l6 AGRICULTURE OF MAINE. 



and Twenty Ounce, are upright in growth. This is also true 

 of Wagener. But from ten years on, owing to the branches 

 being pulled toward the ground by the loads of fruit, the shape 

 is changed markedly and the diameter of the tree more nearly 

 approaches the height. Lack of knowledge in this respect fre- 

 quently leads planters of young trees to feel that they should 

 cut back their trees because they are afraid they are going into 

 the air too much. We are led to believe that it is a much safer 

 plan to try to encourage early bearing and have the continuous 

 load of fruit upon the tree and cause it to spread, rather than 

 to attempt to cut it down, frequently delaying bearing thereby. 

 It has been our experience that when we give annual prunings, 

 either to apples or pears, as is frequently practiced by old 

 country growers and those brought up in the past, that we 

 merely make a lot of work for ourselves — we stimulate the 

 production of a lot of wood and we delay bearing. So that we 

 have come to practice the more lazy method of practically leav- 

 ing the tree alone, except to remove, from time to time, a limb 

 which we are sure we do not need. And then, as soon as the 

 tree comes into bearing, practice a certain amount of thinning 

 out of limbs which we know can be spared. In both young 

 trees and older trees we make it a policy to do our heaviest 

 pruning when we are sure the tree is going to bear a crop of 

 fruit the same year. If we give a heavy pruning the year the 

 tree is not going to bear, we are apt to encourage the growth of 

 a mass of suckers. The sucker is a protest that the man 

 abused the tree and was not, so to speak, on the job. By giving 

 the heavy pruning when a heavy crop is assured, we increase 

 the size of the fruit that year, and the energies of the tree are 

 so thoroughly absorbed in maturing the crop that, practically, 

 no suckers are formed, and the tree is much more apt to set 

 another crop of fruit next year and tend toward annual bearing. 

 We believe that any pruning should be done whenever it is 

 convenient, from, we will say, November until the following 

 May. although, perhaps in Maine, with the more severe winter 

 conditions, it is better if it be delayed until the spring. We 

 believe that the growth made up to the first of June is made 

 from sap which is already stored in the trunk ; and that after 

 this date, the growth is busily engaged in preparing for the 

 succeeding year, the fruit buds being formed during July and 



