Daily Kennebec journal., 1908-11-12

squares and the pears in the last row
of filters Place the other small fruits
in rows as suits your convenience and
use the remainder for a vegetable
garden. If this small patch OF only
one half acre is well cared for each
year, it will yield all the fruit, twice
over, that any family can use. Of
course you will have to wait a few
years for the trees to give much
yield, but try the experiment and you
will be surprised at the result
In whatever town our annual meet
| ing is held, a few new names are
added to the list Ninety per cent. of
these give because they do not wish 10
refuse when asked for dollar to aid
in the good work. They give a dollar,
they hear the song, they forget the
singer
| Why is there such an appathy
among our farmers wegarding
orcharding in Maine? In nine out Of
every ten cases it is Indifference, pure
and simple.
/ There are some apple trees to be
| found on each of the $4,000 farms in
the State
| There may be orchards on 20 per
! CcIt VI lIlcSc, llldl is, d COllccClOn or
| trees numbering from so upwards
OF these 10000 or more aggregations
of trees how many could be rightly
called orchards? Perhaps SO per cent
or these 5000 orchards how many
have modern or up-to-d date methods
Of care bestowed upon them? Not one
| tenth of one per cent. Do you dare
| contradict that statement? l cannot
| verify it but 1 believe it,
| Now it is up to you, members of
| this Society, to bring about a radical
| change in the orchard conditions in
| the State
There are grave problems to be
faced. There are questions to be dis
| cussed at our firesdes during the
coming winter months.
In your grange meetings and
wherever you may meet brother
farmer.
| would recommend the appointment
of an orchard committee in each sub
ordinate grange whose duty it should
be to arrange for an all day or even
ing meeting, to be held for the pur-
pose of advancing the orchard inter-
ests of the State. Fruit to be ex-
hibited, papers read, a speaker might
be secured where deemed expedient
or a general discussion could be
arranged.
The fruit might be donated. sold at
auction, and the proceeds go to pay
the premium. Life is too short to be
spent in idle theory and gossip. We
spend twenty odd years in getting a
start and when our wisdom teeth are
cut. third of the span has been
crossed.
To my mind one of the essentials
to health (and health is the whole
keynote to the enjoyment of life,
either in the city or country is gagged
directly by the amount. variety and
quality Of the fruit consumed.
There Is no reason why each one Of
the $4,000 farmers in the State should
not raise his own fruit 1 have here
outlined a diagram on one half of an
acre Of ground
The farmers are Gods chosen
people and fortunate indeed is he who
lives up to the full extent of the
priviledges bestowed. The vital
workshop above referred to employees
many an artisan whose skill is COM
mensurate with his chosen duties, hut
we are all there to do our part, are we
doing it to the best of our ability?
Are we improving our opportunities?
Although the present orchard condi
ton may seem diScOuraging yet there
is all the more reason why we should
exert ourselves to regain what we
have lost. Our failure should not put
a damper on our effort to win. If we
would apply the same sturdy COM
nonsense methods to our orchards
that We do to our other farming
operations success would surely re-
ward our efforts.
We have the best of soil, the best
of locations, and the best of climate
for many varieties of apples. All we
lack is good honest application OF
first class sticktoitiveness applied
with brush of business methods and
a good blending of common sense.
What is the present condition Of our
orchards taken as a whole? Many
trees both young and old are dead,
large per cent of the remaining ones
are in dieng condition, many of
these through lack of attention. Some
could have been saved If they mad
been attended to in season, but large
per cent of them received their death
blow in the winter of 'O6 and '01 and
have fingered along, some dieing last
year, many more this season. ana
some will follow another year.
During the past season we have In
vestigated by request about SO
orchards located in thirty different
towns in the State. When 1 could not
attend to the calls personally a
trained orchardist was sent to make
the examination. In most cases the
conditions were much the same.
Trees were found dieing. either as
direct result Of the cold winter above
mentioned or by the presence Of
canker Canker Is a we'll known
fungus disease of the apple while
''Fire Right" Is a bacterial disease