60 
FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY 
changes, and the uncertainty as to 
whether extremes of heat, cold or pre¬ 
cipitation will be equalized gradually 
over wide areas or suddenly within nar¬ 
row limits, will make general predictions 
of weather changes for years or even 
months ahead, of comparatively small 
local value. Yet, as we look back at the 
vast advances that have been made in all 
sciences in the past century, it is reason¬ 
able to hope that equations of the almost 
unknown forces can be preparerd in the 
future that will give more definite an¬ 
swers to the problems of abnormal local 
conditions. 
Culture of Early Peaches* 
BY J. P. MACE, OF THE COMMITTEE. 
Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: 
Anyone who has listened to or read 
the reports of your Committee on 
Peaches, Pears and Plums, with the dis¬ 
cussions following these papers, for the 
past four or five years, I am sure must 
feel that if anything is said we will have 
to thrash over old straw. 
The growing of early peaches in Flor¬ 
ida has not been an unbroken success 
the past five or six years. The freeze of 
’95, killing trees back to the stump, 
again in ’99, with perhaps twenty-five 
per cent, killed below the bud—in this 
’99 freeze my Angel and Waldo trees 
were killed back to large branches—-crop 
of all early varieties lost by cold in 1900 
—a good crop of Angels and Waldos in 
1901—all this, with the San Jose scale to 
contend with, must convince every one 
that the South Florida peach grower’s 
bed is not one of flowery ease. 
But with all these drawbacks, we be¬ 
lieve there is money to be made in 
growing peaches in Florida. I still pin 
my faith to the early varieties, Bidwell’s 
Early, Suber, Maggie, Jewel, etc.; and 
to prove my faith by my works, I am 
preparing land now on which to set a 
new orchard this coming winter. Sev¬ 
enty-five to eighty per cent, will be of 
these early varieties. 
The trees I have at present were set in 
my orange groves, about 300 in Novem¬ 
ber, ’86, about 900 in December, ’95. 
The older 300 have been killed to the 
stump the second time; the others, ex¬ 
cept the latter kinds, once. High winds 
play havoc with the new limbs, splitting 
them off the stump because of this 
weakness; and I have strong hopes that 
the orange trees are to be spared to 
spread and grow and fill all the space 
with their incomparable beauty. And 
for reasons given before in this Society, 
I believe that the peach and orange trees 
should be in different plots of ground on 
account of different modes of cultiva¬ 
tion. For these reasons, I have decided 
to set a new orchard. Will hold on to 
the old trees until new ones fruit, or for 
two more crops after the present one. 
