56 TEANSACTIONS OF THE ILLINOIS 



orchard continuously managed as I propose, and wellnigh despair of 

 finding any this side of Michigan or New York, where I think they 

 must be found, at least here and there, i have, however, some re- 

 liable accounts of orchards continually increasing at the age ours 

 usually begin to decline. What I call my old orchard, of thirty 

 acres, is only ten years old. A neighbor planted forty acres at the 

 same time, which has only been cultivated in part, though about like 

 the average. He had some fruit several years before I had any, but 

 my first crop more than doubled all he had had then, and each crop 

 since has more than doubled his. The stems and tops of my trees 

 are one-third larger than his by actual measurement, although I 

 have trimmed them up to five or six feet high, but for which they 

 would doubtless have been some larger. I have lost more trees by 

 winter-hurt than he has, especially where I cultivated rather late in 

 the fall of 1884, but counting in all other causes, which constantly 

 occur, I have eighty per cent, of the first planting yet in bearing 

 condition, which does not at all discourage me. 



As I have called cultivation the base on which my hope of suc- 

 cess rests, I will call pruning one of the mainstays, and will call 

 your attention to it, because it is about universally neglected and 

 requires the next most labor. A man who will guard well these two 

 points needs not often be reminded of rodents, insects, etc. 



Nature is always profuse and lavish in her provisions for in- 

 crease and against contingencies. . Every bud is capable of making a 

 branch, and, as there is plenty of room the next spring, a larger 

 number start out than will be needed in the future. Many of this 

 surplus nature will soon try to suppress by overshadowing and with- 

 holding sap, but they obstinately refuse to surrender, and insist on 

 dividing the common stock of nutriment, and compelling their rivals 

 to await their company, until they are entirely too crowded, and even 

 generous cultivation and manuring could hardly furnish enough 

 nutriment to go around in liberal measure. We are put here to 

 dress and keep them, or to assist nature in her efforts to suppress 

 this surplus, and not to wait for her to do it. Take a tree that was 

 properly thinned out in planting and has made one year's good 

 growth in the orchard, the first thing I would have in view would be 

 to get a sufficiently high stem. Many of our folks are disgusted 

 with low-headed trees. As soon as I could obtain a desirable stem 

 and corresponding top, I would thin out all branches that a mental 

 picture of future shape would show to be superfluous. Never cut off 

 the leader, unless it threatens to grow out of balance, and then try to 

 have another take its place. Never tolerate a fork, but cut out one 

 prong at first sight. Follow out every branch and thin out the sub- 

 branches, as indicated for the leader, and it will never become such 

 an immensely bushy mass as we generally see, and you will seldom 

 need to make any large wounds or severe drains on the tree or checks 

 to its growth. 



