\ 
American Agriculturist, July 7 ID.'3 
Apple Growing Advancing 
Interesting Facts Revealed in Pennsylvania Survey 
A PPLE growing to-day is a distinctly 
.business proposition. Only those 
men who are qualified to underake it 
in a business-like way can expect to 
succeed. This statement is borne out 
by the fact that while during recent 
years, there has been a rather general 
decrease in the total number of apple 
trees, that decrease has occurred largely 
in the old farm orchards rather than 
in commercial plantings. Thus in the 
report just published of the survey of 
the Pennsylvania apple industry, made 
jointly by the Pennsylvania State Col¬ 
lege and the State Department of Agri¬ 
culture, it is shown that while during 
the last 20 years, there has been a de¬ 
sandstones which form the ridges over¬ 
looking the valleys. 
Trees in the northern section of the 
State have been planted usually 40 
feet apart. In the southern districts, 
the spacing has been from 30 to 33 feet. 
This has been found to be too close, 
however, and the newer plantings are 
being spaced more widely—from 35 to 
40 feet apart. 
Fillers have become popular. Peaches 
have been used, but since the two fruits 
require somewhat different care, many 
growers use early apples instead. 
Probably three-quarters of the or¬ 
chards surveyed are plowed before blos¬ 
soming time. The largest group of 
TABLE 1.—FERTILIZER TREATMENT AND RESULTS 
Treatment 
Sod with Fertilizer. 
Sod without Fertilizer. 
Cultivation with Fertilizer. . . 
Cultivation without Fertilizer 
Condition of Trees 
Per Cent of Total 
Total 
Good 
Medium 
Poor 
48 
42 
10 
100 
20 
27 
53 
100 
71 
27 
2 
100 
19 
43 
38 
100 
crease of about 4,750,000 apple trees in 
that State, the commercial apple indus¬ 
try is advancing in almost promising- 
manner. 
This is but one of the interesting 
facts revealed by the survey, which is 
of wide interest and value because of 
the importance of Pennsylvania among 
apple-growing States. For example: 
About one-third of the growers in¬ 
cluded in the survey had spent, from 
seven to eight years as hired men, 
tenants, etc., before buying their farms. 
There were more growers between 
the ages of 40 and 50 than in any 10- 
year age period. The next largest 
group was between 50 and 60 years old. 
There were as many fruit farm owners 
over 60 years of age as there were be¬ 
tween 30 and 40. 
A surprisingly large percentage of 
growers started without previous train¬ 
ing. Among the most successful were 
found doctors, engineers, teachers and 
business men. 
All but 33 of the growers questioned 
were Pennsylvania born. 
The estimated costs of growing, pick¬ 
ing and packing a barrel of apples 
growers cultivate four times. Nearly 
as many cultivate from five to seven 
times. Cultivating is over and the 
cover crop seeded in by the third week 
in July. 
Clover, either alone or with the other 
legumes is the most common cover crop 
of the non-leguminous crops, rye is 
found most often. 
Where the season is long enough, the 
usual rotation is corn, wheat and hay 
for the main crop, with small acreages 
of oats and potatoes. Where the season 
is shorter, part of the wheat usually is 
replaced with oats and the potato acre¬ 
age largely increased. 
Apparently because of somewhat dif¬ 
ferent fertilizer practice and more 
favorable climatic and growing condi¬ 
tions, Pennsylvania apples do better in 
sod than do those of New York or 
Ohio. Thus nearly one-third of the 
acerage surveyed had been in sod three 
years or more in the last seven. Prac¬ 
tically all orchards less than 10 years 
old, however, are cultivated. 
Two-thirds of the sod orchards and a 
large majority of the cultivated or¬ 
chards were fertilized. Over half of 
TABLE 2, 
-PROPORTION OF GOOD, MEDIUM AND POOR APPLE TREES 
IN FERTILIZED AND UNFERTILIZED ORCHARDS 
ranged from 88 cents to $1.95 before 
the war and from $1.06 to $3.79 in 
1919 and 1920. 
The proportion of the farm in or¬ 
chard ranged from 20 to 42 per cent. 
The percentage of the total farm in¬ 
come derived from fruit varied from 
28 to 97. 
The six most profitable varieties as 
indicated by the combined total of first 
and second choices were as follows: 
Stayman. 255 
York. 250 
Baldwin. 156 
Northern Spy. 69 
Grimes. 41 
Ben Davis. 40 
The six least profitable varieties 
were: 
Ben Davis. 77 
York. 15 
Smith Cider. 15 
Baldwin. 10 
R. I. Greening. 10 
Northern Spy. 8 
Twenty-six per cent of the growers 
questioned were planning new plant¬ 
ings totaling 3,126 acres. 
110 of them expected to plant Stayman 
57 “ “ “ York 
26 “ “ “ Grimes 
19 “ “ “ Rome 
18 “ “ “ Jonathan 
The favorite soils among the growers 
are those derived from the shales and 
Fertilization a Big Factpr 
Thus no matter which cultural sys¬ 
tem is followed, apparently, but five 
per cent of fertilized trees may be 
counted poor, -while about half of the 
unfertilized trees are in poor condi¬ 
tion. 
Diseases and insects have nearly 
ruined all but the well-cared for or¬ 
chards. 
The tractor is replacing the horse 
to only a slight extent, one horse^ less, 
on the average, being found on farms 
of the same size without a tractor. 
On a farm of say 200 acres, the num- 
(Continued on poge 15) 
Conditions of Trees 
Per 
Cent 
Fertilized 
Unfertilized 
Good . . .. 
62 
20 
Medium . 
33 
31 
Poor ..... 
5 
49 
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the unfertilized sod orchards were re¬ 
ported in poor condition. Most of the 
orchards were manured, the frequent 
interval being three years and the com¬ 
mon application, 5 to 10 tons per acre. 
Most growers used commercial fertil¬ 
izer applied every year, the one nearly 
standard mixture being nitrate of soda 
and acid phosphate, used at the rate 
of from 1,015 pounds per tree. Bone 
meal and sulphate of ammonia are also 
used. A majority of the growers apply 
fertilizer prior to May. 
The effect of fertilizer treatments 
may be shown in accompanying Table, 
No. 1. 
Summing up the proportions of good, 
medium and poor trees under both cul- ! 
tivated systems, when fertilized and 
when unfertilized are summarized in 
Table No. 2. 
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