May ;2, JgW. ] 
JOURXAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
417 
aithough the American growers have the advantage o£ a uniform 
temperature through the prevalence of cold in the winter season. 
W ith a view to secure the essential keeping out of frost, .i cool 
equable temperature, the store-house should be in an open, high 
in preference to a low, dry situation. Air should be circulated by 
double walls having a cavity or hollow between, the roof double 
•ceiled, boarded, felted before slating. Internally the sides could 
be boarded instead of plastered, leaving an inch cavity between 
the walls and boarding. Doors with a 'i-inch cavitj', felted on the 
inner side of the outside boards, the shutters to the windows being 
treated in a similar manner to the doors. In that way the struc¬ 
ture would be practically isolated from external influences. There 
remains the floor—internal or earth heat. To prevent this rising 
it should be asphalted, as should also the walls have been on the 
same level, and a double-boarded floor. An inch cavity between 
the lower boarding covered with hair felt would effectually prevent 
Iwat and moisture ascending. Fitted with shelves in the usual 
manner, a fruit room worthy of the name would be provided in 
place of fruit wasters that obtain in most establishments. 
For large quantities of fruit, store-houses with double-boarded 
sides, ends, and roof, with a cavity between the boardings, the sides 
•covered a foot thick, and the roof thatched a similar thickness with 
straw or preferably reeds, the roof projecting well over the sides, 
and with the ground sloping well away from the structure, nothing 
need be apprehended from wet. The doors could be made in a 
■similar manner to those described above, or straw shutters could 
be used for them and the windows or openings for light when 
necessary in severe weather. Earth heat and damp could be 
remedied by concreting the floor ; five parts gravel and one lime 
by measure form a suitable bottom. This will insure a little damp 
without being wet, which is requisite in the keeping of Apples, 
any likely access off earth heat being stopped by a covering of 
■clean dry straw, the pathway being strewed with dry bracken. 
Gr.\s3 veksus Suie Surface. 
In planting an orchard it is customary to merely make holes 
wider than the length of the roots when these are extended at full 
length ; or perhaps stations are determined upon beforehand, the 
ground trenched or deeply stirred, and some manure added if the soil 
be considered poor. In others it is considered expedient to put in some 
concrete to prevent the roots from striking into the unfavourable 
suteoil, the soil being taken out 2 feet deep from 4 to Gfeet square, 
or in circles of 6 to 9 feet diameter. Six inches thickness of lime 
rubbish or concrete being put in, four or five parts loamy gravel 
to one part stone lime make a good concrete, which is more effec¬ 
tive if some rough stones or brickbats be put in first and broken 
<up so as to make a macadamised bottom, the surface of the con¬ 
crete being convex— i.e., highest in the middle, the soil, with pro¬ 
bably an addition of fresh and some manure, being added. Those 
may be necessary in some localities and soils, and where they are 
essential the possessor of £100 or £1000 should not invest it in 
•one acre or ten of such land for fruit culture. The time will come 
when the roots will extend beyond the concreted area, and what is 
to prevent them from passing into the unfavourable strata ? The 
latter end will be worse than the beginning. 
C' o 
Trees planted in the turned up soil of the pits thrive for a time. 
They occupy the whole of the upturned soil in a few years, and 
then push their roots into the hard undisturbed soil - the roots 
•cater for an increased head and crops of fruit. The stations were 
only made to give the trees a start, get them into bearing size 
•quickly—the soil generally is sufficiently open, porous, and rich for 
Apples, trenching would make the trees grow too much. What of 
•soils that are neither sufficiently friable nor fertile to admit of free 
progressive growth as well as carrying crops of fruit ? Do they 
not fruit freely enough after three or five years when thev have 
•made and matured growth through the preparation made for the 
trees in the stations ? The roots cannot penetrate the soil freely 
nor derive sufficient nutriment for the production of large fruit. 
The crops may be full, but the fruit small. The roots may, 
deprived of moisture at the surface, de-^cend into the subsoil, and 
then it is its character that marks the difference between health 
und ill health. If it be necessary to prepare stations so as to give 
the trees a start, it surely is worth while to give them an oppor¬ 
tunity of supporting their crops. To trench the whole of the 
ground at planting may be suicidal when the trees are put 90 feet 
apart, which is equally sacrificial, but there is no reason why the 
■stirred soil of the stations should not bo added to as the trees extend 
their roots, a 2 foot trench every year, and at almost every second 
until the whole of the ground is in its best possible form for per¬ 
meation by the roots and the abstraction therefrom of its enriched 
■elements resulting by the decay of the turfy matter. It is a question 
of grass versus fruit, of having tons of fodder or tons of fruit. A 
grass lawn is certainly pleasant to the eye, affords cleanly access to 
the trees, and is useful as well as agreeable, yet there is no reason 
why the grass should not be periodically converted into humus by 
turning it under. Everybody knows that grass cut annually for fodder 
becomes coarse, though a stopgap it is not nutritious ; where good 
hay is expected manure is put, but in orchards it is expected to 
have two cuttings of grass and a crop of Apples as well. That is 
the way the Apple (a decidedly British fruit) is grown to compete 
against the world. Every kind of crop is thought worthy of 
manure, the Apple has none ; instead of Apples—large, bright, 
cheer}', rich, sprightly, juicy—there are crab like, pitted, sour, 
worthless samples. 
Re(;raftinc!. 
Many orchards have trees which are not inaptly comparable to 
forests. They grow to the dimensions of hedgerow timber, have 
spreading umbrageous heads, dense from live and dead twigs, a thick¬ 
set of confusions. Others have already begun to die back, their 
days are done. The fruit mostly produced is small; it may be 
resultant of variety, of crowded heads, of poverty, of parasites 
smothering the life out of them. Are such worth troubling after ? 
If healthy there is a certainty of full crops being had sjeedily by 
putting on new heads. Observation having been made and note 
taken of the kinds that succeed in the locality, not necessarily for 
adoption, but guidance in selecting the choicer kinds—newer, 
improved, or proven reliable sorts—we can proceed to cut off their 
heads, whereby all the neglected and accumulated filth of years, or 
may be generations, is got rid of, and by putting on new heads or 
regrafting they will simply astonish the owner by the increased 
size, colour, and quality of the fruit produced, the customer being 
astounded at the superior article offered. Trees that are productive 
of fairly good fruits may by judiciously thinning the heads be 
made to produce larger and better coloured fruit, and all thrive 
better and longer by a turning over of the soil with as little 
damage to the roots as practicable, turning the turf under not more 
than G to 9 inches, but stirring twice as deep or more if the roots 
admit. If deficient of calcareous matter a dressing of lime may 
be given—G tons per acre. The lime should be kept well up, not 
buried deeper than the turf. Then in autumn following a good 
manuring may be given, and in spring following it may be put 
down to grass. After breaking it up a root crop of any kind 
could be taken with an application of artificials. I find this plan 
answer admirably, the trees being rejuvenated by the grafting, 
and the soil restored to fertility. 
Regrafting is a ready means of making a tree produce good 
Apples in place of bad. Trees that are too vigorous, or are late in 
coming into bearing may be regrafted in part or wholly with an 
early fruiting variety, so as to get some return for the outlay and 
the ground occupied. Blenheim Pippin is notoriously late in 
coming into bearing. Grafted on the Paradise stock it fruits 
earlier, and when repeatedly grafted the obstruction to the sap 
caused by the junctions acts similar to wounds or bruises on the 
stems, inducing the formation of fruit buds instead of too free a 
supply of sap provocative of growth. A tree of Blenheim Pippin 
having half its stems grafted with Cobham (Golden Ducat) 
would have half its growths productive of fruit in three years, iis 
vigour kept under by the production of fruit in the Cobham parts 
tends to a similar disposition in its own, whilst the Cobham is in¬ 
creased in productive and colour of fruit. So free in growth and 
so healthy withal is Blenheim Pippiii that a number of trees of it 
are a godsend if for nothing less than regrafting with Cobham, 
which seems to appreciate the strength and vigour of the Blen¬ 
heim Pippin. This is the only good that I can see in the recom¬ 
mendation to plant Blenheim Pippin, especially when the occupant 
of the land is reliant on its produce for subsistence. 
Allusion has been made to the poverty-stricken nature of the 
ground of orchards. Everything in the way of organic matter, 
and a considerable amount of inorganic substance is abstracted 
from it, yet nothing or very rarely anything is put into it which is 
in any way likely to maintain its fertility. Manure certainly 
would not be thrown away, especially if the grass had not place, 
though there is no reason why it should not be made contributory 
to the enriching of the soil occasionally by being turned under. 
An occasional dressing of compost, in which lime forms a com¬ 
ponent, could not act other than beneficially, whilst artificials, so 
beneficial in their action on grass, would assuredly prove salutary 
in restoring some of the many elements removed. Phosphates 
never act other than usefully. They cause an early and increased 
production of roots, encourage surface rooting by attracting them 
j to the surfaces in which it has become as.similated, and potash 
would assist materially to make available some of its ineit 
constituents, whereby the trees would be increased in vigour 
and enhanced in quantity and quality of crop. Three cwt. of 
superphosphate and 1.) cwt. of muriate of potash per acre every 
other year would give a luxuriance to orchards to which they aie 
