Management of Peach Orchards. 229 



from the ground, and a leader trained up straight three or four feet with side 

 branches radiating from this main stem ; and none of these main radiating 

 branches should ever be allowed to exceed five feet in length. This will ne- 

 cessitate summer pruning, without which no peach tree is well trained. 

 When the trees are j'oung the suckers or sprouts may be allowed to grow on 

 the trunks to some extent, and kept shortened in, so the trunk will be pro- 

 tected from the hot sun and the attacks of the trunk-borers. These side shoots 

 should all be removed as soon as the top of the tree will shade the trunk. ' 

 A number of limbs should be allowed to grow a little lower than the head 

 is wanted till the tree comes into bearing; then they should be sawed off, with 

 stumps about five inches long (the use of these stumps will be explained in 

 another chapter), and the whole top of the tree must be thinned out and 

 shortened in so the sun and air can reach every peach on the tree some time 

 in the day. 



THINNING THE FRUIT. 



Thinning the fruit of a peach tree has never received the attention of our 

 growers as it should. There are many varieties of peaches that are such 

 heavy fruiters that you seldom see a specimen of first-class fruit on a tree 

 that has 4,000 peaches on it (and that is about an average crop on a full- 

 grown tree), and the whole crop will not bring money enough to pay for 

 packages and freight; while, if 3,500 of the number had been thinned oft", 

 the 500 would have filled ten boxes or baskets that would net $1.00 each. 

 This is no theory; it is the actual result from alternate trees in the same 

 row. Thinning is not only a success financially as to the fruit, but the health 

 of the tree is greatly promoted. In fact, I believe that over-fruiting shortens 

 the lives of our peach trees more than one-half. To properly thin fruit on a 

 full-grown tree, there should always be a space of four to six inches between 

 each two specimens. Dr. Hull, of Alton, said, eight inches, but I think that 

 distance ought to be modified to conform to the different conditions of tree 

 and soil. But there is one very important point to be considered right here. 

 If peaches are to be thinned they must be bugged, and if they are bugged 

 they must be thinned ; and, with a few isolated exceptions, there can be no 

 first-class peaches marketed in this valley without both. Any man who can 

 not accept these two last conditions had better not go into peaches for profit. 



CURCULIOS. 



Catching the curculios, or " bugging" peach trees, is a subject that will be 

 indorsed by some growers and sneered at by others, and both parties will 

 contend they are solid in their positions. But the one solid argument on the 

 side of bugging is that the fruit always sells at the outside price, and there is 

 always a demand for it, when the wormy stock is a drug on the market, and 

 it don't require a philosopher to tell a peach shipper what that means. 



The cost of bugging I have found to be about seven cents per bushel, by 

 careful account kept for six years. I have found the most convenient catcher 



