212 
December, 1890. 
December in the Orchard. 
Trees may vet be planted with success so 
long as the ground is open and the weather 
not freezing. Mound up the young trans- 
planted trees as advised in November num- 
ber to prevent water from settling and freez- 
ing around them as well as to keep the wind 
from swaying them about and the mice 
from making nests and gnawing them. They 
may be protected from rabbits by putting 
tarred paper around the trunks, or by wash- 
ing them with lime-wash to which fresh 
blood has been added. Some recommend 
rubbing them with cows' liver which per- 
haps is just as good. 
Young nursery trees in some sections re- 
quire protection from rabbits either by tight 
fencing or washing as above stated. We 
once had nearly the whole of a yotmg nur- 
sery ruined by them before we were aware 
of it. so rapidly was the work done after a 
heavy snowfall. 
See to the apples that they are not decay- 
ing: if so assort them at once. They keep 
best in tight barrels at a temperature near 
to freezing. Clean up the orchard, remove 
decayed and broken limbs and put it in 
good shape for spring work. Store away 
baskets, ladders and all orchard implements 
in a suitable place. 
This has been a peculiar year in many 
sections. Small fruits have been a glut and 
have proved unprofitable to the growers, 
while in other districts they were cut short 
by untimely spring frosts. The apple and 
pear crops have been almost an entire failure 
over a very large portion of our fruit-grow- 
ing sections, except easternKansas and west- 
ern Missouri, where the crop has been abun- 
dant. Peaches have been almost a failure 
everywhere yet in some few individual in- 
stances they have been good. Here we never 
have had such a fine and abundant crop with 
such total failure around us. Quinces and 
plums, with us, were never better, and 
brought good prices. The former $4.00 per 
bushel and the latter $2.00 per case of 24 
quart boxes. The Angers quince has proved 
a better bearer than the Orange, but a little 
later.— J. Stayman. 
Whole Root versus Piece Root Grafts. 
We would again caution our readers not to 
be humbugged by ‘'whole root-grafted trees ” 
as an effort is being made by certain parties 
to show by long and windy articles that no 
other kind of root-grafted tree is of any 
value. This matter cannot be settled by 
such an advertising dodge to sell at a high- 
er price whole-root trees and to di-card all 
others. The parties that are working this 
matter are either young or inexperienced, 
or they would give some facts and not mere 
opinions and theories. 
Orchards set out with trees grafted on 
sections of roots, perhaps over seventy 
years ago, are as healthy and long lived 
as any other in the State; my father 
set out an orchard of trees from them 
about that time which was healthy and in 
fine condition some twenty years ago, when 
I last saw it. The best orchard I ever saw 
was a doubly worked orchard in Warren 
Co., Ohio, first grafted on sections of roots 
to form the trunks then top-grafted. The 
trees were all as near alike as different va- 
rieties of trees could be on the same kind 
of trunks. 
Forty-nine years ago, S. Blaksley near Un- 
iontown, Knox Co., Illinois, set out an or- 
chard and cut off all the tap roots and set 
his trees on flat stones. At the same time 
James Milam, on an adjoining farm set 
out an orchard of the same variety from the 
same nursery. Milam did not cut off the tap 
roots or set them on stones. Chas. McGrew 
helped set out both orchards, and says that 
the work was done about as well in both. 
The result was that Blaksley’s trees made 
the best growth, were the stoutest and largest 
trees ard always bore the largest crops. 
Milam’s trees began to fail at twenty years, 
whilst the others were goo 1. Seven years 
ago Milam's orchard was entirely gone 
whilst Blaksley’s was still a tolerably fair 
one. Charles McGrew, seeing the great 
difference in the growth and vigor of the 
above orchards, set out, forty-two years ago, 
an orchard on his own farm, but not having 
flat stones to set them upon he cut off the 
tap roots and set them on the hard earth. 
This orchard we have often seen and it was 
the best we ever saw in that section; it 
was a good orchard seven years ago. He 
has set out since that time three orchards 
near Bloomington, 111., cutting off the tap 
roots and setting them on flat stones with 
the same result as above stated. He was so 
well satisfied with the plan that seventeen 
years ago, when he came to Cherokee Co., 
Kan., he set out an orchard of 1000 trees, cut- 
ting off the tap roots and setting them on flat 
stones. This orchard to-day is said to be 
the best in the county, and I have no doubt 
of it, for we saw an orchard about 35 years 
ago, at Oneida, 111., in every other row of 
which, the trees had the tap roots cut off 
and were set on fiat stones. the alternate rows 
being set in the common way. So marked 
was the difference in size and vigor in favor 
of the rows with the cut tap roots and set 
on stones, that no person could hesitate in 
the matter.— J. Stayman. 
Russian Apples. 
It is very difficult for me to understand 
why there should just now be such a gen- 
eral disposition to decry the apples of north- 
eastern Europe, among writers for the hor- 
ticultural press. As long as we had only 
four or five of them they took their places 
without any stir, — and some of them took 
quite prominent p’aces, even in select lists. 
None of them stood high as dessert fruit, 
but their beauty, productiveness and hardi- 
ness led to their being very widely, if not 
very extensively planted. When the upper 
Mississippi valley began to be populated, 
these Russians were found to be the only 
apples that could stand up against the cli- 
mate extremes of that part of the country, 
and so, at the instance of prominent citizens 
there, a large collection of them was 
brought to the Department of Agriculture’s 
grounds at Washington, and thence distri- 
buted,— with the usual lack of good sense 
there, — to all sorts of people, all over the 
country. In this way two-thirds of them 
were practically, if not absolutelv, lost; but 
enough of them came under the notice of 
fruit-growers to induce an attempt at re- 
importation, in which Prof. Budd of Iowa 
and Mr. Chas. Gibbs of Canada were the 
agents. 
SINGULAR PHEJUDGMENT. 
Fully 250 varieties of Russian apples have 
been brought over; but until tbe present 
year but few of them have been fruited at 
all in the cold North and of the later im- 
portations scarcely anything can yet be 
known. Even those who have had the 
best opportunities to learn something about 
them, hold most of them yet under trial, 
and do not undertake to assign to them any 
relative, much less any absolute position, as 
compared with the well known sorts. Yet 
there are those who are bruising their shins 
and almost breaking their necks in their 
haste to condemn these new comers as be- 
ing all poor in quality, and worthless as 
keepers. Now if it be true (as it is) that 
none of us know much about many of them, 
these critics clearly know almost nothing. 
They are asking those of us who are fruit- 
ing them for samples, “testing" what few 
they get hold of before they are mature for 
eating, and promptly condemning them by 
wholesale. Thus they do not hesitate to 
put their own judgment upon these few 
and ill-treated specimens above that of those 
who grow them, handle them carefully, 
and give them a fair chance to show what 
may be their capacity to fill a widely felt 
want over a large area of our continent. 
WINTER RUSSIANS. 
It is surprising to see men calling them- 
selves experts in pomology who seem to be 
utterly unaware of some of the simplest 
facts of the science. When the long-keep- 
ing Baldwins and Greenings of middle New 
England are known to become fall fruit in 
southern New Jersey and Pennsylvania, — a 
distance of four or five degrees of latitude 
only, — is it so remarkable that some of the 
long-keepers of Russia, (all of which great 
empire is north of 45°J should show signs 
of premature ripening when grown south 
of our great lakes. If but a small propor- 
tion of the winter apples of Russia prove 
good keepers south of 45°, it does not follow 
that along our northern boundary and in 
Canada they may not equal or approach 
their home repute in that respect. It ought 
to be understood that those who have the 
most knowledge of and the most hope in 
these new apples, have not thought of 
recommending them for those parts of 
our continent already so well supplied with 
