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HOME-MADE CIDER VINEGAR. 



Ha-Rdy Fruit Buds and Blossoms. — Dr. Halsted's 

 notes (May American Garden) on the condition of peach 

 buds in New Jersey are suggestive. We also were fav- 

 ored with Italian-like weather up to the last days of 

 February, when it was followed by a number of days of 

 very low temperature with dry westerly winds. The 

 buds of our hardy peaches, of Pi-imns Simoni, Priiiins 

 virgata, the Japan plums, and other plants from less rig- 

 orous climes, were started, and utterly killed by the sud- 

 den change, Though the buds of Pruniis Maacki, Primus 

 triloba, the common lilac, and other plants from Siberia, 

 the valley of the Amur, and northwestern China, twere 

 started still more, yet they came through the 25° below 

 zero weather without apparent injury. 



This seems to prove that even the unfolding buds of 

 some hardy plants are capable of enduring extremes of 

 temperature which will kill even the dormant fruit buds 

 of the peach, and many other less hardy plants. Even 

 when fully expanded, some of the plants of the Amur 

 will endure a freeze that would destroy the half opened 

 buds of even our native plums. As an instance : three 

 years ago our plants of Pruiius Si/'erica, or Russian 

 apricot, were in full, bloom the last of March, and were 

 subjected to a frost that formed ice in a watering trough 

 near them, nearly half an inch thick; yet not a flower 

 was injured, and we grew hundreds of seedlings from 

 the almonds that matured. In like manner, the foliage 

 and nearly expanded fruit buds of Primus Maacki have 

 been severely frozen without show of injury, when the 

 starting foliage and buds of even the native willows were 

 blackened. This gives us a hint that we may yet secure 

 varieties of the peach, almond, and possibly other fruits, 

 from the home of Prunus Maacki and the Amur almond, 

 which will endure a low temperature when the buds are 

 started. In the last letter received from the lamented 

 Charles Gibb, when in northwest China, he stated that 

 peaches and apricots were really grown in Mongolia and 

 the valley of the Amur, and that he would devise means 

 for obtaining them. 



To a great extent, the fruit trees and shrubs we have 

 on trial from the interior provinces of Russia and north 

 central Asia, are provided with very hardy fruit buds 

 and blossoms. It has long been known that the half or 

 fully expanded blossom of the Oldenburg apple would 



safely pass through frosts or bad weather that would 

 ruin those of most of our fruits of west European ori- 

 gin, and we now find that dozens of varieties from its 

 home on the Volga will endure as much and some even 

 more. 



The cherries, plums and pears of the interior steppe 

 of Russia we find have equally hardy buds and blossoms. 

 As an instance : in the spring of 1888 we had a very 

 heavy frost, when our native plums, the Richmond 

 cherry, and a number of the Russian cherries were in 

 blossom or the buds nearly open. The native plums 

 were nearly all ruined, and there were no Early Rich- 

 mond or other common cherries grown in the state; yet 

 some of our Russians were well loaded with fruit. 



So far, it appears to me, too little attentfon has been 

 given to the relative hardiness and perfection of the 

 blossoms of our fruit trees and shrubs. Aside from the 

 question of relative hardiness, close observation has 

 shown that many of the cultivated varieties have defec- 

 tive blossoms. The Rogers' hybrid, and some other 

 grapes, we find have little, if any, perfect pollen, and 

 are barren unless intermingled with those possessing 

 perfect flowers, and the same is true of some of our 

 raspberries, plums and apples. Again, some of our 

 plums and other fruits have apparently perfect blossoms, 

 yetthey fail in ourclimate to be self-fertilizing, as the pol- 

 len is ripened and wasted before the stigma is ready to 

 receive it. I hope that able observers and experimenters 

 will give more attention to the subject than has been 

 given in the past. 



The past unusual winter gave us a good opportunity 

 for the selection of trees and plants that winter well . 

 While many of the half-hardy and really hardy plants 

 were well started when the cold wave struck us, we 

 found dozens of our native trees and shrubs, and dozens 

 of varieties of apples, pears, cherries, plums, and all 

 other trees and shrubs from east Europe and north cen- 

 tral Asia, with buds as perfectly dormant as they were 

 in November. As a rule, these are the truly hardy trees 

 in wood, bud and blossom ; yet, as stated, many plants 

 that hibernate less perfectly than the peach, we must 

 still retain in our hardy list as exceptions to a general 

 rule. 



lozva Agricu/tura! College. J. L. Budd. 



HOME-MADE CIDER-VINEGAR. 



The wholesale adulteration of commercial vine- 

 gar makes it important that everyone who grows 

 apples should manufacture a good quality of cider- 

 vinegar for home use, and for the local market. 

 We doubt if there is much money to be made by 

 the general apple grower in manufacturing vinegar 

 upon a large scale, but a small quantity is often 

 salable and profitable. We have frequent inqui- 

 ries concerning the best methods of making vinegar, 



in reply to which we publish the following instruc- 

 tions from L. R. Bryant, of Princeton, Illinois. 

 Secretary of the Cider and Cider- Vinegar Makers' 

 Association of the northwest, and which appeared 

 in a late number of the Prairie Farmer. 



The essentials for making cider-vinegar on a small 

 scale are a grinder to grate up the apples into a fine pulp, 

 a good press to extract the juice, barrels to put the 

 juice in, a frost-proof room or cellar to store the pro- 



