2o7 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKERo 
more about crowded apple trees. 
Mr. Hoyt Explains His Method. 
Having an apple orchard, spread over about eight 
acres, although there are only 125 trees, your article of 
February 16 is of unusual interest to me. I would like to 
ask further information on a few points. What do you 
mean by thinning, and how do you do it? Do you use 
manure for feeding the trees? Do you plow the ground 
every year? What do you use to spray, and how often? 
New York. O- 
Your apple orchard of 125 trees spread over eight 
acres, or 16 trees to the acre, at 50 feet apart, is all 
wrong. If the trees were all on one acre, you would 
realize more profit from the trees in 15 years on this 
one acre than if spread over the eight acres. Then 
you could have your seven acres to farm if you choose. 
The 125 trees on the one acre could be liberally fer¬ 
tilized with one ton of fertilizer, and the cost of har¬ 
rowing, cultivating and spraying would not cost you 
one quarter what it would to cultivate the eight acres. 
With 16 or 30 trees set to the acre there is not enough 
fruit raised to pay one for giving up the ground to 
the orchard, as should be done; so other crops will 
need to be planted or the orchard put down to grass, 
which it does not pay to do, as the orchard is liable 
to be more or less injured thereby. If corn, potatoes 
or grass is to be raised on the farm, grow them some¬ 
where else after the orchard is four years old, or after 
it begins to bear fruit. For best results from the or¬ 
chard the trees should not be robbed of any of the 
soil’s fertility or moisture. If the trees 
in the orchard are set too far apart, and 
other crops raised, the frequent stirring 
of the soil so necessary to keep up the 
moisture cannot be done, and the fruit 
will not‘only drop more, but will not be 
so fine as when closely set. 
By thinning, I mean the fruit on the 
trees. If too much fruit sets, thin out 
by picking it off, not leaving but one 
apple to a fruit spur, and if the spurs 
are too close take all off every other 
one, or leave one apple only in every 
four inches, or perhaps farther, as good 
judgment would suggest. With an old 
neglected orchard this would be a tedi¬ 
ous job, and would hardly pay to do; 
but when commencing with a young or¬ 
chard to thin the fruit with the first 
crop, if it needed it, the work would be 
light. If no more fruit was allowed to 
grow than the tree could easily perfect, 
fruit buds would be formed for the next 
season’s crop, as well as the crop of fruit 
grown. If more fruit set than you think 
the trees could perfect and form ouds 
for the next season, pick off some of the 
fruit again. Never let the trees over¬ 
bear. Overbearing tends to weaken the 
producing powers of the tree, which 
with starvation, is the cause of what is 
termed “off years.” There should be no 
“off years” with intelligent apple grow¬ 
ing, unless frost or blasting winds occur 
when the trees are in blossom. If you 
have stable or yard manure, and have 
no other use for it, spread it over the 
surface of the ground and harrow In 
thoroughly, but if you have to buy fer¬ 
tilizing material buy a good honest made 
fertilizer in preference to stable manure, 
and use from 1,200 to 1,500 pounds per 
acre annually sown broadcast and harrowed in well. 
For your eight acres of orchard you would have to 
plow every year, being careful not to plow too deep 
as you came to the tree. If the trees were set 18 to 
20 feet apart I would only harrow with a Cutaway 
harrow early in the Spring, or cultivate with a good 
cultivator. After that with a spring-tooth or any good 
stirring harrow. 
Spray in February with Bordeaux Mixture. If there 
are any injurious insects on the trees, spray with pe¬ 
troleum about 25 per cent strong. Just before the 
blossoms appear, spray again with Bordeaux Mixture. 
After the blossoms fall and fruit is well formed, spray 
again with Bordeaux Mixture with one-third of a 
pound of Paris-green to 50 gallons of water. Two 
weeks after this spray again with same mixture as 
before. This may be sufficient, yet another spraying 
the middle of July with Bordeaux Mixture might be 
beneficial, and certainly would do no harm. To spray, 
use a good force pump placed upon a barrel in a 
wagon. There are many good pumps advertised in the 
market for this purpose. A pump made by Morrill & 
Morley, Benton Harbor, Mich., we have found to be 
a very good one. This spraying of trees is to be a very 
important factor in fruit raising, and I believe the 
time is coming when some person will get up a spray¬ 
ing outfit and go about doing this work better and 
more cheaply than small orchardists can do it for 
DO THE CATALOeUES EXAGGERATE? 
Varying Results Under Diverse Conditions. 
The catalogue crop having been secured what are 
the fruits of the harvest? We reply, many, and along 
all lines pertaining to horticulture. The first is a 
stimulant to grow something, and, having grown it, 
to have the results a surprise rather than a disap¬ 
pointment. Many get the impression that descrip¬ 
tions are overdrawn; this, however, is rarely the case, 
but it must be understood that a squash weighing 300 
pounds, and a crop of potatoes, 450 bushels per acre, 
or 800 bushels of onions and 800 bushels of carrots 
from an acre, 1,600 in one year, as Hallock & Son, 
of Orient, do annually, are the results of intensive 
cultivation. Such crops can only be produced by brain 
application as well as by fertilizers. These results 
are all possible, and happy is the amateur who ex¬ 
hibits the squash, or the farmer who produces the 
other crops. But they can be done, and when the 
catalogue promises what is seemingly an impossibil¬ 
ity, it only states what has been done, and what the 
seeds sold will do again, if the buyer does his part. 
The catalogue only states possibilities, and the seeds¬ 
man does not hope or expect that one man in a thou¬ 
sand will grow a 300-pound squash, because not one 
in a thousand gets from his farm or garden what it 
is capable of producing, along any line. Besides, that 
enormous growth can only be made where all the 
natural conditions are favorable, and where labor has 
been wisely and freely supplied. The 
gardener must understand fully that ex¬ 
treme products are the results of ex¬ 
treme efforts, and under the most favor¬ 
able circumstances, and that where A 
does not get as good results as B, it is 
because the latter has some advantages 
the former does not possess 
But this is not the point we started 
out to illustrate. Every gardener knows 
that some varieties will succeed admir¬ 
ably in one locality, and prove total fail¬ 
ures in another. The same grape or 
apple that does well with one will not 
prove satisfactory in a locality not far 
distant. Trial alone will settle that mat¬ 
ter. The same is true in the vegetable 
garden, and there is nothing more an¬ 
noying than to plant a variety not 
adapted to one’s soil and situation. To 
guard against disappointment the gar¬ 
dener should always buy a year’s stock 
in advance and test in a small way the 
seed bought for the next year’s crop; 
then he will be absolutely sure of what 
he has. Our best growers of cabbage 
always do that, and with good results. 
Many seeds improve with age; this Is 
particularly true with vine seeds, which 
improve with age until vitality is great¬ 
ly impaired, and all the Brassicas im¬ 
prove with age. The gardener who 
wishes to get the best possible results 
from his garden should give this subject 
the most careful attention, c. l. al,i,en. 
WHO SHALL MIX FERTILIZERS? 
A man has a pain in his knee, and 
finds that by rubbing a certain linament 
on it the pain is relieved. The next 
week he has a headache, and remem¬ 
bering his knee, he rubs the same liniment on his 
head. The pain gets worse instead of better, and the 
man denounces the liniment as a fraud. He does not 
realize that the trouble in his head may come from 
his stomach. The liniment helped his knee but failed 
to help his head—therefore it is a fraud. You see this 
man fails to recognize that there were two kinds of 
aches, each requiring a different treatment. He is like 
the man who uses a “phosphate” or some one-sided 
fertilizer, and obtains good results on a certain crop. 
He tries it on another crop or soil and fails—therefore 
all fertilizers are frauds. A friend once used 200 
pounds per acre of nitrate of soda on wheat in the 
Spring and increased his yield quite a little. Next 
year he decided to use only nitrate on his potatoes, 
which were planted on a soil quite deficient in pot¬ 
ash. He got a large growth of vines but few potatoes. 
He said that nitrate of soda and incidentally all fer¬ 
tilizers were “no good.” A fair amount of potash 
used with the nitrate would have doubled his yield, 
but he would not go down to the true causes of his 
failure. Such men make a mistake in attempting to 
mix their own fertilizers, or to use special substances. 
They will do much better to buy the mixed goods, and 
always select complete mixtures. Generally speak¬ 
ing, it will 'pay a farmer to. hire experts to mix or 
plan for him unless he is willing to think and study 
down to the basic principles that underlie his work. 
The soil may have four aches—requiring nitrogen, 
potash, phosphoric acid or lime to cure them. Unless 
you know which particular ache your farm has, you 
would better use all four. 
themselves. Intelligently carried on, and with mod¬ 
ern business ways, the future of the apple industry 
will be one of much pleasure, as well as great profit. 
EDWIN HOYT. 
A CHAPTER ON WILLOWS. 
Every farmer who has running water on his farm 
will find it easy and useful to plant a few willows in 
the Spring. It is the easiest of all trees to propagate. 
By simply cutting off a limb and sticking it into the 
ground so that the bottom is near water the planting 
is done. Any size of cutting will do, but if it is to be 
set out where cattle run it would better be eight or 10 
feet long, or they will eat off the young shoots and 
cause it to die. The willow is especially useful as a 
soil binder, and to prevent the washing of stream 
banks. It is against the laws of Nature for a stream 
to run straight, and if it is made so, it will get crooked 
again. Its sinuosities cause it to occupy more ground 
than necessary, and throw out points and corners 
which are of no use except, perhaps, for pasture. A 
willow planted at the right point, or a row of willows, 
will effectually prevent erosion of the bank, and keep 
the stream where it is put, or prevent further en¬ 
croachment on the land. Its root system is a mass of 
fiber, and binds the soil completely. The trees give 
shade to stock in Summer, and, where there is plenty 
of moisture, they do no damage to adjoining crops. 
If one contemplate making a fish pond, or confin¬ 
ROSE ALBA RUBIFOLIA. Fio. 90. See Rdkaeism.s, Page 313. 
ing the water for any purpose, there is no better way 
to build a dam than by planting a row of willows 
close together. As soon as the trees are large enough 
the dam is easily made, and the willow roots binding 
all together there will be no washout. Some farmers 
treat their willow trees as pollards; they cut them off 
about five feet above the ground, and allow them to 
sprout. In this way a clump of willows may be made 
to yield a supply of poles and wood year after year. 
When dry the timber makes an excellent Summer 
fuel. Baskets are made mainly from certain varieties 
of the willow. Basket-making Is a growing industry 
in this country, and in 1890 $2,800 worth of prepared 
osiers were imported. There is no reason why many 
of our small farms should not have their osier beds, 
which would give the owner profitable employment 
for some of his idle time during the Winter preparing 
the osiers for market. There are a number of varie¬ 
ties grown in Europe for basket uses, out they do not 
seem to do well here. Some small native species, 
however, make good osiers, and if one thinks of start¬ 
ing an osier bed he had best to go or send to where 
they are already growing them. The basket-making 
industry and the growing of osiers are thriving about 
Syracuse and Rochester, N. Y. The Department of 
Agriculture at Washington, D. C., has issued a bul¬ 
letin on osier culture which will be useful to those 
interestea in the subject. g. d. 
Whitehouse, N. J. 
