418 
WISCONSIN STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
advocates. Fruits, especially the apple and pear, thrive as well, and per¬ 
haps better, than in any other part of the state. The lands around the 
lake seem to be peculiarly adapted to this purpose, the trees of hardy vari- 
ties growing well and bearing abundantly. Much loss was formerly in¬ 
curred by lack of knowledge of the varieties of fruit trees adapted to this 
country. Tree peddlers and agents from the east and south brought trees 
that were successful in their respective localities, but which failed after a 
very few years; and many orchards were utterly ruined; many more were 
left with scattering trees of the hardy kinds, and the owners were so dis¬ 
heartened in many instances that they refused to fill the vacant spaces or 
even to take proper care of what they had left. 
Another cause of failure has been the propagation and sale of trees cov¬ 
ered with bark lice. The idea has been promulgated that the apple tree 
well manured and cared for, like the well fed calf, would outgrow the lice, 
and in time become healthy and thrifty. There is no doubt that liberal 
treatment will enable them to withstand any difficulties of this kind better 
than continued neglect, but there is no disguising the fact, that many orch¬ 
ards have partially failed, and will in time become entirely ruined from this 
cause. Trees are found unthrifty, black-hearted, decaying and finally dead 
without any other apparent cause, and certainly all that are thus affected 
will follow in this course unless they can be relieved from this parasite. If 
the careless growth of the Canada thistle, burdock and other noxious plants 
is a proper subject of legislative authority it seems as if the dissemination 
of this pest of the orchard ought to be prohibited by law. 
It has become the custom in this county, for every farm house and vil¬ 
lage residence to be flanked by a few grape vines. The Delaware, Concord 
and Clinton succeed well, the Isabella generally ripens, and several of the 
other kinds succeed with proper attention. 
The marshes in the northern part of the county, and in some of the ad¬ 
joining counties have, since the first settlement of the country, been the 
home of the cranberry. But since the vines have been protected from the 
fires that used to run over them, and some attention given to drainage, and 
where dams have been erected by which the grounds are covered with wa¬ 
ter at the proper season, and proper care used in picking the berries, the 
productiveness is vastly increased. The quality of the berry is also greatly 
improved. The cultivation of this fruit is just now, perhaps, the most 
profitable business in this part of the country. 
The population of this county, like most western communities, is made 
up from all the nations of the earth, but the universal Yankee and the Ger¬ 
mans are the most numerously represented. While there is no occasion to 
boast of any unusual intellectual or moral endowments, on the other hand 
there is an average amount of ctilture, and taken as a whole the people of 
the county will compare favorably with the people of most parts of this or 
any other country. Schools abound everywhere, and it is believed the 
quality of instruction imparted in them is improving, slowly, perhaps, but 
