The Hood River glacier. (Hood River, Or.) 1889-1933, 1911-06-08

on the trunk of the tree, so that no
forks are formed, il gives.the tree a
goblet shape. The work of spraying.
thinning and lpicking is greatly facili-
tated thereby, the air circulates freely
and the sunlight strikes every portion
of the tree, giving the fruit better
chance to grow and color. The one
drawback to an open center lies in the
fact that the outer branches need
supports to carry the load of fruit, and
Mr.. Mason shows how eleverly and
successfully this is accomplished by
the use of wires stretched from the
branches to a ring in the center of the
tree. Pruning is done twice 4 year,
in the winter or early spring when the
tree is dormant and again in July.
The former pruning Of old trees re-
moves all limbs that may interfere
with the air circu Iation and all broken
bracnches, while the summer pruning
takes off the water sprouts.
Sraying is another important feature
of orchard work, religiouslY attended
to by the successful Orchardist. Last
spring my trees were sprayed with a
lime and sulphur mixture for rust and
| fungus, and again in the summer for
fungus growths. but it was and is not
necessary to spray for the codGiiag
moth, as the nights here in this 1pper
valley are so colo the worms cannot
hatch out. The green aphis was
sprayed for at different times as
necessity demanded. Now you will be
inclined to doubt my word and will
accuse me of gross exaggeration, such
as is found in various advertising
matter sent out from these northwest
states, yet it is an absolute fact that
out of nearly 5000 boxes of apples
marketed found only half a dozen
do you fully comprehend what that
means only six real live worms in
apples. There may have been one box
of apples, certainly no more, which
showed stings, but only six wormy
apples do | recall having found during
the season. A small percent of
Delaware Reds were injured by
fungus, but prompt spraying prevent
ed the spread of the disease and the
loss was small.
We have many other pests, such as
| the sap sucker, or what we used to call
the woodpecker, which punctures the
bark of the tree, allowing the sap to
ooze out. He makes hoe after hole
and then goes back to suck the sap.
If not discovered in time he will com
pletely girdle the tree with these holes
and cause great injury, il not death to
the tree. Our little % is kept ready,
and it was proud day for me when
brought in my first bird, for never
before had | shot living thing. The
gopher in the newer sections is a
menace to young trees, and an eff
fectual remedy is to put poisoned
raisins in their runways. One or two
applications generally suffice.
Cultivation begins early in the Ia
son and continues we'll into the sum
mer, but ceases in early August, as
later cultivation tends to continue the
tree growth Il am speaking of young
trees now into late fall, giving them
no chance to harden up for the winter.
When the young apples have formed
and are about the size OF hickory nuts
the work of thinning is begun, the aim
being to remove all apples that are not
likely to fully develop, or that may
limb rub, or are too crowded, leaving
only as much fruit as the tree will
carry and bring to perfection. This is
almost as laborious task as that of
picking. | we'll remeber my first sight
of the orchard after the thinning had
been finished last year. The ground
was literally covered with apples and
deismay and fear filled me as thought
of the terrible loss. And yet when the
crop was harvested | found so many
small and unmarketable apples |
realized that the thinning had not been
thoroughly done.
And now the harvest The trees
have been pruned and sprayed, the
ground has been watered freely the
apples thinned, and soon will develop
what the years work is to bring.
Ladders and picking stands are made
ready, patent buckets of galvanized
iron. lined with canvas, are given the
pickers, who are instructed how to
handle the fruit. The apples are
pulled from the tree with a light up
ward tWistsso that the stem may not
be broken and frrit spurs knocked off,
and placed, MT dropped, in the
buckets, and from this time forward
the apples arr handled as carefully as
you would handle eggs. Great care is
exercised in picking and by means of
| ladders and cross planks the fruit is
reached without picker climbing into
the trees. The apples are then placed
in boxes and hauled to the apple house,
! there to be wiped and sorted and made
ready for packing. The practice is
becoming quite general to make two or
three pickings, rather than stripping
the tree of all its fruit at oneytime, as,
| in this way. the more matured apples
are gathered first. allowing the green
ones to remain and develop furthe".
Such, in brief. is the work of the
Hood River orchardist, work that
enabled the valley to win the sweep
stake prize at the National Apples sshow
at Spokane for the best carload of
apples exhibited, also the first prizes
for best cars Of Spitzenburgs and
Yellow Newtowns, in competition with
the entire northwest. At Chicago,
also, the sweepstake prize came to the
same Hooi River grower. Surely the
art of growing apples has reached we'll
nigh perfection here.
This letter would not be complete
without reference to the class of
people settling in this upper valley.
| Many New Workers are coming here
from homes of affluenee and refine
ment; young men with college educa-
tion, who are taking up the work in an
intelligent, scientific way and it augurs
we'll for the future of this contry when
such type of men take up farming in
its varios branches as a life work. A
cleaner, brighter. manlier lot of young
men cannot be found anywhere than pu
here in the heart of the Cascades.
Many amusing stories are told about
these New Workers and their first
attempts at farming. One of them
was getting ready to prune his trees
and asked If he should do it with an
axe. On another occasion he was
making his first attempt at milking.
After a couple of hours hard work he
came into the house dsgusted saying
lit is no use. the COW is gaining on me
all the time - Another having an
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