wood and next spring some more German seedlings will lose their tops. It
is only from continued efforts that success may be obtained in growing
pears in Minnesota.

Who would have thought it possible that in spite of all the frost and
cold rains we would get a pretty good crop of cherries? And yet this is
a fact. We have four varieties, and among them is one originated by the
late Clem. Schmidt, of Springfield, Minn., which was bearing a good crop
of very fine cherries while the three other sorts did not do a thing. To
get ahead of the many birds we picked the cherries a few days before
they were ripe and put them up in thirty-two half-gallon jars. As the
cherries become very soft when dead-ripe, it was of advantage to can
them when they were still hard. These canned cherries are meaty and most
delicious. We never tasted any better. It is only a pity that this
seedling cherry is not quite hardy.

As most everywhere in the state, our grapes were a complete failure. The
early growth with its good showing of fruit having been frozen in May,
it was well toward the end of June when the vines had recovered from the
shock and were able to grow vigorously again. There were a few grapes on
some of the vines, but they never got ripe. The Alpha showed the most
fruit, and a few bunches were just about getting ripe when the frost
spoiled them. This May freeze was more severe than we thought it was.
The wood of the old vines was not injured, but the one year old wood of
young plants was killed to the ground. The lesson we learned from this
is very important. It may be stated that vines full of sap and in
growing condition can endure very little cold, but when the wood is ripe
and dormant the vines will seldom be injured by sub-zero weather. This
injury to vines from frost might have been averted at least in part by
precautionary measures. In other countries people start smoldering