decay of the primitive rock, and of vegetable growth, has all the elements of tree growth in abundance. Its timber resources are its chief attractions at present, and no doubt the Siberians and other hardy apples will find congenial homes where the native wood now thrives so abundantly. But we have too little data to speak conclusively of its special adaptation to any species. Were our soils the direct product of the underlying rock, we would find the lines of demarkation in the native wood growth much more sharply drawn than at present, for the drift deposits have given us an endless variation of soil, as we find erratic or stray rocks everywhere. We have limestone soils in sandstone districts, and visa versa. The most variable soils I have found in the valley of the Wolf river, in the lower sandstone district, where on a single quarter section I have found four or more distinct varieties of soil with their corresponding native trees. 1st. Siliceous sand from the Potsdam sandstone, with its black oak and gray pine. 2d. Marly clay, or upper clay of sedimentary origin, with its mixed oak, maple and pine. 3d. Boulder clay, calcareous, from the decomposition of boulder drift, with its white oak and sometimes burr oak. 4th. Arenaceous clay from the granite region, with its mixed timber of great variety. Special causes exist for this diversity of soil in the narrow limits of this valley, with the limestone of the east and granite of the west, which are marked features in the geology of our state. In the southern and eastern portions of the state the boulder drift is more general and of greater depth, and breaks up the outline of soils more than in any other section. Here we often have a subsoil of clean washed gravel, which affords most perfect drainage and good supply of mineral elements of tree growth, but is too porous to hold manure, and admits frost to a great depth in winter; and though trees here make hardy, well-ripened wood that seldom winter-kills, nothing but a heavy winter mulch will save their roots in dry seasons. Where the drift soil is more of the nature of concrete, with sufficient calcareous clay to bind it, it is yet of good natural drainage, and stands at the head of the list of fruit soils for the west. I have given this general outline of these natural divisions of upland tree growth, not as a perfect system, but as introductory to a more thorough investigation and complete arrangement. I propose to draw some practical lessons on fruit growing from this evident tendency of the tree to choose its home and surroundings. This tendency is evidently based on necessity; on the individuality of the species or variety, and therefore as inherent and permanent as the same quality in animal life. The tree we plant must find not only a root hold, but congenial food, in its home or it cannot thrive, and if these needed elements are not, native to the soil they must be supplied by art. How may we know of the proper relation of soil to tree growth? First, by analysis, and second by observation. The first most positive and the last, most practical. If any have concluded that fruit growing is not a success in our state, they must admit that there are cases of fair success, even under the blind practice of the past. We now propose to see light ahead at every step we take, and to call to our aid practical science, as well as practical experience. We must understand the harmonies of vegetable life and of tree growth. We find in district and group number one that the apple, pear, plum, cherry, and all the small fruits, thrive finely, but grow too fast and too late for endurance on the richest prairies or valleys. We should then choose the leaner soils, grow slower, and cultivate less. In the second district or White Oak group, the soil is by nature more prolific of sound timber and is, therefore, other things being equal, more likely to grow a perfect fruit tree, and with good drainage, and careful management, must become the main fruit region of the state. The third district or Maple group has all the elements of tree growth named for the second, but with its agriculture in general, can be truly successful only when ridging or underdraining are the rule and not the exception. Strong, rich soils, retentive of water as these are, must be radically changed by drainage, subsoiling and elevating or ærating, so as to secure an earlier growth and ripening of the wood. This secured, the maple group will become a successful competitor in our fruit exhibits and in our markets. This is especially true of the strong marly clays of central Wisconsin, where the highest colored, richest flavored apples, pears and grapes of our state are grown. The fourth district, the Black Oak and Scrub Pine group, are the nearest to hopeless of any portions of the state, but with the frequent areas of clay and peat, which are abundant and easy of access all through that formation in our state, none need despair, even there. A moderate amount of clay mixed with the soil in which the tree is planted, and an annual top dressing of clay and muck around the tree will be a gradual and permanent change of the soil for the good of the trees In all of these districts we find hopeful signs of progress and permanency in fruit growing. There is a growing inquiry as to the best locations for, and care of the orchard. There is an earnest searching for hardy varieties, and a careful weeding out and rejection of such as do not prove both hardy and productive in a given locality. When the condtions of success are well demonstrated, the best locations, soils, elevations, aspect, varieties and mode of culture are made plain, then will there be a new life and permanency to fruit growing in our state. I believe the grandest problems of practical agriculture and horticulture are yet to be solved, and only by accurate and careful experiment from a scientific basis. I would have the labors of our state geologist, and of our analyst heartily seconded by all fruit growers as well as farmers, for every fact established in the geological structure of our state has a direct bearing upon some branch of its industrial interests, and on none more than agriculture, in its broadest sense. AMERICAN FORESTRY. DR. JOHN A. WARDER, CINCINNATI, OHIO. To my Friends of the Wisconsin Horticultural Society: If it be not trespassing upon your good nature, or interfering with your favorite pursuit of pomology, an old friend may be permitted to lead you aside for a few minutes, to the discussion of a subject which many of your sister societies have considered cognate and pertinent to other branches of our favorite pursuit. Forestry, at least in its milder phases, as found among us in this country, may very appropriately be discussed by a horticultural society. So, at least, have we thought and acted in many of the western states. We cannot forget what we owe to you of Wisconsin; you were among the first to direct our attention to the consideration of our native sylva, and to give us some valuable information respecting the trees, in a pamphlet, prepared by Messrs, Knapp and the lamented Lapham. Nor should we withhold our admiration for your energy and perseverance in the pursuit of horticulture, especially in its department of pomology, and in the selection of a class of "iron clads," adapted to your rigorous climate. The closely allied question of protection has, no doubt, received a due share of your attention, and (if not in Wisconsin at home) you cannot fail to have drawn valuable lessons in this branch of the subject from your intelligent neighbors in northern Illinois. As is well known, this valuable shelter can in no way be so well secured as by judicious tree-planting in groves and especially in shelter belts. Your early attempts at forestry have been quoted, and we trust you may have persevered in the good work, and that, from your own happy results, we may yet gather much valuable information, resulting from the many lines of investigation we all of us have yet to pursue in our forestry education. From these various experiments, and from the mass of collected data, we shall one day educe some system that may be found worthy the name of American Forestry. It must be confessed, that up to this time we are sadly ignorant of the subject, that we have not even the first principles, the rudiments of the art and practice. We are not even yet sufficiently familiar with the very tools with which we shall have to work the trees themselves! So that what we don't know may be easily told, seeing that, indeed, we really know nothing at all! In the first beginnings of the art, we must admit that our western friends, especially those beyond the great rivers, Mississippi and Missouri, have transcended all our feebler efforts with their wonted energy and pluck, born, perhaps, of the broad horizons of the vast prairies. They have planted more extensively than we, and report the setting out and establishing in healthy growth of many millions of trees annually. By the offering of premiums and by the stimulus of their Arbor Days, they have aroused the attention of the people, and thus have secured these wonderful results. It may be objected to by some of your more intelligent members, that these western tree-planters make too free a use of what we consider an inferior tree, and that though they may cover considerable tracts with groves they are of insufficient variety. Were the planting to continue indefinitely to be made of this meager selection, this criticism would have some force, but the selection of the Cottonwood, of the Elm, of the Water Maple, Box Elder, and a few others, is really praiseworthy, and for the following excellent reasons: These trees are all natives, to the manor born; they are well adapted to the soils upon which they are planted; they are easily obtained as seeds, seedlings and cuttings, and in one or other form, will grow with certainty; hence there are fewer disappointments and less outlay, with correspondingly less losses and discouragements. These natives are all hardy and able to withstand the climatic conditions to which they are exposed in their tender infancy, when set out on the bleak prairie lands. They grow and thrive, and soon produce a shelter for other and more valuable kinds that could not by themselves have endured the exposure to the hot blasts and burning suns of summer, nor the drying winds and cutting frosts of winter. After the shelter has been created by these, one may hope to succeed with many a species that has been condemned as tender, after a few trials, when standing alone and without even the shelter by which they were protected in their native haunts. There may be something in what is called acclimatization, though in most cases it will probably be found that it depends upon a modification of the surrounding conditions, rather than in any change in the constitution of the individual plant. be per Not to take up the list of trees in detail, a word may mitted here on behalf of the Cottonwood, which constitutes the staple of western artificial forests; true, indeed, it is, that where we have natural forests of more valuable species, this, and indeed the whole family of poplars, are considered inferior, but we must remember that trees vary with their conditions, and besides, that there are botanical varieties (possibly species) that depart from the normal characters. In the region of the great lakes, and in the Ohio valley, the Cottonwood is indeed of little value, but on the Mississippi there is found a tree, known as the Yellow Cottonwood, and largely planted there, which has admirable qualities. It splits well; when sawed, the planks do not split and warp; it lasts well as clap-boarding and when worked into shingles, and it holds nails better than that made from the tree with white wood. So with the Box Elder, that is considered a very inferior tree in the valleys that flank the Alleghanies, where first found abundant, and where it is considered useless, except as a shade tree in the village streets; while on the western rivers it assumes considerable importance, and puts on characters that almost entitle it to be considered a new species. Its good qualities are beginning to be realized, and it is planted largely in the streets of Washing ton. The White Willow and the Lombardy Poplar, both foreigners, have similar attractive qualities to the western planter; and the facility with which they may be multiplied, has been a great encouragement to the prairie farmer, who considers them very desirable, although we, who have better timber, may hold them in very low esteem. The former has indeed been a boon to northern Illinois, as a wind-break, though in similar soils and with heavy clay subsoils, the Lombardy appears to be short-lived, while on the eastern border of your state, on the high rolling prairies that are underlaid by gravel, that insure a good drainage, it may succeed better, and it appears to have done good service where the trees have been planted, even in single rows, as wind-breaks around the fields; but you can better speak from your own observations as to the probable longevity of this peculiar and historic tree, brought from classic Italy where it has been propagated since it was immortalized in the poetic fables of Ovid. Long considered a distinct species, it is now believed to be merely an erect form of the common Populus nigra of Europe. It is known only as the male plant, and all have been produced from cuttings of branch or root. Not further to detain you, let us proceed to a glance at some of the great questions that must arise in the path of every man who considers this subject of tree planting: These will occur under the heads of planting, of cultivation, of thinning, of trimming, and of other necessary treatment, and a few words may be accorded to these severally. First, as to kinds, each must decide for himself what will be best adapted to his objects, to his situation and soil, latitude and altitude, exposure, et cetera. Next he must decide how to plant, and whether he shall use seeds, seedlings, or cuttings, and how closely these must be set. Wide planting is one of the greatest mistakes that has been committed, and this, unfor |