Delaware gazette and state journal. (Wilmington, Del.) 1883-1902, 1895-03-21

III the shade us sit here riting, and there |
are indications Of a gathering thundergust, |
Out there IN the sun il is pretty hot, but |
here on my back porch there is a delicious |
breeze goiug-there generally is in FLORIDA |
$50 that even a March afternoon with tho |
mercury at S9' has its pleasant features.
We're 10 not for the brown and lcatlesS !
orange groves one could hardly realize that |
the land had been devastated by icy blasts !
little more than a month ago.
Growers are still at sea AS to the extent |
OF the damage done by this February
freeze. They have no data To go by. Moth |
ing of the kind ever occurred before. There |
had been two killing freezes i'll the history
OF the State-one in lS31, remembered by
only few of the verltable oldest inhabi-
tants,n and the other in 1886. The first of
these is said to have Knocked out pretty
much everything that could be frozen
while the freeze OF 'S6 only killed young
trees aud not very many of them i'll this
neighborhood. The dead groves upon
which look as | write are composed OF
trees that in their youth weathered the
freeze OF Sc IL speak of these groves as
dead because they do not yet show signs
ofreViving MISUNDERSTANDING which do
not regard their case as hopeless, for there
is wonderful recuperative powerin Florida
weather.) And SO would these trees
have weathered successfully the freeze
of December last, had that been all.
=
up and put forth buds. and would
by this time have been in full bloom
aud Verdure had not the unpreCe-
dented happened-a second freeze in the
same winter. Never before had freezing
weather caught orange trees bare of foliage
aud with THE sap up" and that is the
reason why nobody ventures to speak re-
garding them with the authority OF ex-
perence. Some, believing their trees to he
Killed to the ground, are saving them of,
leaving only stumps and roots. Trees .
foot or more i'll diameter and unpurchasa-
BILE at almost amy price three months ago,
are now living PROSTATE by the hundreds
and are being worked up into tirewuud. 1t
is sad to look upon, recalling that i'll De-
cember these trees were clothed IN luNlIri.
ant, satiny green and laden with thegolden
fruit that now lies rotting around their
blackened stumps. Ii any one would
like to lay in stock OF orange wood cheap,
now is the chance of q life time.
| pause to note that my thermometer
has climbed another notch,to sos, the maxi,
mum for the year thus far. and that with
the breeze going, it still continues de.
liuiously pleasant-in the shade And Pm
going to stay i'll the shade till the mercury
drops,
To resume. Those who are so dead.sure
on the "kllled to the roots" theory as to
cut down their trees are still. in the
minority hereabuulS; the majority prefer
to wait awhile longer before resOrting TO 50
radical a steU, They are hoping that in
spite of discoloratiun aud splitting of bark
and wood and other usually infallible signs
of moribund condition, the sap may vet
flow again and that at least the larger
limbs may live. Prudence. it seems to me,
warrants this waiting course ii these
Target trees be really dead to the ground
they can be cut down month or two
hence as well as now. And, looking on
my own little trees, many of which, To the
establishment of my neighbors, have been
spruuting up from the roots for the past
eight or ten days-sending up green shoots
already five or six inches high cannot
believe these Older trees 50 rreparably
damaged, 1t may be more through good
luck than good management but those
same little trees, only set ont 4 year last
january. have beaten everything IN this
section in showing up green sprouts and
more than one stranger mas visited Bloom
land for the satisfaction OF behulduE once
more something preca ON an orange tree"
Of course these trees have lost Il years
growth aud will have To be rcbuddeU. but
this is 4 small matter in comparison VITA
the years and the money ii Will take to put
bearing groves back to where they were
three months ago.
fear 50 much ON this topic as NV let
tiers have contained may prove tiresume to
EVERY EvENISG,s readers, but it is some
lining that never happened to Florida
before and i is to be hoped may never
happen again, and the catastrophe hiss
teen so dire and overwhelming. IN many
hundreds tins phenomenal winter iI.ts
brought change from comparative indie
Iendcnce 20 bankruptcy and peuury.
Everywhere ore men who have lDlled and
saved and pNCGc! and borrowed to Nrina
up groves ia profitable bearing, aud who,
Just on the brtn. ~ success, have seen the
labor and waiting Of ten Or dozen years