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AMERICAN POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 
From the facts which I have been able to bring together and which can- 
not be presented in detail in such a paper as this, I am satisfied that the 
apple industry in Virginia has scarcely been begun though we are now sec- 
ond to New York in total quantity of fruit raised, and yet not one-tenth 
of the possible apple product of the state has ever been produced. The faci 
is there is not an instance to my knowledge where apples have been prop 
erly planted in the State, and given culture and modern care that they have 
not averaged in crop from fifty to one hundred and fifty dollars per acre; and 
of such quality that our apples command the very best prices in the foreign 
markets. It has been thought and many times stated that the future of Vir- 
ginia as an apple growing State lies in its foreign trade, but facts which 
we are now collecting show that this is not true. We are now developing a 
great trade with the far south and we have in fact lying at our very doors 
the entire middle south and Gulf states which are eagerly demanding all 
the late fruit which we can send them and, in the main, give us as good a 
net price as we obtain at Liverpool. 
I think that the statement is fully warranted that there is no state in the 
union that offers a better opportunity or has a brighter future for the tech- 
nical development of apple growing. But I think that all persons should be 
warned that only those who are willing to undertake this work in a thor- 
oughly technical manner can hope to succeed, for the development of fungous 
diseases and insect pests in our areas devoted to orchards has been such 
in the past few years as to frighten many in regard to the outlook for the 
future. Yet with us as in New York and elsewhere proper methods have 
sufficed to produce a good crop. 
J. S. Collins, New Jersey, inquired whether any attention had been given 
to pollination; said he regarded this as a subject of much importance. 
Prof. Alwood: I am paying such attention to this subject as I can. So many 
difficulties surround questions of this character that I have learned to be 
cautious in making a reply. For instance, I have now in mind a certain 
orchard in the county of Botetourt composed of about one thousand trees 
which became unproductive. After careful investigation of the matter and 
obtaining all the local information I could in regard to it, I concluded that 
possibly here was a case of imperfect pollination. Yet, it is such a difficult 
matter to correct this trouble in an old orchard, as one must wait for the 
growth of the top grafting that I decided to prescribe a thorough course of 
treatment by cultural and spraying methods. The result of this was that it 
appears that pollination had nothing to do with the trouble. The first year 
after the renovation work was undertaken the orchard produced a good crop 
of fruit and has been producing good crops since. 
However, while considering this subject I wish to say that I am advising 
the intermingling of varieties and would not myself set large blocks of one 
variety isolated. 
I have yet to have clearly brought out in my work the fact that any variety- 
of apple fails to pollinate itself. In numerous instances where orchards 
have failed, after they have been brought under a careful system of culti- 
vation and modern treatment of spraying the trouble has disappeared. In 
fact, if the pollen was impotent at all, apparently it was so from lack of 
vigor and the orchard needed constitutional treatment rather than top graft- 
ing. 
R. M. Kellogg, Michigan: In restoring those orchards that are unfruitful: 
do you practice close pruning as a measure for the restoration of the vitality 
and the potency of the pollen? 
