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AMERICAN POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 
Organizations— The State Society: The State Society devoted to horticul- 
ture is the successor to the Michigan Pomological Society, organized in 1870. 
Its field has been broadened, but pomology must ever be its leading feature. 
The hope of its best friends is that it will not make the market side of fruit 
growing too prominent, but will devote its attention largely to amateur fruit 
•culture. The Society holds a prominent place among the rural organizations 
of the State and its literature has been very effective in educating our people 
to high standards of excellence. 
Auxiliary Societies— Some years ago the State Society under the able direc- 
tion of its venerable president, Mr. Lyon, organized the State very completely 
into a system of societies, with the State Society as parent, and about thirty 
.associations auxiliary to it. The plan has, in these later years, not been car- 
ried out as perfectly as it was formerly, but the result has been the contin- 
uance and development of most of these auxiliaries, as local societies very 
effective in moulding the practice of their localities. 
Market Organizations — Here and there in the leading market fruit regions 
have risen associations and clubs devoted to the financial interests of the mem- 
bers. These have been forceful factors in calling the attention of buyers to 
the State, perfecting the style of packages, securing railroad conveniences and 
concessions, and in some places have so far affected the method of market- 
ing as to eliminate the direct shipment of growers entirely from the scheme 
of marketing, thus reducing their cares and anxieties and allowing them to 
center their energies .upon the growing of the products. 
Farmers’ Institutes — A new system of organization has arisen in our State 
which is doing more to educate the general farmer in the matter of fruit cul- 
ture than all other methods combined. The State Board of Agriculture has 
•developed a plan of Farmers’ Institutes directed by an able superintendent, K. 
L. Butterfield, reaching every county in the State. In this work the leaders 
of the State Horticultural Society have been engaged as instructors and thus 
the normal work of the Society has developed men who have by means of the 
Farmers’ Institutes reached with their advanced ideas the uttermost parts of 
the State. 
Agricultural College— The State Agricultural College, with its able ally, 
the Experiment Station, is doing good work in matters of pomology. The very 
best bulletins have been issued on fruit subjects and find their inspiration in 
the painstaking work at the College and South Haven Stations. These bulle- 
tins are distributed broadcast through the State and excerpts of them are 
made by the newspapers of the State. Special bulletins have been issued in 
times of need when technical advice upon some menace to the fruit interests 
was needed at once and the entire press of the State is alert in spreading 
information of this character. 
Forest Elision— Great changes in the conditions effecting the cultivation 
of fruits have appeared in our State, and these changes are connected inti- 
mately with the rapid removal of our great forests which in an early day 
had so modifying an influence upon our climate. In the south part of the State, 
the results have been most apparent. Certain varieties have dropped out 
altogether and the question of hardiness, which had little importance forty 
y^ars ago, is today a vital one. Hence the importance of the forest as con- 
nected with pomological problems has led to earnest and exhaustive discus- 
sions in fruit growers societies upon the duty of the State in formulating a 
forest policy, and largely as a result of this discussion we have a State Board 
of Forest Commissioners who will make a thorough study of the forest prob- 
