The Fixation oe Nitrogen. 39 
1910, so that there was no good opportunity to observe the forma¬ 
tion of crusts and mealy portions. The irrigating furrows, how¬ 
ever, showed the brown lines very strongly in places. A sample 
of the soil taken from the northeastern section of the orchard to a 
depth of one foot showed only 0.062 percent of the matter soluble 
in water, but this soluble portion reacted like a pure nitrate solution. 
The trees were burning in this section of the orchard at the time the 
sample was taken. I had known for several years that a small part, 
possibly one-quarter of an acre, of this orchard, close to a deep 
wash, was affected with this trouble, but in the early part of June, 
1910, I found the trouble more general and it grew quite rapidly 
in severity and extent till there was scarcely a tree in a large 
portion of the orchard but that showed more or less burning, and 
the present outlook is very bad. 
ANALYSES 
LI 
LII 
Water-Soluble 
Water- .Soluble 
laboratory 
laboratory 
No. 1063 
No. 1072 
March 28, 1811 
May 2, 1911 
Percent 
Percent 
Calcic sulfate . 
31.808 
Calcic chlorid . 
12.813 
Magnetic chlorid . 
. 5.312 
14.940 
Magnesic nitrate . 
Potassic chlorid . 
. 9.946 
2.329 
Potassic. nitrate . 
1.727 
Sodic chlorid . 
1.983 
35.556 
Soiic nitrate . 
. 35.560 
Iron and Aluminic oxid. 
. 0.066 
0.267 
Silicic acid . 
0.194 
0.304 
100.000 
100.000 
Sample No. 1063 was taken in March and No. 1072 in May, 
1911, from the southwestern section of the orchard. The total area 
of this orchard is ninety acres. A few trees died in this section of 
the orchard in 1910 but the death rate in May, 1911, is most alarm¬ 
ing. Many trees that leafed out fully in the early part of the 
month, May, 1911, were killed outright by the 30th, as many as 
six or eight consecutive trees in a row, all succumbing in exactly 
the same manner. The water plane of the lowest portion of this 
land was at this time four and three-quarters feet below the sur¬ 
face. I wish to emphasize the following two facts; first, that 
apple trees in our country do not root deeper than two and a half 
feet as a rule; second, that it is very improbable that even the 
oldest reader of this bulletin has ever seen anything in any way 
comparable to the facts here presented, and I am fully convinced 
that they are so entirely beyond his observation and knowledge 
that he can neither conceive of nor justly pass judgment upon 
them for he does not know the facts. 
I have at all times avoided anything approaching a dissertation 
