364 Sfafc Horficiilfiircl Society. 



buds to perpetuate the life of the tree, and to fruit the next and suc- 

 ceeding years. If his tree is not yet fully grown, it is imperative that 

 the crop of young buds that he brings forth shall be larger than the 

 crop of buds that he permits to fruit. Barring only the question of 

 winterkilling, if his methods of culture are correct, there would seem 

 to be no more reason why he should fail in having his crop of flower 

 buds ready to open each spring than that the nurseryman should 

 fail to have a crop of salable trees ready to supply his patrons. 



Let us carry the comparison between the fruit tree and the nur- 

 sery farther. We should at once condemn any system of nursery 

 practice that permitted a few of the strongest trees to crowd the 

 majority of the weaker ones out of existence. But is not such a 

 system going on in most American orchards today? The majority 

 of the buds in many, if not most fruit trees are starved or smothered 

 out of existence by their stronger neighbors, while the weaker buds, 

 in turn, harass their stronger neighbors to an extent that largely in- 

 terferes with their fruiting capacity. 



The conception of the bud as the unit of production is not wholly 

 new, though it will be new to many American fruit growers. In 

 Europe the fruit tree has long been cultivated more or less from the 

 standpoint of the bud. But the pottering methods of training and tying 

 fiuit trees practiced in European gardens are impracticable in our 

 land of high-priced, labor and extensive culture. And yet the bud 

 standpoint is unqviestionably the correct one. What, then, can we 

 do? We must make an economical compromise between their slow 

 and tedious methods and our happy-go-lucky no-system. We must 

 find a way* of pruning our trees so as to better control the growth 

 and to place the buds more on an equal footing as regards light and 

 space. Then, with our improved spraying methods, we should be 

 able to place our fruit crops on a much surer basis, and to grow fruit 

 of much higher average quality. 



*Concluding installment of paper read before Wisconsin State 

 Horticultural Society. 



HINTS TO TREE-PLANTERS. 



(By Jonas H. Priest, Middlesex County, Mass.) 



Editors Country Gentleman — As the tree-planting season draws 

 near, all persons who intend to plant shade or fruit trees should in- 

 form themselves what varieties of trees to plant, and how to do the 



