and while he is making a success of it I am afraid if we went into it we might become overenthusiastic to the neglect of our orchard, as Mr. Seeling has done. He has made it a success, but I think that we shouldn't undertake too much. Professor Green: Mr. President, I think our time is too valuable to listen to verbal reports. The Secretary: I only want a moment's time to refer to a question that was mentioned just before this, and that is that of the vegetable growers. You remember a few years ago we usually had these topics on the program, but as Mr. Pierce said the gardeners were disposed to be clannish, and generally they had trade secrets. Probably that condition is changed. We have younger men coming on now who realize they can learn from some one else, and it is possible that we should do something about it. We are confronted with this difficulty. You who have examined the program see that it is crowded, and the members do not think that they can spend more than two days here. Other things, vegetables, forestry and ornamental planting, are thrusting themselves upon us, and there are so many things that it seems to me we must either devote less time to the question of fruit, or spend more time here, or give less attention to the vegetables than we would like. And this morning we are getting into deeper water, because next year we shall probably have to devote one session to ginseng. Mr. McCowan: It seems to me the fruit business is too important to be pooled with any other business, and in doing that we detract from the business we are engaged in. I do not believe it will stand any division. If we are successful in fighting the enemies of fruit, and in getting the object lessons which we have, and which are before us to get, learning when to spray, how to spray, and what to spray with, and for, we have more than two days' work before us. It is plain to all of us that we have neglected spraying many times when it would be very valuable to us as a money making crop, and also detrimental to our orchards. The fact is we go out in the springtime and notice that there are but few live fruit buds, and but a small set of fruit on the trees, and become discouraged, and say that we will wait another year to spray. When we do that we simply place our trees back in an unhealthy condition. The orchard is not in condition to bear a crop the following year, neither will it bear a successful crop the next year, for the insects which have accumulated on that tree or orchard during that year, which should have been killed, will be in larger quantities the coming year than had we sprayed. So it seems to me that we cannot hire a man to go out and fight, especially the codling moth. I never saw one yet that was fast enough. It will get ahead of him. We must love our business. We must go into it to win, and we will win. It takes but very few apples, if we take care of them, to make a paying crop. Many times we feel that our fruit crop will not pay us anything whatever, as it was this spring. Yet if we successfully fight the enemies to fruit we will have a paying crop. I can say this year that at one time I felt that 75 cents an acre was a fair price for the fruit that would be gotten, and yet I realized a clear profit of $75.00, and I would like to know the conditions under which the rust appeared on the apples in the northern section of the State of Ohio. Now spraying in no sense brings these conditions on in the southern part of Ohio, and I feel that it was through neglect that it was done. I would like to hear from the gentleman why or how it happened to rust the fruit to the extent it did. The President: The gentleman who just spoke owns the farm in the southern part of Ohio where the original Rome Beauty grew. He has some apples here from the original farm. A Member: I want to make a little report from Saline, Jefferson County, Ohio. That strip just along the river is great apple country. Across the river in front of my house I suppose there are 40,000 apple trees bearing. And on this side of the river where I live there are many trees also. We had probably 20 per cent. of a crop this year. It has not exactly struck me as yet, but all south of me the trees are all dying and we are going to lose them all. It is caused by the salt from the pipe works. My trees are all young. I think we will handle them for a while yet, but we are playing a losing game, and there will be one apple country out of the way. The President thereupon announced the following committees: Committee on Exhibits-S. R. Moore. Committee on Essays-T. E. Carr, J. J. Crumley, C. W. Montgomery, Committee on Resolutions-S. R. Gill, F. H. Ballou, W. G. Farns worth. Committee on Business-C. W. Montgomery, Lowell Roudebush, W. N. Scarff. AD INTERIM REPORT FROM SIXTH DISTRICT. BY M. I. SHIVELY, CHILLICOTHE, O. MR. PRESIDENT AND MEMBERS OF THE OHIO STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY.It affords me great pleasure to be present with you at this the forty-first annual meeting of the representative fruit growers of the grand old state of Ohio. We are here again as a loyal family of fruit growers, representing our chosen profession, with greetings to old friends and new acquaintances, to review the success and failures. Hoping to be able to gain some information of value to carry back to our friends that may give them some new light in the many dark mysteries of horticulture. If we like our profession, disappointments should not discourage us. True success is the result of untiring and persistent effort. We must climb life's ladder round by round. Today is ours; if we sow today, we may reap tomorrow. Years are made up of days. We should be careful how we spend today. Remember, it is worth just as much as any other day in the year. This is a busy age. Man in any profession should take a little time to reflect on the events of the past year. We, as fruit growers, do not think enough. We do not experiment enough. We follow in the trodden pathway of our forefathers; successes then are failures now. Think what efforts you have made to accomplish something. Why were those apples so knotty, wormy and worthless last season? Did you prune properly? Did you cultivate or mulch your trees to keep down weeds and sprouts? Did you spray thoroughly? Were results satisfactory? If the season brought you disappointment instead, study the cause and resolve to make greater efforts to overcome the difficulty this year. The pathway of the fruit-grower in the sixth district last year was not a bed of roses to those looking on the dark side of conditions. Unseasonable weather in February and March brought forth buds, followed by severe freezing weather, blighting hopeful longings for a general good fruit crop. Farmers or small growers of fruit in many sections of the sixth district have become discouraged, allowing their orchards to go to ruin, preferring to buy their fruit from commercial orchardists, they say, at less cost than to equip themselves with improved implements and machinery for spraying. The sooner this class of farmers quits growing fruit with present methods the better it will be for the up-to-date progressive growers, who have spent money and energy to fight and destroy insects bred in their neighbors' neglected orchards. The apple crop the past season has been a varied one. In the south and central parts of the district the crop was fairly good, in a few orchards where judicious spraying was done. While in the north and western sections, the crop was almost an entire failure. Prices, however, ruled high, selling from the orchard from 80 cents to $1.25 per bushel, only a very small per cent. of 1906 crop barreled or shipped. Twenty per cent. of a full crop will be a high estimate. In my home county (Ross) a few orchards that bore a light crop in 1906 had a fair crop last year, but quality generally poor. Similar reports came from Lawrence, Jackson, Fairfield and Highland counties. Conditions were not favorable for the proper care of the orchards last year. Cold, wet weather continued throughout the spraying season, making the work ineffective, the result of which was a poor lot of fruit. The varieties of apples grown here that are most productive and profitable, at least in the central section of the district, are the Red Astrachan, Yellow Transparent, Maiden Blush, Grimes' Golden, Smith's Cider, Rome Beauty, Mann, Stark, Imperial and last, but not least, Ben Davis, the mortgage lifter. Peach growing is a lost art in many sections where heretofore it was the leading crop. Climatic conditions and the many diseases the peach is heir to have almost annihilated the many large peach orchards and very few new orchards are being planted. The crop on the few remaining ranches was nearly a failure. Warm weather in February and March caused the buds to advance too rapidly, followed by killing frosts in April and May killing the buds, hence the failure. Small fruits a fair Raspberries scarce, high as $5.00 per Grapes, pears, plums and cherries are entire failures. crop. Strawberries selling for $2.50 to $4.00 per bushel. Black Caps bringing $3.00 to $4.00 per bushel, Reds as bushel. Wild blackberries a bumper crop, selling at about the cost of picking. Many growers of the improved varieties of small fruits, who had dropped out of the business a few years ago on acount of low prices and scarcity of labor, are again stimulated to begin anew. The Secretary: If you will allow me I would like to say a word. One way out of our dilemma of having a crowded program, and of not having time enough to get all we want on the program, is to hold more meetings throughout the State, one or the other. I do not know of another Horticultural Society that tries to get along with one meeting a year, and we should have several either as a whole, or else have our annual meeting here, and then sectional meetings throughout the State, one or the other. This matter might be left to the Executive Committee, if you see fit, but I know they would be glad to have some suggestions from you. We are not doing the work we ought to do. The President: We will next listen to a paper by Professor V. H. Davis of the Ohio State University on "The Effects of Various Cover Crops on the Temperature and Moisture of the Soil." The growing of "cover crops" in orchards has become a universal practice where modern methods of management are attempted, especially in the growing of the peach. While clean culture, followed by "cover crops" during the latter part of the growing season, is being replaced by the "sod mulch" system of management in apple orchards to a great extent, there are still many apple orchardists who prefer the former method and there are doubtless many localities where its continuance is yet most desirable. We have been told, in part, at least, what we may expect cover crops to do. Considerable work has been done from time to time on the effect of various crops on the moisture content of the soil, but very little has been done to determine their direct effect on the temperature. While other results have been noted from time to time, the effects on moisture and temperature are doubtless among the most important. With a view of studying these factors in connection with a number of crops available for "cover crop" purposes in this locality, a series of experiments were begun under the direction of the writer in the summer of 1904 by Mr. N. E. Shaw, then a junior in the College of Agriculture and now of the State Nursery and Orchard Inspection force. The work was carried on in a careful and painstaking manner for two seasons, beginning August 10th, 1904, and ending May 15, 1906. The results formed the material for one of the best theses that has ever been presented for graduation in horticulture and forestry at the university. The site selected for the experiment was a pear orchard of some ten years' growth, located on the upland of the university farm and sloping gently to the west. The soil had received uniform treatment for several years. During the summer of 1904, a crop of early potatoes was grown between the trees. These were dug about the middle of July and the ground thoroughly cultivated, preparatory to the sowing of the plots. Eight different crops were selected, representing leguminous and nonleguminous crops, those killed by frosts and light freezes, and those living through the winter; those making a dense, matting growth and those leaving a loose, rough surface after growth stops. Each plot occupied one row of trees and they were as follows: (1) cow peas, (2) Canadian field peas, (3) hairy, or winter veitch, (4) rape, (5) check (clean culture), (6) oats, (7) corn, (8) rye, (9) buckwheat. In making the moisture determinations, an ordinary soil sampler was used. Samples were taken at irregular intervals of the first and second foot, two samples being taken for each depth from different parts of each plot and placed together, in order to give a better average. The temperature was found by means of an electrical thermometer. The bottom of the coils were placed 18 inches deep. These coils are about six inches in length, so that the six inches just below the surface foot was the depth for which the temperature was determined. This depth is usually below the freezing line in this locality, yet responds quite readily to the changes in the air temperature above. The second year's work was simply an effort to duplicate that of the first. The same crops were sown on the same plots (excepting plot 1, where soy beans were substituted for the cow peas). The plots were sown August 10, 1904, and July 15, 1905. After the crops were plowed under in the spring of 1905, the the orchard was kept under cultivation until July 15. Both the cultivator and smoothing harrow were used after each rain and as weeds appeared. Each year the seed bed was thoroughly and deeply prepared (4 to 6 inches) and the seed, excepting the rape, drilled with a grain drill. Our own experience has led us to believe that the drill is the only satisfactory way of sowing cover crops from year to year. Sowing must always be done at a season of the year when moisture, to insure quick and satisfactory germination, is likely to be wanting in the soil. The drill places the seed evenly and at a greater depth than would be possible by sowing broadcast; and leaves the soil in the best possible condition to lift and hold the moisture to, and around the seed. Good germination and crops that thoroughly cover the soil, with all the attendant advantages, can usually be depended upon if the seed bed is thoroughly fined and compacted, and good seed and plenty of it is sown with the drill. During the two years nearly 550 separate moisture determinations were made and over 450 temperature readings taken. I cannot weary you with the tabulated results of all this work and must confine myself to summarizing only. In comparing the results for the two years, many differences were noted. These, of course, were to be expected. As no two seasons can be exactly alike as to rainfall, temperature, etc., the crops for each will differ in their growth and their accompanying effects upon the soil. The total precipitation from the time of sowing until first frost came was 3.42 inches for 1904, and 13.87 inches for 1905. It must be remembered, however, that the plots were sown almost a month earlier in 1905 and that the first frost came almost a month later the same year. Thus the large rainfall for the growing season of 1905 covered nearly two months more time than in 1904. The sowing of the crops a month earlier one season, together with the heavier rainfall that occurred, was beneficial to some crops and detrimental to others. Oats and rye made an excellent growth and cover the first season, but very poor the second. The growth of corn was much heavier the second season, while there seemed to be little difference in the other crops. The field peas were killed very early both seasons by plant lice, after which the moisture and temperature conditions very nearly approached those of the check plot. Among the first noticeable effects on moisture was the preventing of the rapid loss of the rainfall after growth started. In every case moisture determinations made very soon after heavy rains, showed a smaller amount in the check plot and in those where the crops had made little growth. See table I. |