PRUNING AN APPLE ORCHARD. 189 



spring months. Six horses are kept for work and one for family use. 

 One or two colts are raised each year. 



The actual costs given are not the most important result of this 

 study, as other farms in the same community might show quite differ- 

 ent results. The method of analyzing the various cost factors is the 

 feature that is ^of most practical value. The department's new publi- 

 cation aims to outline for the independent apple grower a method that 

 will enable liim to determine the actual cost of maintaining and 

 operating his fruit enterprise on his own farm. It does not attempt to 

 give a concrete example of just what the costs will be. Besides the 

 fact of the depreciation of the apple orchard already mentioned, other 

 factors such as the variety, age, and size of trees, the soils, and the 

 climate will infl'ipnce the actual costs but not the method of analyz- 

 ing these costs Apple growers will find much to interest them ia 

 the new publication wihch is being sent free of charge to such persons 

 as apply for it. — U. S. Department of Agriculture. 



PKUXlX(i A\ APPLE OR(^H.\m). 

 C ii. Marsliall, Nebraska City. 



Mild days between now and spring may be taken advantage of to 

 prune and clean up the orchard. Commercial fruit growers of this 

 section are commencing to realize the importance of pruning more and 

 more each year and this feature of orchard management should be 

 just as carefully attended to in the home orchard as in the commercial 

 orchard. Orchards as a rule are not grown for ornamental purposes 

 or windbreaks but for the fruit that they produce. The objects sought 

 in pruning, then, are to train the tree to the decided shape, to conserve 

 its vitality and make it produce the maximum amount of desirable 

 fruit. 



Up-to-date growers have not questioned the advisibility of prun- 

 ing to obtain the above results and where orcharding has reached its 

 highest state of development careful annual pruning is practiced just 

 as carefully as spraying, culture, etc. The past season demontrated. 

 also, that well pruned orchards have a decided advantage to with- 

 stand drouth. In the commercial apple growing sections of this state 

 very little marketable fruit was produced on trees wliere pruning was 

 neglected even though they were sprayed and cultivated, while trees 

 the were carefully pruned matured fair crops of good fruit in almost 

 every case. 



All old and accepted theory among the orchardists was that prun- 

 ing should be deferred till the severe winter was past. It was generally 

 thought that the freezing of large wounds and the drying out during 

 the winter injured the tree. Such injury probably occurs if the wounds 

 are left unprotected but nowadays no progressive grower would leave 

 wounds unprotected. He seals all wounds of an inch or more in 

 diameter immediately to protect against the entrance of moisture and 



