W. M. BARNGROVER, Hamilton, Greenwood county: I have been in Kansas seventeen years, and have an orchard of 100 apple trees fifteen years old, twenty-four inches in circumference. For market I prefer Ben Davis, and for family use Winesap. I prefer bottom land, with a black loam soil and a red clay subsoil. I prefer two-year-old, low-headed trees, set in big holes. I cultivate my orchard about every four years with a disc and harrow, and sow English blue-grass in a bearing orchard. Windbreaks are essential to orchards on the hills; I would make them of a row of maples between every row of apple trees. For rabbits and borers I paint the body of the tree with a solution of coal-tar and carbolic acid. I prune my trees to protect them from the hard winds; always trim the highest limbs--never the low ones. I fertilize my orchard with about twelve inches of old hay for four years, and think it should be used on all soils, as the tree growth will be one-third larger. I pasture my orchard with calves, and think it advisable and that it pays. My trees are troubled with leaf-rollers. I spray with Paris green. In picking, I use a step-ladder and a pole with a hook on the end. On the under side of the pole I sew a long sack [a canvas tube]; the apples fall in this sack and roll down to me. I pack in barrels; sell in orchard; use the waste apples at home. Have tried distant markets; it did not pay. Do not dry any. I store apples for winter in barrels, and find White Winter Pearmain keeps best. I have to repack stored apples before marketing; the loss depends a great deal on the season. I do not irrigate. Prices have been from thirty cents to one dollar per bushel. Home-dried apples, four and one-half cents per pound.
DAVID LEHMAN, Halstead, Harvey county: I have resided in Kansas nineteen years; have an orchard of 180 apple trees sixteen years old, eight to twelve inches in diameter. For market I prefer Winesap, Missouri Pippin, Ben Davis, and Jonathan, and for family orchard would add Maiden's Blush. I prefer hilltop with a black loam and an east slope. I prefer one- or two-year-old trees, two feet tall, with good roots, set thirty feet apart in rows. I cultivate my orchard to corn for ten years, using a harrow and five-tooth cultivator very shallow. Cease cropping after ten years, and plant turnips in a bearing orchard. Windbreaks are essential; would make them of red cedar, ash, or catalpa, by planting eight by eight feet in rows. I prune my trees when young with a pruning-knife to get rid of all unnecessary limbs; I think it pays. I fertilize my orchard with stable litter that will not heat, and would advise its use on all soils, but lightly on rich soils. I pasture my orchard with hogs, but do not think it advisable; it does not pay. My trees are troubled with borers, and my apples with curculio. For insects not affected by spraying, I use one box of concentrated lye and four ounces of tincture of tobacco to four gallons of water; wash well with a swab three times a year--the 15th of June, July, and August.