April 7,1887. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
203 
7 
Tn 
Linnean Society at 8 r.M. 
H 
P 
Good Friday. 
9 
s 
10 
SUN 
Raster Sunday. 
11 
M 
B»nk Holiday. 
11 
13 
To 
W 
Royal Horticultural Society. Finit and Floral Committees at 11 A M. 
THE WEAK LINK IN FRUIT CULTURE. 
HOUGH the biting winds of February were the 
lr^ reverse of agreeable, and the “second winter ” 
Ma\ in March generally mo-it unwelcome, the pro¬ 
tracted term of cold that was experienced 
during those months may, by arresting vege¬ 
tation and retarding the blossoming of trees, 
be the precursor of good crops of fruit. All 
must hope that such may be the case, but at 
the same time it will be conceded that late springs are 
not the certain forerunners of golden harvests. Generally 
speaking, the later the expansion of blossom the greater 
is the chance of its escaping destruction, but with the vast 
majority of trees its preservation is a question of chance 
after all. 
No matter how late the blossoming period, one or 
two severe frosts may occur when the trees are in beauty 
and destroy all hope of a bountiful crop of fruit in a 
night, or even in the absence of frost a “ dripping week ” 
at a critical time may equally result in barren orchards. 
That late blossoming alone is not always a favourable 
circumstance is evident from the fact that during some 
years Plums and Pears are abundant and Apples scarce, 
yet the blossoms of the former are very much earlier than 
the latter. It is, however, an advantage for the earlier 
blossoming trees to be late, as in that case not only is the 
prospect of a good set of fruit better, but the contingency 
of a subsequent term of cold weather occurring is more 
remote, and it has not infrequently happened that trees of 
all descriptions have been denuded of fruit a week or two 
after the blossoms faded and the setting of the crops 
accomplished. 
There is of necessity a large degree of uncertainty in 
fruit culture in orchards and gardens where protection 
cannot be afforded, but at the same time there is a certain 
amount of “ safety in numbers.” When the question is 
asked, as it often is, “ What kind of fruit pays the best ?” 
it will usually be safe to answer that no one kind can be 
absolutely relied on, and to depend on one to the exclu¬ 
sion of others is highly unwise. Amidst all the uncer¬ 
tainty pertaining to the cultivation of fruit, there is at 
least one reassuring element—while it is very rare to find 
bountiful crops of every kind of fruit in one season, it is 
equally rare the whole of them fail. In private gardens 
mixed collections of fruit are a necessity, hence a due pro¬ 
portion of all kinds are planted. Jt is equally desirable 
in growing fruit for commercial purposes that the same 
practice be adopted. Those who are the most successful 
do not rely on Apples alone, or Plums, Gooseberries, or 
any other fruit, but provide against total failure by grow- 
ing the best of the different kinds that succeed in their 
soil and district. The importance of acting on this safety 
No. 354. —Vol. XIV., Tumid Series. 
principle is not sufficiently recognised by many persons 
who are disposed to plant fruit trees more freely, but who 
lack experience. The greatest obstacle to the production 
of fruit is the liability of the blossom to be ruined by 
frost or inclement weather, and by having kinds to expand 
at different times the greater is the chance of some of 
them escaping, because it is extremely unlikely that 
“ bad ” weather will prevail over the whole term of 
blossoming. 
In the case of established trees in open positions the 
owner or manager of them is helpless in respect to pre- 
sei'ving the blossom. He is at the mercy of the elements, 
and the trees must take their chance; but in instances 
innumerable there has been great lack of judgment in the 
selection of sites for fruit culture. Without a doubt 
many planters were victims of “no choice;” they were 
compelled to plant the trees where they stand or not 
plant at all. But others have had large districts at their 
disposal, and have chosen sites for orchards and chosen 
w'rongly. They have preferred warm sheltered valleys to 
more exposed elevations. Warm depressions expedite the 
blossoming of the trees, and the greater humidity of the 
air there than at a greater altitude intensifies the destruc¬ 
tive action of spring frosts.- Mr. R. Parker of Impney 
recorded a striking example of that some time ago. More 
than once Apple orchards in sheltered valleys in the south 
of England have been barren, while trees in positions 
300 to 500 feet higher, and 300 miles further north, have 
been laden with fruit. Both the later blossoming and 
the drier air on the northern altitudes were favourable, 
though wet occurring in the south during the blossoming 
season and not in the north may have exercised an 
influence. 
Another instance can be cited of the advantage of a 
comparatively high position for fruit culture. Two 
orchards of Apples chiefly, but including a few Pears and 
Plums, are within a mile of each other. One is in a 
valley, the watercourse of the district, the trees being as 
well sheltered from the north as an orchard can be; the 
other is about 200 feet higher—the highest land in the 
district, this orchard being sheltered from the south, 
exposed to the north and the east. The trees grow and 
blossom alike freely in both positions, and at the same 
time, the coldness of the wet soil in the valley perhaps 
retarding the movement of the sap there, the warmer, 
because drier, soil on the hill exciting its flow. Either 
that or something else causes the simultaneous blossom¬ 
ing of the sheltered and exposed trees. Up to that 
point there is no difference, and the same weather 
obviously prevails in the locality; but the difference in 
the two orchards in the autumn is very conspicuous, the 
higher seldom failing to give tons of fruit, the lower often 
affording none; or, in other words, while one orchard is 
profitable four years out of six, the other is unprofitable 
four years out of five. In the exposed and productive 
orchard the wood is ripened better than in the lower, and 
spring frosts blacken the blossom in the latter, while in 
the higher and drier site it remains uninjured. If, there¬ 
fore, the blossoms of orchard trees cannot be protected, 
experience suggests that something can be done where a 
choice of positions is afforded in selecting a site by which 
adverse weather influences may be, if not evaded, greatly 
mitigated, to the decided advantage of the cultivator. 
The blossom is at once the most important as well as 
the weakest link in the chain of fruit culture. Everything 
that can be done should be done to relieve the strain to 
which it is subjected. Trees on walls can be protected 
No. 2010. —Vor. LXXVI., Oi.u Series. 
