Blush, Cooper's Early White, Ben Davis,
and Missouri Pippin. I have discarded Gennetting, Winesap, Rambo, Red
Astrachan, and many others that were worthless in this locality. I
prefer second bottom, dark sandy loam, with north and east aspect. I
plant two-year-old trees thirty feet apart, in holes four feet square,
dug one foot too deep, and filled up with surface soil. I cultivate
thoroughly as long as the orchard lives, with stirring plow and disc,
and crop with corn as long as it will even make fodder, or until the
trees shade the ground too much to raise anything. For small orchards I
would recommend a windbreak of Osage orange set far enough apart on the
south to grow in the shape of trees. For rabbits I use nothing but
corn-stalks tied around the trees. I prune in moderation to keep the
trees low; much pruning will kill trees in this locality. I thin apples
some on the trees, at any time after they are the size of hickory-nuts.
I find the best pollinators are a good apiary of bees. I believe in
using plenty of stable litter well mixed with potash, but in moderation
near the trees. Nothing except hogs should be allowed in an orchard.
They destroy nearly all the insects. I spray for canker-worm as soon as
they begin to hatch, and believe I reduced the codling-moth fifty per
cent. last spring. For borers I wash the bodies of the trees early in
spring and twice in May with soft soap and lime. For picking I use a
long-handled device of my own invention, and sort into two classes: No.
1, best and largest; No. 2, medium. One week after they are put in the
packing-house we pack in barrels, with hay or straw between the layers.
We market our best apples and sell our second and third grades at home,
and make all culls into cider and vinegar. Have tried distant markets,
but did not generally pay. Never dried any. We store for winter in a
fruit house and cave, in barrels, and are successful. Our best keepers
have been Missouri Pippin and Winesap. Our loss on winter apples runs
from three to five per cent. Prices in the fall, twenty-five to forty
cents; in winter, 75 cents to $1.25 per bushel. For help we use common
laborers at from seventy-five cents to one dollar per day.

* * * * *

WM. N. SMITH, Brownsville, Chautauqua county: I have lived in Kansas
twenty-eight years. I have an apple orchard of fifty trees twenty years
old and twelve inches in diameter. For commercial purposes I prefer Ben