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FRUIT ORCHARDS.Delivered before the High 'Point Farmers'Institute, April, 1887.BY J. VAN LIN1LEY.Mr. President, ladies and gentlemen of the Raleigh Farmers' Institute:Plow deep, drain and manure well is our motto, if we wish to find gold. That is a true saying. Keep your orchards in a thrifty condition, properly pruned and you will have long lived trees and plenty of fruit. Where to plant a peach orchard and all other early blooming fruits is best learned by observing what orchards bear often in your neighborhood and note theelevation and situation. Late years the common opinion is that peach trees are short lived. What Started such an opinion ? Are the trees planted in thin land and allowed to bear heavy crops and nothing added to keep up the ground. In 8 to 10 years they egin to die out, the cause is they imply starve to death. Keep feed to our peacli trees sufficient to keep t^em in a thrifty condition and you ill have long lived trees.The best paying market kinds according to my observation for the past few years are the June, July and October varieties. The August and September kinds are best suited to can-ng and drying.It is not so particular where you lant an apple orchard and other late looming fruits as they rarely get killed by late frosts, but further Northern States for winter apples. November and February are the best months for planting but trees can be successfully planted any time duringthe winter or from November 1st, to April 1st., provided the frost is out of the ground and it is not too wet. March is a good time, but February is better. How to plant a tree is the most important question, and thousands of trees are lost and allowed to die annually for the want of knowledge on this point. If the ground is properly sub soiled, a small hole is sufficient. Run off the rows with a two horse plow and then check it with the same will often be sufficiently deep to plant a tree if the cross is well cleaned out. Many trees are planted too deep. If the ground is of a high and dry nature plant not more than two inches deeper than the tree grew in the nursery. If the land is wet or of a wet nature the tree should be planted very shallow and earth raised around about the tree. If the holes are to be dug, which is generally the best, dig them two feet square and eighteen inches deep, then fill up the proper depth with the best top soil before plantation. Never put stable manure about the roots of a tree while planting, it is good to mulch with after planting. Take up the tree in the left hand and the knife in the right, let the top hang down and trim off bruised and broken roots, cutting them from the under side which will cause them to heal up better—than if trained from the topsides if they have been damaged by freezing or any other cause, if by freezing they will look black and you should keep cutting them off till they appear fresh and sound, every root that is not fresh and sound must come off or they will die. I have often seen trees planted when all the roots were cut away but the main stem on account of being damaged and it looked more like a walking stick than a fruit tree and in nearly every instance they throw out new roots and grow off finely, when if the damaged roots had not been removed they would have died certain.The Magnolia Grandiflora dies worse than any other tree and yet if proper ly managed it is easy to make live. Apply the knife to the roots until every bruised or damaged one is cut away. If the leaves begin to look dry cut them off and wait for sometime and if the tree looks shriveled cut offall the branches and shorten back thetop, if necessary cut it back to the ground, it will only grow up that much stronger and more beautiful. Cutting back fruit trees when firstplanted is quite important especially the peach, the later remove every limb if it has any and cut the top back to a strong bud two or three feet from the ground, many cut lower I often do so myself. Served in this way they will be more sure to grow, start stronger and make larger trees the first year than if all the top had been left on, so it is easy to see the importance of thorough pruning fresh planted trees.The common distance for planting apple trees is thirty feet apart each way. Peach, plum and pear twenty feet is sufficient.Were I asked to give a selection of fruits for an acre lot for a beginner I would say about 20 apple, 20 peaches, 10 standard pear, 8 dwarf pear, 10 cherry, 2 crabapple, 2 pecans, 2 Japanese Persimmon, 12 grape and 12 each Gooseberry, raspberry, currents and pie plant and 100 strawberry plants. These properly planted on the borders will give plenty of room for garden vegetables and if the selections are properly made will give fruit the year round. The J apanese persimmon should be planted on the south side of a building. If I were not limited to space for simply an orchard would plant 100 apple, 100 peach, 25 pear, 25 cherry, 20 plum, 25 grape and from six to twelve of other fruits. Grape, strawberry, c., should be in every garden, they do not get killed by late frost and are a sure crop and how delicious is a dish of strawberries all smothered in cream, too much praise can not be made of this noble fruit. We are far ahead of ve olden times when the varieties of strawberry were very limited and the garden was carefully supplied with material for new planting from the woods. Old Tusser, in his “Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry,”points out where the best plants of his time could be had, and turns them over with an abrupt, farmer-like contempt of little matters to femininehands:“Wife, into the garden, and eet me a plot With strawberry roots, of the Itefct to te got;Such growing abroad, among thorns and the wood, Well chosen and picked, prove excellent good.What a country wre have. Not hardly a fruit in the whole catalogue of fruits but what succeeds well with us, but they will not do well without some attention as the poet says “We know the right but yet the wrong per-sue.”The apple in the most remote periods is the subject of praise, among writers and poets, and the old mythologies all endow its fruit*with wonderful virtues. The allegorical tree of knowledge bore apples, and the celebrated golden fruit of the orhards of Hesperus, guarded by the sleepless dragon which it was one of the triumphs of Hurcules to slay, were also apples according to old legends. Among the heathen gods of the north, there were apples fabled to possess the power of confeiring immortality, which were carefully watched over by the goddess Iduna, and kept for the especial desire of the gods who felt themselves growing old.As the mistletoe grew chiefly on the apple and the oak, the former tree was looked upon with great respect and reverence by the ancient Druids of Britain; and even to this day, in some parts of England, the antique custom of saluting the apple tree in the orchards, in the hope of obtaining a good crop the next year, still lingers among the farmers of portions of Davonshire and Herefordshire. This old ceremony consists of saluting the tree with a portion of the contents of a wassail bowl of cider with a toast init, by pouring a little of the cider about the roots, and even hanging a bit of toast on the branches of the most barren, the farmer and his men dancing in a cicle round the tree, and singing rude songs like the following:“Here’s to thee, old apple tree,Whence thou mayst bud, and whence thou maystblow;And whence thou mayst bear applee anow.Hats full, cape full.Bushels and sacks full.Huzza.Lard, if applied at once, will remove the discoloration after a bruise.
Newspaper Details
The Progressive Farmer
Raleigh, North Carolina, US
Thu, May 26, 1887
Page 1
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Anonymous
USA 15 Jun 2021
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