Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1882-11-08
The Culture of Fruit Trees.

Mr.. p. Whittier of Pennington Falls
Maine, is an experienced and successful
orchardist, and we take pleasure in repro
ducing extracts from an article by him upon
Farm: If any one of my readers believes
the best way to raise an animal is to starve
and expose it to all the inclemency of the
weather so as to harden and tougher it
when young, it will be hopeless task to
make good orchardist of him, for he is the
one 10 set trees in poor grass land and let
them take care of themselves.
1.-THE first and most essential objects to
be kept in view is to have continuous
(not occasionally supply of plant food avail
able all the time for the trees according to
their need heavily bearing tree needing
more for that season than one not bearing.
Any one acquainted with the habits of his
trees can generally judge when one is likely
to bear much, and if in cultivated land, an
extra amount of manure is worked in within
reach of the roots early in the spring or the
fall before, the fruit will be better and
the tree will be more healthy and
come out stronger the next spring after
bearing; whereas if they are not so
served they are so injured frequently as to
be worthless ever after. If they stand
in grass land good mulching of manure,
straw, or even loan so as to kill or decidedly
check the grass for a rod or more from the
trees according to size, is the best and most
convenient way of treating them. Accord
ing to my observation, the very worst way to
serve an orchard, old or young, is neither
NOW nor pasture it, but let the grass and
weeds remain and die naturally, worse even
than moving and taking off.
"Many practice moving their orchards
without top-dressing until the trees begin
to decay and the grass to fail, but still
leaving heavy, compact sod, then they
plow deep and manure and give the trees
quite start for year or two and then
seed down and leave them to starve again,
then they complain that their trees are
short-lived and improbable. No wonder.
Let them try feeding their COWS and
other farm stock, in that way, and SEQ if
it will prove profitable. A steady and con-
tinuous supply of food is necessary in both
cases.
ga bearing orchard in a field should
either be plowed often shallowly, and ma
nured well, or if left to grass it should be
heavily top dressed with manure. A good
way to keep up such an orchard is to mulch
the whole surface with straw, brakes, muck
and almost anything that will keep the grass
down unless one cares more to get hay than
he does apples. l look upon grass as a
troublesome pest in an orchard and when
do not wish to cultivate it do not seed with
grass or grain but let it stay out as long as
possible The less hay get out of, and the
more manure | get into, the orchard the
better off / am fnan cially. pillow but a
small portion OF my orchards but depend
almost wholly upon manure, brakes and
weeds from pastures, etc., for what trees !
have in my fields, and for those in the pas
lures that are quite young. | have about
twenty acres of orchard on the upper end of
my pasture and fenced off so that only
sheep can get into it and they stay there a
great part of the time. This consider the
cheapest and best way to raise good fruit
and keep the trees in a good, healthy and
thrifty condition.
After all that has or can be said in re-
lation to the special treatment of trees fol
diseases and enemies, the best remedy and
preventive above all others is to keep the
trees in a good condition by supplying
sufficient quantity of available plant food
for them, not once in a while, but all
the time, for one fruitful source Of disease
is alternate liberal feed and starvation.
Food is not available if placed and imme
diately snatched away by something else.
Please remember this when you are feeding
your fruit trees"