The Apple: The Kansas Apple, the Big Red Apple; the Luscious, Red-Cheeked First Love of the Farmer's Boy; the Healthful, Hearty Heart of the Darling Dumpling. What It Is; How to Grow It; Its Commercial and Economic Importance; How to Utilize It.
Science
The Apple: The Kansas Apple, the Big Red Apple; the Luscious, Red-Cheeked First Love of the Farmer's Boy; the Healthful, Hearty Heart of the Darling Dumpling. What It Is; How to Grow It; Its Commercial and Economic Importance; How to Utilize It.
Apples
P. F. JOHNSON, Oberlin, Decatur county: Have lived in Kansas seven
years; Have 200 apple trees, four to eight years old, and seven to
fifteen feet high. For commercial purposes I prefer Ben Davis. For
family use, Red June, Winesap, Grimes's Golden Pippin, Jonathan, and Ben
Davis. I prefer bottom land, with deep, black loam and clay subsoil,
north slope. I plant two-year-old trees, in rows north and south, as
close as the different varieties will allow. I cultivate as long as the
trees live, with plow and cultivator, allowing them to go no deeper than
three inches. I plant the young orchard to beans, pumpkins, and
squashes; the same in a bearing orchard, and never cease cropping.
Windbreaks are essential. I would make them of Russian mulberry and
ash, and keep them cultivated. I tie dry corn-stalks around young trees
to protect from rabbits. Never prune. Never thin. I use stable litter as
a fertilizer and mulch; I think it advisable in this latitude. I pasture
my orchard in fall and winter with hogs, and think it advisable. My
trees are troubled with roundhead borer, twig-borer, and grasshoppers. I
do not spray. Have never irrigated, but intend to soon. Prices have been
from $1 to $1.50 per bushel.
* * * * *
W. B. STOCKARD, Beloit, Mitchell county: I have lived in the state since
1871. Have an apple orchard of 800 trees. For all purposes I prefer
Missouri Pippin, Winesap, Jonathan, and Jefferis. Have tried and
discarded Ben Davis and Limber Twig. I prefer bottom land with a clay
subsoil; southeast slope. I prefer two-year-old trees, planted
twenty-four feet apart, then thin them out when they crowd. I cultivate
my orchard to corn and potatoes, using a cultivator and drop harrow, and
cease cropping when about six years old; plant nothing in a bearing
orchard. Windbreaks are not essential. To protect the trees from rabbits
I rub with rabbits' blood, and whitewash for borers. I prune very
little; remove dead limbs, and clip the others; think it beneficial if
not too severe. I do not thin my fruit while on the trees; it does not
pay. It is not necessary to set trees in mixed plantings when you keep
bees. I fertilize my orchard with stable litter; think corn-stalks best,
it has proven beneficial; would advise its use on all soils. Do not
pasture my orchard; is not advisable; does not pay. My trees are
troubled with tent-caterpillar, bud moth, root aphis, bag-worm,
roundhead borer, woolly aphis, twig-borer, oyster-shell bark-louse, and
my apples with curculio. I spray just before the bud swells, and after
they bloom, with white arsenic; sal soda and lime for canker-worms and
moths; think I have reduced the codling-moth. I hand-pick my apples;
sort into two classes. Sell in the orchard, wholesale, retail, and
peddle; keep the best apples at home; make vinegar of the second and
third grades, and culls. Never tried distant markets. Find a ready
market for dried apples; but it does not pay. I store apples for winter
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