bare
and as hard as the road. It will do no harm; it will do good. Hogs may
not like green apples, but there is something specially delectable to a
hog in a green, wormy plum. He will pick up every one that drops, and so
diminish the crop of curculio. In my locality, pruning of apple and
cherry orchards is practiced very sparingly. Cutting out broken, decayed
and interlacing branches and the suckers at the base seems to be about
all the pruning that is desirable. Peach and plum orchards are likewise
neglected, though some growers practice heading in to make the trees
grow more compact, and to thin the fruit. I think that, with tall and
straggling apple trees, such as Missouri Pippin, Winesap, or Minkler,
heading in might be profitably practiced.

The question as to the profit of spraying for insects and fungi, as far
as my observation goes, is not settled yet. The theory is all
right--indeed, it has become one of the strongest articles of faith in
the horticulturist's creed. When the subject comes up in the
horticultural meeting all commend it. Very few growers, however, make a
business of spraying. Most of the growers in my locality who used to
spray have quit it. They deny that they have lost faith in it, but they
don't do it. My opinion, based not on my own experience, but the
practice--or rather lack of practice--of others, is that, save in
exceptional cases, it doesn't pay; that the ravages of codling-moth and
curculio are not appreciably lessened by spraying; that the loss from
scab in this dry climate is so light as not to justify the cost of
spraying; that, just as many of the doctrines of the churchmen would
die out if the preachers should turn teachers, so the doctrine of
spraying as a cure-all would die out if the pump men and experimenters
should turn fruit-growers; that the average man believes in a
perfunctory way many things which his experience forbids him to
practice.

The damage from borers is a serious drawback to orcharding. There are
various patent contrivances and washes that are recommended to prevent
the work of borers, but all, so far as my observation goes, fall short
of complete success. The only safe way is to hunt the borers out. This
should be done twice a year, late in August, when the newly hatched ones
are large enough to be easily seen, and in April or May, after they have
come up out of the roots, to get the ones overlooked in the fall.

Rabbits the past year have been specially tro