THE SLOSSON ORCHARD. 



33 



siderable damage both to the fruits and flowers. On the Seckel it 

 interfered materially with the results. The general tendency of this 

 orchard not to fruit made the effects of cross-pollination stand out prom- 

 inently in the self-sterile varieties. The results In this and the second 

 orchard agreed more precisely with the lirst two series than did the 

 Eochester work. 



The Slosson orchard. — This orchard is the property of Mrs. William 

 Slosson, who kindly allowed the trees to be used for the experiments. 

 The orchard consists of several hundred line youug Angouleme, Anjou, 

 and Olairgeau dwarfs, about 14 years old, well trimmed, and in good 

 condition. The ground liad not been fertilized for tlie T)ast five years, so 

 that some, if not all the trees, appeal ed in need of plant food. Probably 

 the pruning had not been severe enough for the best results. The 

 orchard bloomed very heavily and fruited moderately. 



The flowers began to open at Geneva on May 10, the vegetation 

 being a]3parently a day or more later than at Eochester. Both pollina- 

 tion and simple bagging experiments were carried on. On May 13-15 

 paper bags were i)laced on a number of trees in the same manner as in 

 the other experiments. The methods used by Mr. Fairchild in the 

 pollination experiments were somewhat different from mine and pos- 

 sessed some points of advantage. Instead of using pollen from open 

 blossoms in the orchard, he took it from tlowers which had been allowed 

 to open in a warm room. 



Branches supporting numerous nearly mature flower clusters were 

 cut and placed in water^ each variety by itself, in a room free from 

 flies. The purity of the pollen was in this manner insured and i)robably 

 the quality was in no appreciable degree injured. The emasculating 

 was at first performed with a sharx^ knife or scalpel, but later a i)air of 

 strong pinchers was employed, and the calyx tips and a part of the disk, 

 with petals and stamens adhering, were removed. Instead of emascu- 

 lating the flowers and pollinating at once, rather young buds were 

 emasculated from one to three days before the tree came into flower, 

 and when the other flowers opened pollen was applied. The bags were 

 removed and the count taken by myself on June 16 and 17. I there- 

 fore had the advantage of seeing how^ everything looked and of noting 

 the condition of the trees and comparing them with those of the other 

 experiments. 



Weather record. — The w^eather conditions at Geneva were, I think, 

 favorable for the healthy growth of the flowers. A predominance of 

 sunshine during the critical time gave abundance of opportunities for 

 insects to effect cross-pollination. The following table shows the 

 temperature and rainfall during the blooming period: 

 11870— No. 5 3 



