be said, within certain limits at least, to 
have been demonstrated. In the majority of the orchards and fruit 
gardens investigated the results have justified the efforts that have 
been made. In numerous widely separated cases very satisfactory 
returns have been secured. In many sections a complete crop failure 
is rare. 
Not all of the efforts to grow fruit, however, have been successful. 
Many things have contributed to failure. The one ever-present diffi- 
culty where only the natural rainfall is available is lack of moisture. 
Yet after the trees are well established it is not often that this causes 
more than temporary losses, as a crop of fruit for a single season. 
In some sections hail is frequent and occasionally causes great dam- 
age not only to the fruit but to the trees. Many regard it as the most 
serious factor that has to be considered. Late spring frosts are also 
a cause of much injury. But with all the difficulties, rarely is the 
effort to grow fruit one to be regretted. Those who have been suc- 
cessful prize beyond any commensurate monetary value the product 
of their trees and bushes. 
THE OUTLOOK FOR THE FUTURE. 
The vast majority of settlers on the Great Plains must depend upon 
their own plantations for a supply of fruit for home use. Most of 
those who do not have home-grown fruit are obliged to do without it. 
The chief interest, therefore, in the cultivation of fruit in this region 
centers about the home and the production of enough to meet the 
needs or desires of each family. _ 
Here and there, as above stated, there are fruit plantations of com- 
mercial size. Doubtless others will be developed in the future. But 
[ Cir. 51] 
