Tillage, Fertilizers and Shade Crops 
for Orchards. 
Wendell Paddock. 
Clean cultivation has been practiced by the majority of our or- 
chardists from the time the first trees were planted. It would be 
difficult to explain just why this plan has been followed but it is prob¬ 
able that it was brought to us from California. While a certain 
amount of cultivation is necessary we wish to state emphatically that 
we do not believe in any system by which the soil is exposed to the 
action of Colorado sunshine during the heat of the summer. In fact, 
we believe that this practice has been very much over done and the 
older orchards are in some cases beginning to show the effects. We 
may well profit by the experience of fruit growers in other states and 
in this connection the following quotation should be instructive: 
“For a quarter of a century great areas of vineyards yielded thousands 
of tons of grapes. All these years, under the stimulus of success, these 
same areas of land received clean, annual and (may we not truthfully add) 
merciless cultivation. The natural fertillity of the soil was gradually re¬ 
duced by enormous crops of fruit and its physical condition lowered year 
by year, without the restoration of any considerate amount of plant 
food or vegetable matter. After the lapse of many years, from various 
troubles and diseases, the vigor and fruitfuffiess of the vineyards waned 
and the industry began to languish. Hundreds of acres of vines were pull¬ 
ed out and the land immediately and without improvement set to peach 
trees which, for another long term of years, and under the usual relentless 
culture without the addition of humus in any form, thrived and produced 
numerous, heavy crops of fruit. Again, as the remaining store of fertility 
became further depleted by the searching root systems of adult peach trees, 
enemies began to appear and make their presence felt. San Jose scale and 
leaf curl fell upon the Island as a scourge and came near writing the final 
chapter in the history of successful peach culture there. With the destruc¬ 
tion of great areas of orchards by the scale and the injury of thousands 
upon thousands of trees, upon which the scale was not quite successfully 
combated, it is only natural that great discouragement and' depression 
should overtake the orchardists, so long accustomed to bountiful rewards 
for labor performed under such favorable conditions.” 
Has not Prof. Green* truthfully portrayed what we have a right 
to expect will happen to Colorado fruit growers if our system of or¬ 
chard management is not changed? No sane man should hope to 
continue to take large crops of first class fruit from an orchard for 
very many years without doing something to restore the lost fertility. 
True we do not expect to have the San Jose scale or the peach leaf curl 
to contend with, but both are possibilities. We have however been 
faithful in giving clean cultivation and when one comes to think of it. 
*Green, W. T. and Ballou. F. IT., Ohio Fxpt. Sta. Bui. 157, p. ti8. 
