The Delta independent., 1888-07-31
From North Fork

IT. will probably be Of interest to most
readers to hear Of the fruit farms and nurser.
ies of the North Fork, and so we will On
this, our first opportunity, give short ac-
count of some of them.
The first one we visited'wns that of ". s.
Coburn. Mr. Coburns nursery is situated
about three quarters of the way from Hotch-
kiss to Paonia, on lower Cotton creek. The
land is a sandy loan such as forms the most
Of the bottom lands of Delta county.
Mr.. Coburn was one of the first settlers on
the North Fork. He put out his first fruit
five years ago, and he now has fifteen acres of
orchard and six acres of nursery, consisting
of seventy-6ve varieties of apples; twenty-five
varieties of peaches; twenty-five varieties of
plums and corresponding amount of april
cots, cherries, pears and other fruits. He has
twenty thousand grapes, ten thousand goose
berries aud curraRts, and blackberries, rasp-
berries and all small fruit in abundance.
For the benefit of those who might wish to
know the best varieties of apples for this eli
mate, he gives list Of those which he has
thoroughly tried, and recommends the fol-
lowing: For summer Yellow Transparent,
Tetofski, Summer Pearmain, Duchess, Red
Astrachan, Red June and Sweet Bough. For
fall, Emporer of Russia, Fall Pippin, Haas,
ST. Lawrence, Fall Stripe, Rarnbo, Groven-
stein, Grimes, Alexander, Golden Pippin and
all Russian varieties. For winter, Ben Davis,
No. Pippin, Lawrence, Large Red Utters,
Wealthy, Mann, Northern Spy, Sutton's
Beauty, Rawlss Janet, Bethel, Jonathan,
Waenor and Walbridge. He has many others
equally good.
From seventy trees now bearing he esti-
els of apples, the trees being filled with fruit
to the end of the boughs. Some of the trees
will yield five bushels each. although the
fruit is only half grown the trees are /unable
to support it. We picked an apple of the
winter variety, the Alexander, which meas
ured nine inches in circumference and weigh.
ing fve..and aihalf ounces. The apples are
all large, smooth and without a blemish.
The Tetofskis wereJripe the fifteenth of
July, and with succession of ripening of the
winter keepers Mr.. Coburn will have apples
until next June.
The growth of wood is phenomenal, peach
and apple trees, set out five years ago, are
five and six inches in diameter, also cherry
trees fve years old five inches in diameter
Apricots and peaches budded to trees two
years old are two and half inches in diane
ter /, would be doing an injustice to Mr..
Coburn not to mention his skill shown in
budding, he being so adept that only the
most practiced eye can detect where art has
transformed nature. Mr.. Csburn, in bndding,
uses the French crab root for apples. consid-
ering them harder and better suited to all
climates and avoiding all the infections rels-
tive to the American apple. He has the i'm.
ported wild French cherry and plum and
pear to bud to. The wild roots are imported
when one year old, set out one year and bud
ded too, when two years old. This makes a
more expensive, but a better and more reli-
able tree, of which anyone will be convinced
by examining Mr.. Coburn's stock.
Resides grapes b.-rin- rrolifcallv in the
nursery Nv, wers cherries, plums of several
varieties, apricots two years old from the bud.
apples three years old, pears four years old
bearing, and ruims four years old loaded to
the gunwails.
Mr.. Coburn attribute. the early bearing to
the top working on first class roots and the
natural ingredients in the soil to produce
fruit on any plant inclined to pear. for all
varieties tried. both northern and semi-tropic-
al, have proved successful. This shows that
Delta county must some day stand at the
head in trait culture, which is as yet in its
infancy.
Mr. Coburn seems imbued with the idea
of budding to the wild roots. His experience
with the peach has been that it is of too
rank growth on peach root and it is with
great difficulty that they can be kept back
late enough to escape injury il not entire de
struction by late frosts. He says that by bud
ding to the wild French plum, it will retard
the growth and hold the sap later in the
SPRING stand greater difference of climate
without injury and still be prolific. He buds
from trees that have borne here successful
ly consequently in.ureing a reliable bearer.
This will without doubt be OF great interest, to
the people of this county.
Those contemplating setting out an orchard
would do we'll TO confer with Mr.. Coburn as
to the best variety and stock, and we will
guarantee that they will receive every atten-
ton We might add ,ha, II would be well to
invite Mr. Coburn to give some of his eSper.
fences through the INDEPENDENT, as il would
he Of benefit to all those interested in fruit
and Of interest to those who arc not.
TEoMAS.