for twenty years and has not failed to give me some fruit every year. I have never seen a fruit of any kind that will stand drouth like apple trees and cherry trees. You cannot recall to mind a spring in which we did not have more or less moisture in the months of March, April, May and June. If you have the moisture then you may expect the tree will gather up enough to develop its fruit buds and carry it through to the ripening of its fruit. Unless you have philosophy at the basis it is no use trying to grow apples.

M. Pierce-Have you any scab on your apples?

A. L. Hatch-Yes, when I neglect them I have plenty of scab.

Discussion closed.

LOCAL NURSERIES FOR NEIGHBORHOOD PLANTING.

J. C. Plumb, Milton.

Of the problems of horticulture which face the northwest, none are of more importance than that of an abundant home supply of fruit. This was the first question to raise when I commenced tree growing in Wisconsin over fifty years ago, and now we are far from the home production of any of the culinary and dessert fruits, except strawberries, in quantities to meet the real necessities of our growing million of people.

Shall we conclude, as many say, that "Wisconsin is not favorable to the production of fruits," when at every national and international exposition Wisconsin carries off so large a share of the prizes on hardy fruits?

And yet this 6th day of February, '95, not a barrel of Wisconsin grown apples are to be found in the markets of any of our larger towns, and precious few in our farmers' cellars. Two years ago I advocated cold storage as a practical means of preserving our surplus autumn apples for winter use, I have been pleased to see that other writers in the west have taken up and advocate that as a necessary adjunct of commer

and

cial fruit growing in the west, as it has so long been with the enterprising commission men of the east in conserving the immense apple crops of the east and south. I now will add, that in looking over our own northwest I see but little progress in growing even a home supply of apples, and am led to ask, why is it so?

The year 1880 saw the largest crop of apples Wisconsin has ever produced, three-fourths of which went to waste for want of suitable means of conserving it. In Jefferson county alone the crop was estimated at 200,000 bushels by an extensive cider manufacturer near Lake Mills, who was overloaded with good apples at ten cents per bushel, and for twenty years before that, from 1860 to 1880, the best of apples were sold in the markets of that county at twenty-five to fifty cents per bushel. And the same was true of all southeastern Wisconsin at that time, since which the home supply has largely diminished.

To me two facts are apparent:

First, that tree planting here has not for the last twenty years kept up with the increase of population, nor with our progressive civilization, which demands more fruit as a daily diet in proportion to population.

Second, that nine-tenths of the fruit trees planted here in the last twenty years are from foreign nurseries, and sold by irresponsible parties, whose sole interest lies in the dollars that can be gathered by them as salesmen.

The large crops of apples grown in southern Wisconsin from 1860 to 1880 were largely from trees grown in local nurseries, which were started in that region in the 40's and 50's, of which the counties of Racine, Kenosha, Waukesha, Walworth, Rock, Jefferson, Dodge and Dane had over twenty-five, to my knowledge.

Today there is not a nursery in all that region which is growing yearly more apple trees than its own township should plant in order to maintain its orchard area.

Early maturity and early decay, is one of the peculiarities of our western climate and soil, and for one planting to last one or two generations it cannot be expected. In any event, we

find that it pays to renew our orchards often, by filling in the dead spaces, or better by additions to the area every few. years.

In that most favored apple orchard region of the Mississippi valley, the Ozark mountain plateau of Missouri, the limit of profitable bearing is set at twenty-five years. Is it any more in Wisconsin?

I advocate the home production of trees, not because I believe only such will endure our climate, for such is not my own, nor the faith of any intelligent and broad-minded horti culturist. Yet there is reason to think that trees raised in and expressly for a locality, by a grower whose sincere desire is to supply that locality with best adapted varieties only, that such are far safer to plant than those now generally put on our market, without any guarantee of variety or character.

In the spring of 1845 my brother and myself commenced to sell apple trees from our nursery near Lake Mills, Wis., which he planted five years before, all budded above ground on seedling stalks. For the next ten years every tree went out in the hand, or by wagon in bundles, as we did no shipping, nor was there much importation except at the lake ports, for we had no railways, and so those early local nurseries were liberally patronized and were the means of an early and abundant supply of fruit for all southeastern Wisconsin.

Local nurseries need not, nor should they, be started on the slow plan of half a century ago. Then we planted the seed in rows where the trees were to stand for three to six years, thinning out and transplanting only where too thick. These stocks were budded or grafted at three inches to three feet from the ground, and one to four years from the seed, and dug and sold only when large enough to go into the orchard. This plan gave us some good trees, but too many poor ones, from the large variations of the stock grown from promiscuous seed, as well as often an imperfect union. The roots of those trees were generally coarse and but few of them. The present demand is for uniformity in size and form, with plenty of fine roots, and in the northwest we want these roots to spring from the cion by the second year and before planted in the orchard.

Hence, in the main, root grafting has come to be accepted as our best mode of propagating the apple.

The natural order of apple tree growing is as follows:

First year: The seed, which if well grown, will give stocks large enough for root grafting; taken up and cellared in the fall at one year's growth; grafted during the winter with cions cut before cold weather; planted out the following spring in nursery rows, where they stand two to four years before they go into the orchard. Further south the most orchards are planted with one and two-year-old trees.

Since most of the apple seedlings used in the west are now grown on new and cheap lands of Nebraska and Kansas, and since root grafting has become mechanical and shop work, I question the economy of the local nurseryman attempting either; and yet I commend the school work which Prof. Goff is doing in this line as normal and highly useful to the state. With the best of root grafts to be had on order, at $5 per thou-sand, of the varieties wanted, especially for any given locality, and with them plain, concise directions for planting and growing, it is no great task for a farmer's boy to become a local nurseryman, and a great blessing to his country.

Local nurseries would secure large share of the home trade by growing only such varieties as are adapted to the locality, as well as by underselling the foreign tree agent. Local nurseries and local horticultural societies should go hand in hand. Village improvement will surely come to any community having a live, practical, reading nurseryman, who would impress his ideas as well as press his products on the locality.

While the apple industry is just now the main needed reform, other nursery and garden products will come in as adjuncts, supplies for which can be grown by the local nurseryman or bought of specialists at wholesale, for the local trade.

I know the tendency is to centralize all the great industries, and that nursery stock, like reapers, can be produced cheapest on a large scale, but there are other questions involved here than simply first cost. Of first consideration is the planting

and culture of the horticultural idea among the people, which a local nursery will do if properly fostered; and with the idea will come the demand and the supply. For such is the kingdom of Horticulture and for such the horticultural society and the local nursery.

I will close with another personal reference. Among my earliest recollections is that of stumbling into the holes made by digging out trees from the little nursery at the lower end of the garden on the homestead among the Berkshire hills of western Massachusetts, where my father grew trees for himself and the neighbors. In 1840 my father removed to Ohio to school his younger children, where he commenced at once to grow a nursery and where my nursery work commenced. Three years later family and nursery were removed to Jefferson county, Wis., where I was put in charge of a nursery, from planting, culture and propagation to selling.

Thus with my elder brothers we have carried out the family bent, by growing trees in eight states of our union, and given a start to hundreds of local nurseries in the west.

In these latter days my earnest desire is to see practical horticulture revived by the establishment of local nurseries, which will bring the grower and the planter nearer together; will save the use of that middleman commonly called tree peddler, and from much of the uncertainty which always attends tree planting. The organization of local societies will do much. to stimulate local planting, and to foster both should be a work of this State Society.

DISCUSSION.

A. D. Barnes-In commendation of what friend Plumb has said about local nurseries, I will say that the local nurseries in Waupaca county are doing us a great deal of good. We are selling four times as many trees as we were before, and I believe that we are educating the people on the subject of