EXPERIMENT STATION BULLETINS. 



373 



training apple trees among fruit growers who have employed it. However, 

 one will find it impractical to train trees of all varieties, or even all the trees 

 of one variety according to this system. 



Severity of Treatment — Immediately after being planted, the tree should 

 be cut back rather severely to reduce the top in proportions similar to root 

 reduction at the time of digging in the nursery, in order to get the desired 

 height of heading, and, in the case of two-year-old trees, to reduce to two or 

 three scaffold branches. If a one-year-old tree is planted, the pruning will 

 usually consist in cutting the whip back to the desired height of heading. 



Figure 14. This tree is the same variety 

 and age as the one shown in Figure 15, but it 

 has received no pruning except that given 

 immediately after planting. 



Figure 15. -A three-year-old 

 Northern Spy which has had a mod- 

 erately heavy pruning annually. 

 This has consisted mostly of thin- 

 ning out shoots of the past season's 

 growth. A small amount of heading 

 back to improve form has been given. 



After such a tree has been planted for a year, the pruning will remove all but 

 the selected scaffold branches, and these may be slightly headed back to give 

 the central leader sufficient advantage and to regulate the balance and sym- 

 metry of the young tree. 



Fruit growers disagree considerably as to the treatm"ent that should follow 

 1 liat outlined in the above paragraph. Some'hold that 50 to 75 per cent of 

 tne growth should be removed in thinning, and then 50 to 75 per cent of the 

 remaining 25 to 50 per cent removed by cutting back, and that slightly less 

 percentages be removed each year until the tree comes into bearing. This is 



