Rensselaer Union, Volume 9, Number 42, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 July 1877 — Agricultural Department [ARTICLE]

Agricultural Department

Thinning Out Fruit. It is a well-known fact that the inflexible law of supply aiul demand governs the prices of produce of all kinds. This fact being remembered, it is only necessary to bear in mind that the quantity of ordinary or inferior quality of produce is always in the excess, and when a “glut'’ appears in the market the purchasers very naturally gravitate toward the best, which they can buy at fair prices—prices which pay the producer-even though they can get poor or ordinary quality otthe same at their own figures, which is, as a rule, below the cost of production and mar keting, bringing the producer in debt, instead of returning him even merely a lair profit on his produce. There are many ways to increase the size of fruit, such as only planting those varieties best suited to your soil and climate, cultivating thoroughly, and thinning out the fruit at certain stages of the growth. Thinning out apples, especially in a large orchard, to make them grow to a larger size, is but rarely resorted to, on account of the tendency of the apple to come to nearly perfection under the best system of prooning and cultivation, and the consequently small increase in price obtained for slightly larger specimens produced by thinuing the fruit. The case, however, is different with pears; for the amount produced annually is far less than with apples and the price per basket or bushel is considerably higher. To enable pears to grow to a large size and to make size and quality rank ahead of mere quantity (though we believe that nearly the same weight of CD fruit is obtained by judicious thinning out, but in a fewer number of years), the pears should lie thinned out about two or three times a seasonin all to about one-lmlf of the numbers of pears first set on the trees. About two weeks after the blossoms have dropped, go over the trees and sort out a few of the poorest specimens and carefully remove them from the tree, having a care not to disturb those remaining. In from two to four weeks later go over the orchard again, and remove a few more of the inferior ones, in the same careful manner; and again in about the same length of time give the third visit for tile same purpose, which generally constitutes the last thin-ning-out. Some pear growers merely go over the orchard once, during June, and thin out the fruit. —JYew York Independent.