82 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
February 5 
people would have picked her out as a tuberculous 
cow, yet her lung-s were found to be badly diseased, 
with great bunches of tubercles in them. The whole 
thing- is described in bulletin 51 of the Minnesota Sta¬ 
tion, and it well shows how veterinarians may be de¬ 
ceived by the outside appearance of a cow. 
THE DOMINIE APPLE IN IOWA. 
Fig. 31 shows a Dominie apple tree planted in the 
Spring of 1890. In the Fall of 1896, I picked 3J£ bushels 
of apples, and last Fall, five bushels from the same 
tree. The Dominie is a good keeper, flavor fine, and 
it does well on our prairie soils. 
If orchards are to be profitable, they must receive 
as good care as other crops. Trees should be made to 
send their roots deep into the soil, in order to fortify 
themselves against drought. In our State, this is done 
by draining the soil and by plowing the orchard rather 
deep. Good tillage increases the available food supply 
in the soil, also conserves moisture. This deep plow¬ 
ing should begin the year the trees are set, and should 
be continued every spring until the trees are estab¬ 
lished. after which it should be begun as soon as the 
ground is dry enough in spring, and continued every 
10 days through the growing season until July 15 or 
August 1. Moisture is retained in the upper soil by 
frequent but shallow tillage, by which the surface 
becomes a mulch for the soil beneath. Tillage should 
not be simply for the purpose of killing weeds. Fall 
plowing may do for farm crops, but not for orchards; 
late cultivation and plowing will induce a late growth. 
Only cultivated crops should be allowed in the orchard: 
grain and hay should never be allowed to grow there. 
I find that level culture is best ; a cultivator and har¬ 
row make such work easy. 
Trees here are trained too high, especially the apple. 
Potash is my fertilizer for fruit trees after they begin 
to bear ; it may be had in wood ashes, and an annual 
application should be made upon bearing orchards. 
Barnyard manure can be used with good results on 
ild orchards. I plant only one-year-old trees from 
he bud ; these small trees lire more certain to make 
a good growth the first season, and will allow low head¬ 
ing and the shaping of the top. Low heading is the best 
on our prairie drifts ; with high stems, all varieties 
are liable to sunscald, and the stem is injured ; low 
heading overcomes this. I cannot too strongly impress 
the importance of planting the orchard on the highest 
and driest land, and furnishing no protection on the 
north : it is a great advantage in furnishing air drain¬ 
age, and equalizing the temperature in summer, and 
averting danger from frost in the blossoming period. 
In setting the apple tree, lean it toward the 1 o’clock 
sun ; in a couple of years, it will become erect. I 
find that, in our State, the best results have been ob¬ 
tained by planting rather thickly in the rows running 
north and south, and give more room the other way. 
I set my trees 20 x 30 feet. J. f. waoner. 
AN APPLE CANKER. 
In many orchards of the eastern States, 1 have ob¬ 
served a disease of the bark of apple trees, which re¬ 
sembles, to some extent, the work of Pear blight, but 
is of different origin. The disease may be described 
roughly as consisting of dead spots or wounds, usually 
the size of a man's hand or larger, which occur on the 
trunks and larger branches of what would, appar¬ 
ently, otherwise, be smooth, healthy trees. The dis¬ 
ease is particularly severe on the Twenty-Ounce apple 
in western New York, and has been observed to be 
quite destructive to this variety in the vicinity of 
Rochester and Brockport. To my knowledge, it 
occurs in Pennsylvania, and typical specimens have 
been collected at Still Pond, on the eastern shore of 
Maryland, and in the James Itiver country of Vir¬ 
ginia. In the South, the principal damage from the 
disease is done to the Early Harvest variety. 
The first indications which I have observed consist of 
small sunken spots, one-half inch or more in diameter. 
These spots do not penetrate through the bark at first, 
but finally reach the cambium, and spread outward 
from the center. A microscopic examination of the 
bark from these dead or dying spots shows the presence 
of the mycelium of a fungus. This mycelium is exceed¬ 
ingly delicate in texture, branched considerably, and 
not jointed. The threads are frequently joined in 
wefts or masses and knotted places. The djnng spots 
have a concentric appearance of slightly different 
colored bark. This is, evidently, due to the growth of 
the mycelium from the center, and tends to show that 
the mycelium is the cause of the death of the spots. 
Inasmuch as there is no gumming, bacteria, or other 
indications of Pear blight, it seems reasonably certain 
that the mycelium is the cause of the disease. The 
spots often start on the forks and rough places on the 
bark, as well as on smooth places. Their position and 
concentric growth, as well as other characters gener¬ 
ally, enable one easily to distinguish them from win¬ 
terkilling, simscald. Pear blight, or ordinary wounds, 
all of which make dead spots on apple limbs, of a 
somewhat similar character. The dead spots seem to 
have a sort of determinate growth. They rarely ex¬ 
tend more than 0 to 12 inches. Occasionally, branches 
three inches or more in diameter are girdled by 
the spot and killed, and others are greatly damaged 
by more or less complete girdling. More commonly, 
however, the spot, after spreading a few inches, ceases 
to grow, and the bark falling off, leaves the wood 
exposed in an ugly wound, which becomes deeper 
each year as the wood grows under the live bark 
around the edges. 
The fruiting form of the fungus Schizophyllum com¬ 
mune is very commonly found on the dead bark. This 
is, probably, the mature fruit of the mycelium which 
docs the work of destruction. At any rate, the find¬ 
A DOMINIE APPLE TREE. Fig. 31. 
ing of this fungus fruiting on the dead spots in widely 
different localities, leads to the belief that it is the 
cause of the disease, although it is not supposed to be 
a parasite, but belongs to a class of fungi which in¬ 
habit dead rather than living trees. 
So far as I am aware, no experiments have been 
made with a view of finding a preventive of this 
disease, or a remedy. It would seem that, if branches 
are kept well sprayed with Bordeaux Mixture two or 
three times annually, they would thus be protected 
from new infections, but this, of course, could be 
determined only by an experiment. Bordeaux Mix¬ 
ture could not be expected to reach the fungus already 
in the bark. 
The Twenty Ounce apple tree is so much subject to 
this disease in western New York, at least in certain 
localities, that it is questionable whether this variety 
should be grown in that section on its own body and 
branches. The finest Twenty Ounce apple trees that 
I have ever seen were top-grafted trees. About two 
AN APPLE CANKER. Flo. 32. 
dozen Twenty Ounce grafts were set in the tops of 
Baldwin trees, and the Baldwin branches afterwards 
suppressed, resulting in fine Twenty Ounce tops on 
equally fine Baldwin foundations. Much more of this 
top-grafting might, in my opinion, be profitably done 
with certain non-resistant kinds of fruit trees. 
As a rule, hand work seems to be unpopular with 
American horticulturists, but no doubt, it would be 
profitable in this case to cut out the diseased spots 
where they occur on valuable trees, disinfect the 
wounds with one-tenth per cent corrosive sublimate 
solution, and paint them over with liquid grafting 
wax. The appearance of the fungus supposed to be 
the cause of the disease is shown at Fig. 32. I would 
be glad to receive more specimens of this disease, with 
or without the fruiting form of the fungus, from as 
many different localities and States as possible. 
U. S. Department of Agriculture, ,M. b. waitk. 
WHAT THEY SAY. 
Cow Manure for Rabbits. —About a year ago. we 
had some pet rabbits, which ran loose. One morning. 
I went out and found 10 or 12 of our small fruit trees 
gnawed, and some completely girdled. This had been 
done the night before. I got some perfectly fresh cow 
manure in an old tin pail, spread it on some old cloths 
with a stick that had been flattened for the purpose, 
wound the cloths around the gna wed part, and tied with 
thin strips of cloth. Every tree lived, and did well: The 
cloths ought to be left on, at least six months, to give 
the wounds a chance to heal ; they will do no harm, as 
the tree in growing will stretch the cloth, h. r. w. 
Southington. Conn. 
Pine Tar on Trees. —Eight years ago. I set an apple 
orchard; two years after it was set, the worms 
were very bad on the wild cherry trees of my neigh¬ 
bor, and after they ate the leaves off from the cherry 
trees, they moved in a body to my apple trees. Not 
knowing that pine tar was injurious to trees, I put a 
ring of it around each tree about one foot above the 
ground. It stopped the worms, but the trees began 
to die in about two years, and have kept at it until this 
year, when I took out 36 trees. The Winter after the 
Summer that the worms were bad, a long-legged Ger¬ 
man hare passed twice through the orchard in one 
night, and barked 56 trees, so that between the tar 
and the hare, I have had to replace one-half of my 
trees. n. p. d. 
Rockland County, N. Y. 
Oxen in Germany. —Fig. 33 shows a photograph 
taken by an American in Germany last Winter. He 
took a shot with his camera just as the oxen and driver 
were passing out of the yard. The German farmers 
make good use of all stable manure, and handle large 
quantities, generally using acid phosphate and kainit 
in connection with it. The oxen are blanketed, 
which seems a good idea in cold weather. Notice how 
they pull the load ! There is no yoke, but each ox 
wears a band over the forehead just under the horns. 
Traces run from this back to the wagon. The Ger¬ 
mans say that oxen will pull a heavier load when 
harnessed in this way than they will when wearing a 
yoke. Four years ago, we had an account of a Long 
Island farmer who drove steers in this way single or 
double. Americans generally prefer the yoke. 
San Jose Scale in Delaware. —My remarks on 
page 18 seem to have been taken by some to imply 
that “ the original source of infection in this State” 
was a Delaware nursery. To allow this impression 
to continue would be unjust. There is no evidence 
that any Delaware nursery is infested with San Jos6 
scale. The reference was to a well-known New Jersey 
nursery. The State Inspector has located, perhaps, 
all infested points in Delaware. If there are others, 
they will not long remain undiscovered. While these 
cases are somewhat numerous, they are mostly of 
limited extent, and the prompt destruction of every 
orchard in which it exists would not be a very heavy 
loss. Is not this. then, the wisest course for this State 
to pursue ? New Jersey, on the east desperately in¬ 
fested, seeks to hold the scale in check by the use of 
kerosene. Maryland, on the west, having tested kero¬ 
sene and whale-oil soap, is testing the efficiency of 
fumigation with hydrocyanic acid gas, a yet more 
costly and dangerous process, and her area of infesta¬ 
tion is also large. It is very doubtful whether it can 
be shown that any infested tree has ever yet been en¬ 
tirely cleared of the pest by either method. For Dela¬ 
ware, then, and for any State having similar condi¬ 
tions of infestation, the “ Mattock and the Match 
Box” would seem to offer the most rational, effective 
and inexpensive treatment. e. h. Bancroft. 
Stick to Mixed Farming. —Not altogether liking 
the advice given to T. B. on page 36. I make a few 
suggestions: First, keep out of debt. Do not go to 
the extreme upon any one or more special hobbies. 
Start out and do, first, that which you understand 
best and like best, and make everything else second¬ 
ary. Cows will make slaves out of yourself and fam¬ 
ily, and you will be more lucky than I have been if 
you get more than enough to pay for feed, and half 
price for taking care of them, taking one season with 
another. Better work by the month or day. Chick¬ 
ens are a very uncertain number ; a few chickens are 
like cows as regards care ; they will take all a man’s 
time, then the first thing he may know, they are all 
dead with the cholera. A friend spent about $800 in 
buildings for chickens, bought two incubators for 
$112, and never made enough out of them to pay in¬ 
terest on the $900 invested. He did not have the time 
to attend to them, as he had 100 acres of land to at¬ 
tend to. Chickens, like cows, require constant care, 
and that by an expert. Let the Yankee have the cow 
and the woman the chickens. Straight farming with 
mixed stock is, by far, the safest and best way, unless 
one is an expert. If I could keep sheep away from 
dogs and bot fly in the summer, I would risk a few 
