382 STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
farmer, and at the same time it is nearly impermeable by water. A 
In this latter particular it has the injurious effects of clay 
itself upon the growth of the fruit trees, by preventing a sufficient 
drainage for their proper growth. This impalpable formation is 
in all the limestone regions of the State more or less, and may 
be found also at some points in the sandstone regions. Wherever 
it is, the cereals will grow with deep plowing in perfection; and 
with a proper supply of manure to the surface, the farmer who 
has such a farm need never despair of a crop, as he is possessed 
of as many farms as he has feet of this kind of soil. 
This is not a proper time or place to give my ideas of its 
creation, formation, deposit, or whatever it may be called. I 
am only dealing with the fact of its existence, and pointing out 
its effects upon the life of the tree. From its impervious char¬ 
acter, both to water and the roots of the tree, and its depth, it 
is unfit as a subsoil in which to grow apple trees, notwithstanding 
it contains all the elements required for the nourishment of the 
tree; unless, perchance, it may hold ,them in too fine a form. 
Trees planted in it will grow for a few years very vigorously; 
and probably commence bearing, but after some fifteen or twenty 
years they will die, in the same manner as their predecessors, 
the black oaks, have done before them. I am of the opinion that 
their feet get wet, they catch cold, and die of the quick con¬ 
sumption. This appears plain from the fact that the last year’s 
growth of wood is not much, if any, less than that of any 
preceding year. 
As this formation occupies so large a space of the southern 
portion of Wisconsin, and portions in which farmers desire to 
plant their orchards, it is a question deserving careful attention, 
whether such lands can at all be used for the purpose of rearing 
orchards. I answer unhesitatingly that it can. This land is 
the native land of the American crab apple, wild plums and 
cherries; showing plainly that the surface soil is well calculated 
for the growth of the choice fruits. Besides the direct evidence 
arising from the vigorous growth, though untimely decay of the 
trees planted in this soil after a few years, we have the negative 
evidence of the flourishing and lively condition of those trees 
