ltivated them and kept the insects off of them and
burned them up instead of letting them prey on the neighborhood. I think
there should be a law passed that these trees along the roadside must be
cut down or that somebody will have to take care of them.
The Chairman: The original idea of roadside trees was constructive in
its nature but failed to include the idea that, with the increase of
orchard trees, or trees of any one species, we increase the insect pests
because we disturb the balance of nature; and by disturbing the balance
of nature we give advantage to insects which then remain on neglected
trees to prove a menace to our own orchards. It we have various towns
setting out roadside trees and detailing the children to look after
them, asking the children to report on them, I believe the thing can be
made a success and that the taxes of many a small town can be paid from
the nut trees along the roadside, provided you have one boy or one girl
for each tree, their services to be given free and the profit from the
tree to be given to the town.
Mr. Corsan: How about the cattle? Let them keep grazing around?
The Chairman: Oh, my, yes.
Prof. Smith: I think we sometimes let our feelings make us say things
that our brains would scarcely approve. I believe Mr. Littlepage's
charge against the tree on the roadside is not necessarily
substantiated. I don't know just how he is going to take care of his
trees, but if it requires a vehicle carrying spray, I submit that a
roadside tree is about as well fixed as one in his field. If it requires
a man with a stick or a hoe or a ladder, the tree on the roadside is in
about as eligible a location as one in the field. If care implies the
idea of turning over the soil, the roadside is handicapped, but nature
has got along without having the soil upturned. My point is this; there
is on nearly every farm in the East a little patch of land somewhere, a
little row between a road and stream where a few trees can grow, and if
fertilization is required, a few barrels of manure can go there as well
as anywhere else. The fact that a tree is put in a place that is not
ploughed doesn't mean that it is beyond all care. My point is that with
care we can get trees in fence rows without tillage and that, in
addition to Dr. Deming's formal and carefully cultivated plot, there is
about every farm a place where a man can stick a few trees and give them
such care as can be given without tillage.
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