122 
July, 1891. 
£ 
ORCHRRD 
GARDEN 
July in the Orchard. 
Summer Cultivation— Essential# to Success in June 
Budding— Handling Summer Apples and Pears. 
Trees, plants and nursery stock must now 
be well cultivated and kept free from weeds 
as they suffer from neglect more at this 
time than at any other, especially as the 
ground often becomes very dry. No other 
treatment is so effectual in dry weather as 
constant stirring of the soil, but when once 
commenced it should be continued until 
rain falls. This is better than mulching and 
costs less labor. 
But it must be remembered that clean 
cultivation should be given from the com- 
mencement to the end if we want to reap 
the best results. No after treatment is suf- 
ficient to restore neglected plants or trees. 
No one can be successful in any pursuit 
who neglects doing his business in season 
and much less so in orcharding. It is safe 
to say that over one-half the nursery stock 
planted is lost by neglect, and fully half of 
the crop of fruit is lost from the same cause. 
We have received a card from Mr. E. T. 
Daniels, of Melior, Kansas, asking for in- 
formation on June-budding trees. He says 
he can get the buds to take but fails to 
make them grow. He wants the particu- 
lars. We do not tie differently than at any 
other season; no tighter above the bud than 
below. We head back to the bud just as 
soon as it has taken, and keep all of the 
suckers or other shoots off, to force the bud 
to grow at once. If they do not grow then 
the stocks are not vigorous or they have not 
been well cultivated. There is no mystery 
about the matter: the stocks must be strong 
and in vigorous growth, budded as soon as 
it can be done, and headed back to the bud 
just as soon as the buds have taken. Then 
al 1 the suckers taken and kept off to force the 
bud into active growth. If this is done early, 
on good stocks, thoroughly cultivated, they 
will nearly every one make good fine trees; 
of course not as large as fall-budded, but 
for many uses just as good, if not better. 
Early summer apples and pears will soon 
commence to ripen, and preparation should 
be made in due season for picking and dis- 
posing of them. It is best to pick summer 
fruit before too ripe as it can then be hand- 
led better and will bring a higher price. 
Fruit in very warm weather deteriorates 
and soon becomes of little value, and there- 
fore must be disposed of at once. — J. STAY- 
MAN. ^ 
Most varieties of pears are much finer in 
flavor if picked from the tree and ripened 
in the house than if allowed to become ful- 
ly matured on the tree. Change of color in 
the fruit, the readiness of the stalk to part 
from its branch on gently raising the fruit, 
the ripening of worm-eaten specimens, are 
the signs which indicate the proper season 
of gathering pears. 
Orchard Notings. 
THE SHIAWASSEE APPLE. 
The commercial value of the Fameuse 
apple, in New England and Canada at least, 
cannot well be over-estimated. This value 
extends beyond the true Fameuse to its 
seedlings, many of which very closely re- 
semble the parent variety, — some so nearly 
as to be sold for it, — though such among 
them as are most likely to pass undetected 
by the eye are often the easiest of detection 
by other senses. “ Cabane du Chien," or 
St. Hilaire, is one of these which, being 
very free from spot, is often used to “dea- 
con” barrels of Fameuse, — though it would 
be hard to sell it in quantity for its parent 
to any expert on apples. McIntosh Red is 
pretty free from spot in some localities, and 
its large size, rich color, and high, though 
peculiar flavor, tend to make it popular; 
but its size will necessitate its being sold on 
its own merits. Shiawassee is also distinct, 
— yet if marketed as “Michigan Fameuse” 
it would receive acceptance, for it has the 
Fameuse flesh and flavor, with somewhat 
larger size. The only question about it is 
in regard to its freedom from fungous spot- 
ting. As my own favorable experience with 
the Shiawassee has been to some extent 
nullified with readers of Orchard and 
Garden by the unfavorable report of my 
friend Craig, of the Ottawa Experiment 
Station, whose every word on such a mat- 
ter carries weight, I have been at some 
pains to reach headquarters on the subject. 
I have heretofore expressed a doubt of Mr. 
Craig’s having the true Shiawassee, it being 
often substituted by nurserymen with 
Fameuse, — for they rarely have the true 
sort, and are misled by the usually exact 
but here erroneous statement in Downing’s 
Fruits and Fruit Trees of America to the 
effect that the two fruits are indistin- 
guishable to the eye. This is so far 
from being the fact that it would be im- 
possible to sell the Shiawassee for Fameuse 
to any one familiar with the latter. I sub- 
join extracts from letters lately received 
from President T. T. Lyon and Secretary 
Charles W. Garfield, of Michigan, who are 
unquestionably the best authorities on this 
matter. Mr. Lyon writes: “I was the first 
to bring out the Shiawassee, and in fact I 
gave it its name. I have watched it with 
much interest. It is in Michigan nearly 
(not wholly,) exempt from the scab, which, 
especially on old trees, is so serious an ob- 
jection to the Fameuse. I regard it very 
highly as a marked improvement upon the 
Fameuse in each and all its peculiar quali- 
ties.” Mr. Garfield says: “The Shiawassee 
in our vicinity is singularly free from blem- 
ishes, while tne Fameuse has been about 
given up, owing to its tendency to scab and 
crack.” I may add that I know of no apple 
upon which the scab fungus never makes 
its appearance. I hope Mr. Craig will try 
the Shiawassee from cions or trees direct 
from Mr. Lyon. If my experience with this 
apple can be duplicated in Canada it will 
be worth millions to that country. 
value of leaves as manure. 
The sap of trees all goes into the leaves 
to be organized, and a considerable portion 
of the mineral matter brought up by the 
sap remains in them, so that a dry autumn 
leaf is much heavier than a dried leaf of 
like size taken from the same tree when 
first expanded. This mineral matter is 
largely plant food in a very available form 
for manurial uses. I have known this, 
theoretically and practically, for a long 
time; yet I have never said much about it 
in print, because I do not want to have our 
forests robbed of their natural mulch. A 
recent experience has however so impressed 
the fact upon my mind that I must give it 
to your readers. Four years ago I grubbed 
out an old buckthorn hedge which had for 
a long time formed the northern boundary 
of one of my orchards. This hedge was 
about 800 feet long, and the spread of its 
branches covered some 15 feet. Every au- 
tumn, after the fall of the leaves in the or- 
chard, the south winds drove nearly all 
those leaves into that hedge, where they de- 
cayed. For four years the strip of land 
where the hedge stood has been in cultiva- 
tion with various garden crops. The growth 
of all these has been surprisingly luxuriant, 
— fully equal to neighboring land liberally 
dressed with stable manure. While I still 
object to and do not allow the gathering of 
leaves by raking in my woodland, I am led 
to value most highly the drifted leaves 
which gather against the fences in the fall. 
They make excellent bedding for stock, and 
very rich manure. 
stunted fruit trees. 
In how many neglected young orchards 
do we see trees making a feeble growth, 
and becoming gnarled, scrubby, and ap- 
parently worthless! I am not prepared to 
say that such trees can ever be made as val- s 
uable as those which have been well cared 
for from the first; but I do know that a 
wonderful change can be worked in them 
by proper treatment. In this I am of course 
not alone, — every gardener and orchardist 
has seen many instances of the same thing. 
I am led to refer to the matter here by re- 
cent observation of a case in point. Some 
dozen years ago, in a bed of apple seedlings 
planted for stocks, one of them made a 
most remarkable growth the first season, 
reaching over three feet in height and half 
an inch in diameter at the ground. It was 
noted in digging that fall, and one of the 
men set it out in an odd corner to “see 
what it would come to.” Grass and weeds 
grew about it, and no care was given until 
three years ago, when the land was plowed 
close up to it, aud heavily manured. It was 
then hardly more than twice as large as 
when planted; — now it is ten feet high, and 
it bore fruit last summer for the first time. T 
It is evidently a Siberian crab cross of no 
particular value except as an object lesson 
on the comparative effects of neglect at 
first, and of a little good treatment after 
years of abuse. — T. H. Hoskins. 
