Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1883-11-14
Coz. HARDEE's ORANGE GRovE-A

few afternoons since number of the at
taches of the 1ames- Union visited Col. l..
A Ualdee at his home at Honeymoon for
the purpose of seeing his orange grove.
some OF the rarly never having seen one
before. A great deal has been said, in Il
general way, about Honeymoon, but none
of the Times Union party were prepared
10 believe that inside the borders of Duval
county, and, in fact, almost inside the
units Of the city of jacksonville, existed
one OF The largesl, most thrifty and heav
lest bearing orange groves in the state OF
Florida; and, IN iacl, we doubt very much
whether the regular visitors TO Honey
moon are aware OF this fact themselves,
but nevertheless it is true.
The party met Col. Hardee standing at
the cxtrtme northeastern co. ner OF the
grove and on being asked il he had any
objections to our entering and inspecti g
the same, the colonel replied: "No; on
the contrary | will lake great pleasure in
showing You through mvseIf; and, by the
way, you are the first newspaper men who
have thought it worth while to take the
trouble to come out here and see for your.
selves exactly what can be done at home.
| frequently blame you newspaper men
lor remaining quiet and allowing visitors
to go south to see orange groves, under
the impl ession that the huit cannot be
successfully grown mere, when you ac u
ally have right here, within one and half
or at most two miles from ihe post office,
what claim to be the largest and finest
g,ovt in the state, which fact | am pre-
pared to demonstrate,
CHOW large is your grove. colonel?'
"Oh, it covers one hundred acres,
though it Is / OF all in bearing yet. Why
sir, will walk with you straight through
the grove distance cf one mile, and then
we will uot get through. In the younger
portion OF the grove, where the trees are
not bearing. l keep my nursery stock
rhis stock IS planted in alternate rows and
be, W, en- the trees"
GLOW many acres have you in bearing?"
Twenty or twenty five"
"And about how many treesP"
"In all, or do you mean bearingP"
II mean both"
"Well, have in the neighborhood of
600 trees bearing. | cannot say how
many there are in all, including the nur.
sely sock-lt is somewhere between l5O-
600 aud 900 QUO trees; that is as near AS
| can come at it,.
GLOW many oranges do you expect 10
gather this year. colonelp
Il do NOT know, | estimate that there
ATE over 5O0,O QUO on the trees; but Mr..
Connor, our largest fruit dealer, who has
visited the grove, estimates that there are
between 100000 and 1000 QUO on the
trees. How they are you can Judge Tor
yourself" sald the colonel, as The party
entered the bearing portion Of the grove;
and, sure enough, there we were in the
midst of a magnificent orange srove-lbe
lalge healthy looking trees all loaded
down with fruit. In passing from one
portion of the grove to another. we fire.
quenty saw limbs hanging to the ground,
aud Others propped up by poles in order
to assist them to support the immense
weight. There were oranges of all sizes
and varieties, a great many of the trees,
though loaded down with pretty ripe fruit,
were still in bloom and countless numbers
of young oranges from the size OF buck
shot up, could be seen. There were also
oranges of every variety, from the small
taneerine or "kid glove" to the largest
naval orange, and, besides these, We were
shown, during the afternoon, bearing ba-
mana plants, pecans, peaches, apples, figs,
| puulS anu all OlHol hIuuo vi iluie' "bio'
the colonel grows on his place to perfec'
ton.
A rather amusing feature of the grove
which will be noticed at once is the colo
nels peculiar method of experimenting
with his trees The trunks of some are
literally filed with nails. while pieces OF
wire, bone, iron, sticks, railroad spikes,
etc, are to he seen on every hand, all fas-
tened to or in some way connected with
the lree. In places where four or five
shoots run up from the ground in a cluster,
forming as it were, as many separate
trees, the colonel, by his various expert
ments, is succeeding in forcing them all 70
unite into one large trunk, anu by this
means he says that within II few years he
will have trees three or four feet in diane
| ter
"How long have you been here, col
onelP'
Il started this place about thirteen years
ago. AT that time had seven children,
not a cent of money, was $4,000 in debt,
and had otherwise bad character gener-
ally -,
"What do you value your grove atP'
"Haven't got any valuation on 1t. Re
fused this summer 100000 in cash for it
expect to net this year $4,000 from the
sales of my oranges alone. to say nothing
Of nv nursery business, which is now
simply immense. and my potato patch.'
Foreda Times Union