Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 65.djvu/312

308 islands, representing a stretch in latitude the equivalent of from northern Maine to Florida. Altogether these explorations enabled him to make a pretty correct judgment on the San Jose scale problem in Japan. Japan is not especially a horticultural country. Her comparatively enormous population of 46,000,000 compels the growth of cereals and other necessities of life wherever possible. Very little land, therefore, is devoted to fruit raising, and fruits are considered as luxuries. Nevertheless, practically every dwelling house in Japan has a little dooryard or kitchen garden in which are single examples of cherry, plum, peach, persimmon and other trees. Furthermore, the roadways and temple grounds and streets are lined with cherry and plum trees, planted for bloom and ornament and not for fruit. There are orchard districts in Japan of limited extent. In northern and central Japan there are a few peach orchards and a few orchards of native pears, and in southern Japan, small orchards of orange, pomelo, walnut and other fruits. In old Japan the chief deciduous fruit is a native pear grown in small patches of from a fraction of an acre to two or three acres in extent. These are trained low on overhead trellises, and at a short distance look like vineyards. There are several districts where such orchards occur in considerable numbers. These orchards are very ancient, many of them having trees more than one hundred years old. If the San Jose scale were native to Japan it would occur in these pear orchards, the pear being one of the favorite food plants of this scale insect.

In northern Japan, including the island of Hokkaido, and the northern end of the main island, Hondo, apple raising has been introduced in modern times very much on the lines of this country. Prior to the opening of Japan to foreign commerce and exploration, the apple as an edible fruit was unknown in that country. The orchards in northern Japan arc chiefly, therefore, of American origin and