Summer Meeting- 89 



'6 



•ciple. I have not had time to do this myself, but beUeve there is some- 

 thing" in it. 



Secy. Goodman. — I have done a great deal of this all my life. 1 

 remember in my old home in Michigan, we often had trouble in the 

 trees not bearing and girdled them, with the idea of holding back and 

 making them more hardy. I believe this is worth testing. The trees' 

 usually set plenty of peach buds. Even then the fruit may hold better 

 and become larger and have better color if they are girdled. We used 

 to girdle apple trees as much as pruning them. The trees were marked 

 at bearing time and we girdled the trees that did not bear. I have no 

 fear in taking off six or ten inches on the tree. Girdling is a much 

 "better wa}', because this space will heal over in the course of two 

 years and almost every instance will heal. It may take three or four 

 years sometimes. By girdling the size of the crop and the size of the 

 fruit is often double, also girdle the peach, plum and cherry. One 

 man told me he had an orchard that did not bear and I told him to 

 girdle them. He said he was afraid he would kill them. I told him to 

 §•0 through the orchard and girdle every other tree and note the difference, 

 and then the next year girdle the others. This year we are girdling 

 «ome we girdled last year. Of these, I am taking out a strip about two 

 inches above the old girdling. They have got to bear. You need not 

 be afraid of killing the tree. This of course injures the tree, as does 

 -every bearing, but this injury is to our profit and if I can make a tree 

 bear by injuring it, I will do so. You are not injuring the tree; only 

 making it do what it ought to do for you. In girdling this time of the 

 year, from now until the twentieth of June, you may be sure you will not 

 injure the tree, only make them make perfect fruit buds and the chances 

 are that you will have fruit for the next year. 



Every grower of the grape knows very well how to produce a long 

 cluster by tying a wire around the vine and so have the vine loaded with 

 magnificient fruit. 



You can make a tree bear and hold the fruit by girdling, the apple, 

 pear, cherry, plum and in some instances the peach. The apple begins 

 budding June ist; also the pear. You can transform the young bud 

 into a fruit bud if you girdle now. You may girdle in July and August 

 and change it. Even as late as August, you can make the growth of 

 the bud much better. I take off from two to six inches, depending on 

 the size of the tree. On a tree thirteen or fourteen years old, I would 

 take off six inches, clear around the tree; usually at the center of the 

 body of the tree. This year we girdled about six inches above that, 

 sometimes onlv four inches. 



