Besting Johnny Appleseed

摘要

Ask how many fruit trees he's responsible for, and Michael Glenn just laughs. "I have no idea," he says.rnGlenn oversees some 120 hectares as director of the Appalachian Fruit Research Station here, and seemingly every road leads to a new orchard. Glenn tramps through one rolling 6-hectare plot on a bright day in March, pruning season. Half the branches of some trees lie discarded. After thinking for a moment, Glenn guesses that 315,000 trees live on the station's acreage in the eastern handlebar of West Virginia. To fit them in, the station plants row after row of ash-brown trees, two meters tall and about as far apart, in military formations. The regularity is deceptive.