etimes the orchard requires a certain kind of
cultivation, at other times a different cultivation. In a young orchard
I usually grow corn, potatoes, wheat, melons, or pumpkins. In a bearing
orchard I usually grow nothing, though sometimes I take a crop of millet
or pumpkins from the ground. I cease cropping entirely at from five to
seven years. Windbreaks are not necessary here; they make their own
windbreak if kept thoroughly cultivated and full of life. Thorough
protection will largely prevent borers; if any are found in the tree I
remove them with a knife and wire. For rabbits I wrap with paper or
other material.

I prune with a saw to keep down surplus wood growth and improve the
quality of the apples. It is beneficial if carefully done, a little
every spring and not much at once. I believe thinning will pay when the
trees are abnormally full. Remove as nearly as possible all defective
fruit when half grown, and what is left will be of higher grade in size,
color, and quality. I believe a decomposed stable fertilizer is
necessary on some soils. Better not pasture with any stock whatever; I
do not think it advisable; I think the profit (?) would be an expensive
one. Am troubled somewhat with canker-worm, bud moth, borers,
leaf-rollers, codling-moth, curculio, and gouger. I sprayed one year for
insects generally with London purple through the spring season, and do
not think it was a success. I pick about as Judge Wellhouse does, and
sort into three classes; the best we make firsts, the best half of the
balance we call seconds, and the balance are simply culls. We pack in
barrels and haul to market with wagons provided with racks holding
sixteen barrels each. I sell my best apples at wholesale, but have never
sold them in the orchard; the second grade I sell to groceries and
peddlers; the culls I sell to anybody, usually in the orchard. I have
never tried distant markets. I never dry any. I store for winter in a
cold store built for the purpose on my own farm, which has been
described in the paper. I have also tried artificial cold storage, and
the Jonathans kept well. [See Cold Store.]

* * * * *

E. P. DIEHL, Olathe, Johnson county: I have lived in Kansas thirty
years; have an apple orchard of 700 trees, twenty inches in diameter,
twenty-nine years old. For market I prefer York Imperial, Jonathan,
Winesap, and Ben Davis, and for family orchard Early Harvest, Maiden's
Blush, Winesap,