28 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Our methods and ideas pertaimug to tlie proper pruning, tillage, spray- 

 ing and fertilization of orchards are as follows: 



Pruning: — The best time to prune is in the early spring montlis; any 

 time after the middle of February until the leaf buds begin to open in 

 the spring. Cut out all dead wood and all injured broken limbs caused 

 by wind, spraying or harvesting of fruit and in doing so always cut 

 back to a main limb or to a leader, as conditions may require. Make your 

 cuts clean and close to the main limb or trunk and parallel, leaving 

 no stubs. In doing this it is often advisable to make two cuts; the 

 first one perhaps, a foot or two from the permanent one. Never remove 

 a large limb without cause. If you have no good reason for removal, 

 better leave it alone. The wounds caused by the removal of large limbs, 

 at least those of three or more inches in diameter, should be painted 

 over with white lead, coal gas tar or concentrated lime and sulphur 

 solution. 



TiLLAGEr— The orchard should be ploughed any time after the fruit 

 has been harvested in the fall, or as early in the spring as frost conditions 

 of the ground will permit. Plough as shallow as furrows can be turned, 

 roll down and harrow. The orchard should be then cultivated or liarrow- 

 ed every week or 10 days until about the middle of July, at which time 

 a cover crop of clover or other suitable material should be sown. Or, 

 perhaps, the easier method of allowing a crop of weeds to grow and 

 take the place of the cover crop would practically answer the same 

 purpose. 



Some advocate the sod mulch system. This is not advisable in the 

 western New York district, and is questionable if in any other, where 

 the ground is not too rough to allow of tillage. Thorough tillage renders 

 a portion of plant food in the soil available and in condition for the trees 

 to absorb this natural store of fertility. Remember, however, that tillage 

 does not take the place of fertilization, but simply aids in exhausting 

 the supply provided by nature — which we must replenish. 



Spraying: — Without thorough and intelligent spraying the work in 

 pruning, tillage and fertilization, in most years, would amount to noth- 

 ing, and, in order to get control of the fungous diseases and insects with 

 which your orchards are infested, it will be necessary, for a few years 

 at least, to sjjray five times. Until it has been successfully demonstrated 

 that there is something better, we are satisfied that the lime and sulphur 

 solution for fungicidal purposes and the arsenate of lead as an insecti- 

 cide are the proper preparations for us to use. Any of the leading com- 

 mercial brands of these preparations are reliable. Spraying is better and 

 more economically performed with a power sprayer, using the angle 

 nozzle and with the exception of the first spraying at least, the disc with 

 smallest aperture. Spray No. 1 should be applied in the spring before 

 the fruit buds begin to oi)en and the tree should be thoroughlj^ drenched 

 with a 1 to 8 or 9 lime and sulphur solution; that is 1 gallon of the 

 lime and sulphur solution to 8 or 9 of water. This spray is for the 

 blister mite, San Jose scale and fungous diseases. Spray No. 2 should 

 be applied at the time the fruit buds begin to show pink just before 

 opening. Lime and sulphur should be used in strength 1 to 40 with 2 

 or 3 lbs. of the arsenate of lead added to each 50 gallons of the solution 

 as prepared for spraying. This spray is of especial importance for the 

 bud moth, case bearer and other leaf and fruit eating insects. If aphis 

 are present in suflflcient quantity to require attention add % pint of 



