388 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



PRUNING GRAPES. 



It Avould seem that sufficient has been written on this subject, but from the 

 many inquiries I receive, and badl}- managed vineyards, and the great impor- 

 tance I place on proper pruning, I think still more may proiitably be said. It is 

 a very easy matter to keep a vine in pro])er shape if taken at time of planting; 

 but not so with an old vine that has been allowed to fruit out at the extreme 

 end every year as it is its nature to do, and has no new wood within ten or fif- 

 teen feet of the root. I have a vineyard of live hundred vines, planted ten 

 years ago on sandy soil, some of it so poor it would not produce a fair crop of 

 white beans ; but have had a good crop of grapes every year since old enough 

 to bear, and of a quality I have never seen excelled. They have been pruned 

 in the following manner: First year after planting, wood all cut back to two or 

 three buds in the fall ; the following spring only two or three of these were 

 allowed to grow, according to strength of vine ; the next spring I cut these back 

 to two or three feet from the ground. The next or third year, allowed two or 

 three canes to grow from near the ground, and rubbed off all others as soon as 

 they started out. In the fall cut off the old wood (or that produced the year be- 

 fore), and headed back the new canes to five or six feet. At this age the vine is 

 old enough to produce a full crop, and from three to five canes may be allowed 

 to grow each year, always encouraging their growth from near the ground, 

 and each year pruning off in the fall or winter the wood that is two years olcl 

 and has borne fruit that year. My vines that are ten years old have not more 

 than from one to two feet of old wood on. I am fully convinced that this so_ 

 called renewal system is the best to get grapes of extra quality, and to have 

 them ripen early and evenly, I would advise bringing old vines back to this 

 system, although it may occasion the loss of one or two crops ; the quality will 

 richly repay the loss. Some that tliought this system of pruning not practica- 

 ble years ago now wish instruction how to get their vines in shape to produce 

 grapes of good quality. 



Kcdamazoo, Feb. Gth. J. N. Stearns* 



EFFECTS OF PRUNING. 



The branch of an ai)ple tree is cut off, and soon numerous shoots *are thrown^ 

 off from the end, rc})lacing the single branch renioved by several, the number 

 being regulated by the number of normal or adventitious buds whicli are forced 

 into growth. In the same, but in a more marked manner, on account of the 

 moisture in the earth and other circumstances, the cutting of the root of the 

 apple tree causes new fibers to be developed throughout the whole periphery of 

 the cut, and the one root removed may be replaced by fifty fibers or fibrils, 

 starting from the line of severance. 



"We observe that when a hedge plant is judiciously pruned, the number of 

 small branches and branchlets arc immensely increased, as are also the pro- 

 portion between the leaf and the stem. The iniuiing of fruit trees forces the 

 multiplication of shoots and leaves, and tlic pruned plant, more compact in 

 form, presents a more symmetrical, and more abundantly leaved plant than 

 the unpruned, and presents a larger area of leaf growth within a given space. 

 In orcharding, as by analogy, so we know by practice, that the pruning of large 

 roots is followed by the sending out of numerous smaller ones. AVc know that 



