The dominant considerations in placing commercial peach-orchards in the peach-zones in New York seem now to be economic ones. Natural conditions are so favorable in any of the recognized peach-districts of the State and obstacles so easily overcome by those who possess common knowledge of peach-growing, that a crop comes almost as a gift from nature. Natural advantages are more common than man-made ones; so that suitable locations are mostly to be sought for in the centers of peach-growing near a shipping point where the haul is short, the freight service prompt, regular, efficient, with low freight rates and refrigerator service, where labor is abundant, and, lastly and very important, where the markets are so placed that they are not controlled by growers in regions more advantageously situated. Advantages offered by local markets now determine the placing of a good many peach-orchards in New York. A location where there is a good local market and at the same time ample facilities for shipping to distant markets is ideal, for it enables the grower to dispose of over-ripe and second-rate peaches that otherwise go to the dump. The local consumer, however, usually suffers. Prosperous towns and cities have added much to the prosperity of nearby peach-districts in this State but generally these local markets have not received the attention from growers they deserve. The product sent to the local markets is usually much poorer than that shipped to a distance. On the other hand, growers maintain that customers in towns in the peach-belts will not pay for good fruit. Nowhere are the favorable influences of water more admirably illustrated than in the peach-orchards of New York, all of the peach-districts being bounded on one or more sides by bodies of water. The great majority of the orchards are planted on the shores of one of the two Great Lakes, slope toward one of the several Finger Lakes, or are near flowing water in the Hudson. The equalizing effects of bodies of water on temperature--warmer winters and cooler summers--and the effects of the air-currents from bodies of water are so well known that comment is not necessary. It is worth while noting, however, the distance to which the benign influences of water are felt in the New York peach-districts. In the Hudson Valley the peach can be grown only a-mile or two from the river with safety from frosts and freezes. With few exceptions, the peach-orchards about the Central Lakes overlook the water. On the Great Lakes peach-plantations are found from one to six or eight miles from the water, depending upon the height of the land, and the amount and direction of the slope.