490 REPORT OF THE HORTICULTURAL DEPARTMENT, 
thrifty orchards in sod in New York is not proof that these 
orchards would not do better under tillage. 
In considering the two methods of management, of all the 
factors affecting the growth of trees in this experiment, con- 
servation of moisture should receive first attention from the 
apple grower. This statement is affirmed not only by the re- 
sults in the Auchter orchard but in practice the world over. 
The climate of Europe is moist; sod orchards are the rule there. 
Near the Atlantic seaboard in America, ‘as in New England, 
where the rainfall is comparatively high, thrifty orchards are 
found in sod. In the western fruit regions where irrigation 
is practiced, sod orchards are hardly to be found; water is 
purchased and must be conserved. In irrigated lands tillage 
is found to be the best means of moisture conservation. Mois- 
ture is by no means the only factor to be considered in the 
controversy over the sod and tillage methods of management, 
but it appears to be the chief one. 
The statement is often made that trees will become 
“adapted ” to grass. There is nothing in this experiment to 
indicate that such is the case. The sodded trees began to show 
ill-effects the first year the orchard was laid down to grass 
and each succeeding year has seen greater injury. Trees can 
hardly become adapted to thirst, starvation, asphyxiation and 
poison. 
To manage the soil of an orchard properly requires nice 
adjustments and delicate balancing for each particular case. 
Soils vary much and all are complex; quite diverse chemical, 
physical and biological changes take place in diverse soils. 
Every apple-grower, therefore, has a problem of his own. But 
the individual problem can be best solved by the rational appli- 
cation of the ordinary laws of nutrition and growth—those 
which apply to cultivated plants in general. The apple is not 
unique among plants. 
