New YorK AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT Srarion. 455 
yearly the difference in favor of tillage is becoming more 
. marked; that the tilled trees are yearly increasing their bearing 
capacity; and that, to the contrary, the fruitfulness of the sod- 
mulch trees is decreasing, showing that the treatment is not 
only less beneficial than tillage but that it is positively harm- 
ful to the trees. 
Number and size of fruits.—Size of fruit need be considered 
in discussing this experiment only as it has a bearing upon 
marketable quantity. Size is desirable in a culinary apple 
because it saves waste in paring and coring, but for a dessert 
fruit a medium-sized apple is usually preferred. We may, 
therefore, drop size as affecting intrinsic value of the crop. 
The question arises then: Is the increased quantity due to 
more apples on the tilled plat, or, are the apples larger on the 
tilled than on the sod plat? Tables III and IV throw light on 
this question. 
TABLE III.—AmountT oF BLtoom ComMPARED WITH AMOUNT OF FRUIT, ON 
Sop AND TILLAGE PuatTs. 
Sod plat Tillage plat 
Year 
Percentage Amount Percentage Amount 
loom fruit bloom fruit 
Per ct. Bbls. Per ct. Bbls. 
1 yy eee ea 31.8 233. 31.3 278.9 
GOON Stihl da es lis. 21.6 27D y' 36.4 424.3 
(iti Le Oat eA ie 25.3 325.3 55.4 PPARs 


Table III shows from estimates made from each tree the 
amount of bloom in the orchard for three years. Unfortu- . 
nately the blooming records were not taken the other two of 
the five years. A comparison of the percentage of bloom on 
the trees with the amount of fruit harvested, shown in the 
same table, makes plain that there is a close relationship be- 
tween the number of blossoms and the number of fruits. That 
