lant hills four feet apart, and _train each plant to four or
five vines_, cutting off all side shoots and a few of the leaves. _Never
cut off_ the top of a vine to hasten the ripening.

Make the ground _as rich as possible, plough deep, plant deep, set deep
and prune carefully_. If you do not use poles or a trellis the vines
thus managed should spread over the ground as pumpkin vines grow, and
instead of "going all to vines" the tendency will be to go all to
tomatoes.

_A big story._ Over $3,000 per acre. In 1910 I had three rows each forty
feet long and four feet apart, i.e., a row 120 feet long, or 480 square
feet. More than $35.00 worth of ripe tomatoes were taken from these
vines, the price never more nor less than five cents per pound. If 480
square feet will produce $35.00, 43,560 square feet would produce
$3,175.

During the tomato season I was away from home when a neighbor gathered
bushels which are not counted in the above figures, and our family used
and gave away several bushels more.

Annual Report, 1915, Vice-President, Fourth Congressional District.

J. K. DIXON, NORTH ST. PAUL, MINN.

The fourth district fruit crops--with the exception of strawberries and
raspberries--were conspicuous by their absence this season of 1915.

A festive blizzard that came prancing our way the 17th of May
effectually destroyed what promised to be a bumper crop of apples and
plums. The trees were for the most part past the blossoming stage, and
the fruit had started to develop. Currants and grapes met the same
disastrous fate. Only in favored situations, adjacent to large bodies of
water, were there any apples, plums, grapes or currants to speak of.

[Illustration: Mr. J. K. Dixon, North St. Paul.]

In my orchard, at North St. Paul, we burned wet straw smudges every
second row on the outside of the orchard, allowing the wind to drift the
smoke through trees. This was done by adding the wet straw at intervals
to the burning piles in order to create a continuous dense smoke. When
daylight appeared we noticed the ground covered with a beautiful blanket
of frost, and decided two men smoking pipes would have been as effective
treatment as the smudge.

In this, however, I have since concluded we were mistaken. As the season
advanced we noticed the first three or four rows in from the smudges
gave us our only apples, whereas the further one went in the fewer were
found, until they finally disappeared entirely.

Q