Mr. Erkel:  Is the Duchess a good stock to graft onto?

Mr. Philips:  I haven’t found it very good.  It is hardly vigorous enough for a stock.

Mr. Erkel:  You mentioned Patten’s Greening a few minutes ago.  Isn’t that considered a rather short-lived tree?

Mr. Philips:  Not with me it hasn’t been.  I set some thirty years ago.  I never had a Patten’s Greening injured with the cold.  It is very hardy.

Mr. Street:  How about the Brier’s Sweet crab?  I grafted some last year and had a larger percentage of the scions live on those than on the Hibernal.

Mr. Philips:  You wouldn’t get as good a growth afterwards.  The scions on the Virginia would grow better and have a better top.  I don’t think the Brier’s Sweet is as vigorous as Virginia.

Mr. M’Clelland:  I grafted on 120 Hibernals this spring and got hardly one failure.

Mr. Philips:  You did good work.

Mr. M’Clelland:  Made a growth of three to four feet, some of them.

Mr. Philips:  That is good.

Mr. M’Clelland:  Have you anything as good?

Mr. Philips:  If I had Hibernals I would graft them, but if I had to set something on purpose for grafting I would set Virginias.  I have had better success with that variety for stocks.

Mr. Kellogg:  Too big a growth on the graft is liable to be injured in the winter, is it not?

Mr. Philips:  Too vigorous a growth on the tree is liable to get injured in the winter anyway.  I like to see a good growth.  I like to see it grow and then pinch it back in the fall.  You can pinch it back a good deal easier when it has made a good growth than to make it grow big enough.

Mr. Street:  I would like to know whether we should force all of the growth into the scion the first year where we graft on trees that have been set two years.

Mr. Philips:  One of the pleasures of doing top-working is to watch the growth of the grafts.  I did a good deal of that on Sunday.  You might do worse than communing with nature.  You watch them same as you watch the growth of anything else, and if you think the graft is growing too fast let some of the shoots on the stock grow to take part of the sap, but if you think it is growing too slow and these shoots are robbing it, cut them off.  I like a good growth on grafts; it looks more like doing business.

Mr. Street:  But the second year would you keep all of the growth in the graft?

Mr. Philips:  Yes, sir, the second year I would, and if it makes too large a growth pinch off the end.  I put in some for a neighbor this season, and I go down and see to them every two weeks.  If I thought they made too much growth in August I pinched them back so as to make them ripen up quicker.  I don’t like to have them grow too late; as Mr. Kellogg said, frost will get them. (Applause.)

Spraying the Orchard.

HON.  H. M. DUNLAP, SAVOY, ILLS.