harrow--plow shallow; plant
the young orchard to potatoes, beans, vines, and sometimes corn, using a
one-horse diamond plow, and am careful to harrow afterward. I cease
cropping six or seven years after setting, and plant a bearing orchard
to red clover. I think windbreaks are essential; would make them of most
any kind of rapid-growing trees planted in groves on the east and south
sides of the orchard. For rabbits I wrap the trees, and dig the borers
out. I prune with a penknife to keep the trees in good shape. It pays if
properly done, and is not too severe. I have thinned my fruit by hand
when of the size of hickory-nuts. Think trees do best in mixed
plantings. I fertilize my orchard with barn-yard litter and ashes; I
think it beneficial, and would advise its use on all soils. I pasture my
orchard with hogs part of a day at a time when the apples fall badly.
Don't let them in at will. I think it pays and is advisable, for they
destroy the moth. My trees are troubled with both round- and flathead
borers, and my apples with codling-moth. I spray, using a hand sprayer,
with Bordeaux mixture and London purple, when the blossom falls, for
codling-moth and curculio. It has not been beneficial. I burn the [tent]
caterpillars. I pick my apples by hand in a sack over the shoulder, and
sort into three classes--first, finest; second, fair; third, culls. I
sort from the ground or a table. I sell apples in the orchard, wholesale
and retail, and have no trouble in selling my first-grade apples. I sell
and make cider of the second and third grades, and also dry some of
them. Feed the culls to hogs or other stock. My best market is at home.
We dry some in a common dry-house which is very satisfactory; after they
are dry we put them into sacks to keep from millers; we find a market
for them, but it does not pay well. I am fairly successful in storing
apples on shallow shelves in the cellar; Winesap and Rawle's Janet keep
best. I do not irrigate. Apples have been about fifty cents per bushel,
and dried apples three to five cents per pound.

* * * * *

ANDREW SWANSON, Dwight, Morris county: I have resided in Kansas
seventeen years, and have an apple orchard of 1800 trees eight years
old, eight to ten feet tall. For market I prefer Winesap, Ben Davis, and
Missouri Pippin; and for family orchard would add Jonathan and Maiden's
Blush. I have tried and discarded Rome Beauty, Huntsman's Favorite, and
Minkler