December, 1918 
43 
WISCONSIN HORTICULTURE 
War Gardeners to Plant Fruit 
Trees. 
Many important suggestions 
were presented at the last meet- 
ing of the War Garden Captains 
and Lieutenants, held at City Hall 
last Wednesday evening at the 
call of Chairman H. A. Foeller. 
One suggestion presented by 
Dady Oliver, our champion “weed 
foe,” called for a resolution that 
the Council of Defense be peti- 
tioned to urge the general and 
generous planting of fruit trees 
throughout the country, and most 
especially in our county and city; 
that steps be taken to plant in 
Green Bay no less than 5,000 apple 
trees by next spring. In his plea 
Dady condemned in the strongest 
terms the planting of such trees as 
box elders and other quite as use- 
less trees that rob the soil of 
nourishment and scatter seeds by 
the millions that never fail to 
sprout and infest gardens and 
fields like weeds. He a 1 so showed 
his contempt for the citizen who 
refuses to plant fruit trees or per- 
haps cuts down existing fruit trees 
because the “boys” rob the fruit. 
He wonders where you and I and 
the other old “boys” would have 
gotten our apples in our youth if 
our fathers’ actions and thoughts 
had been as selfish and ungener- 
ous. By the way, the Olivers have 
several trees with nice apples on 
them, some hanging right over the 
fence, — Dady claims that the boys 
don’t bother to steal them at all. 
A general discussion brought 
out many points in favor of the 
fruit tree suggestion. With some 
5,000 additional apple trees plant- 
ed in this city of the suitable va- 
rieties for this climate and soil, 
there would be no need in five or 
six years from now to pay 5 to 10 
cents a pound for apples in the 
winter time. Everyone would 
have plenty of apples to eat. Boys 
could pilfer apples to their hearts 
content and no one would m.ss 
them. Suppose all our box elders 
and maples along the streets were 
hickory trees or butternuts, what 
need of being chased by the bull or 
irate farmer when you go out five 
to ten miles in the country stealing 
nuts in the pasture lots. Two 
rows of tall stately hickory trees 
along the cement highway from 
Green Bay to De Pere would form 
a beautiful “Hickory Lane” some 
twenty-five years from now, with 
plenty of nuts for all the kids and 
some to spare for the grownups. 
Woiddn’t that be far better than 
those dry sticks now lining this 
road? Fruit trees not only give; 
shade equal to box elders and 
maples, etc., but in addition- such 
trees as apple, plum, and cherry, 
give us beautiful spring blossoms, 
and in summer and fall delicious 
fruit. It was the opinion of 
all Captains and Lieutenants as- 
sembled that hereafter, to pro- 
vide for a future supply of good 
fruit as well as beauty, to urge 
everyone to plant suitable fruit 
trees wherever practical in front 
yards, along all city streets be- 
tween sidewalk and curbs, and 
along all country roads. The one 
reason for urging planting of 
fruit trees in such places is the 
fact that street and road sides and 
front yards are better adapted for 
trees, while back yards and gar- 
dens, to produce a maximum vege- 
table crop, should be as much free 
as possible from trees that rob the 
soil of nourishment and keep out 
the essential sunlight. 
Another resolution was parsed 
to ask our City Council to pur- 
chase one or more good sized 
power spray rigs and make the 
spraying of shade and fruit trees 
a municipal responsibility. An 
expensive planting of fruit trees 
would make this a necessity. 
Only systematic and thorough 
spraying would assure the de- 
struction of the insect pests 
threatening the life of fruit and 
shade trees. For the average cit- 
izen, who owns a home, it is not 
an economical proposition to pur- 
chase a spraying outfit for his few 
trees, anymore than it would be 
economy for each to install his 
own independent waterworks or 
sewage system. 
A general complaint was voiced 
against the pilfering and wanton 
destruction of gardens by boys, 
and the positive indifference of 
the police to cope with the situa- 
tion. What could be more dis- 
couraging to the poor men and 
women, who, after working hard 
at their daily task, put in extra 
hours at back breaking labor of 
planting, hoeing, and weeding, 
spend some of their honest earn- 
ings for costly seed, than to find 
malicious or thoughtless boys 
stealing and destroying the antici- 
pated harvest? The devastation 
by dogs running around loose also 
again came in for its share of con- 
demnation. In fact so many dis- 
couraging ailments of the "Gar- 
den Constitution,” that a sugges- 
tion of a War Garden exhibit at 
this time with awards of prizes 
and premiums, found little or no 
support. Thieves, vandals, indif- 
ferent police, dogs, dry weather, 
weeds, insects, poor soil, etc , are 
all parasites sapping the vitality 
of the earlier enthusiasm. 
However, we are not going to lie 
down; we will keep on backing 
our boys “Over There” by early 
preparation for a much better and 
bigger crop in next and following 
seasons. Captains are instructed 
to notify all War Gardeners that 
