sod-practice in some parts of the country
that gives excellent results, under certain conditions. The grass is
cut and allowed to lie, not being removed for hay. Manure and
fertilizer are added as top-dressing, as needed. This method is known
as the "sod mulch system." It is not a practice of partial neglect,
like the prevailing sod orchards, but a regular designed method of
producing results. Its application can hardly be as widespread as
clean tillage, on level lands.

It is a common opinion that hillsides and more or less inaccessible
slopes should be planted to apples. This may be true in the sense
that apples will grow on such areas and that such plantations are
better than fallow land. In fact, many such lands are profitable in
orchards. When they do not allow of tillage, easy spraying, and
economy in harvesting, however, they cannot compete with level
orchards.

To maintain the health and energy of the apple-tree, the land should
be enriched. This may be accomplished by the application of animal
manures, chemical fertilizers, or cover-crops, or preferably by a
combination of these means. Not many persons possess sufficient farm
manures to supply the general crops and the apple-orchard; but every
application the orchard receives is all to the good. Five to ten tons
of good stable manure to the acre annually is a good addition for an
orchard in bearing. This may be supplemented by cover-crops and bag
fertilizers in years in which the manure is not available. Experiments
are yet inconclusive on the fertilizing of apple-trees, but it is fair
to assume that on most lands, particularly on old lands, the addition
of chemical fertilizer is advantageous. A bearing apple-tree may
receive two to eight pounds of nitrate of soda (depending on its size
and on soil) applied to the full feeding area of the roots, five to
nine pounds of acid phosphate, two or three pounds of muriate of
potash; always ask advice.

The pasturing of orchards is often defensible and sometimes even
desirable. If the trees are growing too rapidly, they may be "slowed
down" by seeding to grass for a time; and pasturing with hogs, and
possibly with sheep, may afford a way of keeping the area in condition
and of adding fertilizer. Sheep that do not have access to
drinking-water and salt gnaw the trees. Hogs root up the ground and
thereby provide a rude kind of tillage. If animals are fed other food
in the orchard, the fertilizer increment will be con