J. C. BECKLEY, Spring Hill, Johnson county: I have lived in the state thirty years; have an apple orchard of 130 trees, twenty-eight years old and large for their age. For a commercial orchard I prefer Ben Davis, Jonathan, and Missouri Pippin; and for family use Early Harvest, Maiden's Blush, Jonathan, and Winesap. I have tried and discarded Smith's Cider, Talman (Sweet), Rambo, Fameuse, Willow Twig, White Winter Pearmain, Roman Stem, Dominie, Fallawater, Wagener, Baldwin, and White Pippin, because they mature too soon, fall off and rot long before it is time to pick them. I prefer hilltop with a dark mulatto soil and a clay subsoil, with a western aspect. I prefer two-year-old trees, with plenty of fibrous roots, and a well-developed top, set forty by forty feet. I cultivate my orchard till it is six or seven years old with a common plow and harrow. In a young orchard I plant potatoes, corn, pumpkins, melons, and garden-truck; I cease cropping after eight or nine years, and seed bearing orchard to clover. Windbreaks are not essential, unless on the south and north sides; would make them of cedar or evergreens. I would not make a windbreak at all. For rabbits I wrap the trees. When hunting borers I take knife and chisel and pare all gum and dirt off of the roots; then I cut wherever I see signs of a borer until I get him, and if he has gone too deep to cut out I take a No. 20 wire six or eight inches long, bend a very small hook on one end, and run it up in the hole he has made, and ninety-nine times out of 100 pull him out. When done put some alkali of some kind around the tree, such as lime, ashes, or soft soap; then cover up.