Page 6 



BETTER FRUIT 



October 



The Fruit-Bud Formation Related to Orchard Practice 



Address Delivered by E. J. Kruse at Twelfth Annual Meeting of Washington State Horticultural Association, Spokane, Wash., November 15, 1915 



IT is intended in this talk to deal 

 with some of the possible methods 

 for the modification of fruit pro- 

 duction, especially a few of the main 

 pruning practices in use, since they 

 are generally and widely discussed, 

 and viewpoints differ greatly. It is 

 to be understood from the outset, how- 

 ever, that any practice is a means to 

 an end and not an end in itself. As 

 soon as the fruit grower recognizes 

 this he is in a way to make substantial 

 progress in his work and not until 

 then. It makes absolutely no differ- 

 ence what system or systems of or- 

 chard practices may be employed, nor 

 can any one system be universally 

 recommended as best; the power of 

 control of the fruit bud or fruit spur 

 system rests not upon a mere code of 

 pruning or cultivation ideas, but upon 

 principles and laws influenced by 

 every practice. Since this is so one 

 should be ready to adopt whatever of 

 good there may be in any set of rules 

 and discard that which is not accept- 

 able. Orchard practices must be sup- 

 plemented one by another. It is only 

 by a rational combination of pruning, 

 cultivation, fertilization, irrigation, 

 cover-cropping, inter-cropping, or any 

 other operation which has to deal with 

 the change or modification of the 

 functions of the tree, that ideal fruit- 

 ing conditions can be maintained. To 

 determine the exact adjustment of or- 

 chard practices each man, to a large 

 degree, must conduct his own experi- 

 ments and determine not only what is 

 best for his orchard as a whole but 

 for each tree individually. The surest 

 way to judge the needs of a tree is to 

 carefully check over the treatment 

 given it during the past and note the 

 response. Having done this, modify 

 the practice to conform to require- 

 ments. It may be an increase or de- 

 crease in cultivation to suppress or 

 encourage growth; the application of 

 manures or fertilizers, irrigation, or 

 the combination of these and other 

 agencies rather than a radical change 

 solely in the pruning or any other one 

 practice. Fruit-bud formation is di- 

 rectly induced and the buds are de- 

 pendent upon the conditions existing 

 within the tree, and not by any system 

 that may be hotly agitated today and 

 abandoned tomorrow. 



In the past argument has waged 

 around the ideal tree form but all are 

 coming to realize more and more that 

 tree-form is less essential than tree 

 performance. It is folly to say that 

 any one form is best; it may be best 

 under certain circumstances, but cer- 

 tainly not universally so. Whatever 

 the shape chosen, however, under all 

 circumstances it must be compatible 

 with the basic idea of production, and 

 in discussing production one is at once 

 lead into a discussion of the fruit- 

 producing machinery, the fruit-bud 

 system. 



That misunderstanding may be 

 avoided later, the several classes of 

 fruit buds are mentioned. Those of 

 perhaps most general occurrence and 

 certainly the most widely discussed 

 are those borne on fruit spurs. Now 

 a fruit spur may be either simple or 

 compound, depending on whether it 

 bears a single terminal bud, as is the 

 case when very young, or many buds, 

 as is often true when several years 

 old. The second most frequently oc- 

 curring class of buds is the axillaries. 

 They are borne on current-year wood 

 in the axils or angles of the leaves and 

 always close to the branch from which 

 they arise. In apples it is often very 

 difficult to tell them from the axillary 

 leaf buds, in pears they are usually 

 readily distinguishable by their large 

 size and plumpness. This class of buds 

 merits more attention than it has re- 

 ceived in the past, though they are of 

 rare occurrence in certain varieties, in 

 others they are extremely abundant, 

 and it is often from them that the ma- 

 jor portion of fruit is produced on 



young, vigorous trees. The third class 

 embraces the terminals, so-called be- 

 cause they are borne at the tips or 

 terminals of shoots or branches. Of 

 course it is realized that in the case 

 of fruit spurs the fruit buds are really 

 terminal in position, but in the class 

 now under consideration the shoots 

 and branches are of considerable 

 length, longer than would generally be 

 considered a spur growth. In Ben 

 Davis, for example, the spurs bearing 

 a fruit may produce one to three very 

 long laterals which in turn produce a 

 fruit bud at the tip. If these laterals 

 are very long the fruit bud would be 

 considered "terminal"; if shorter, it 

 would be regarded as forming part of 

 a very loose, open spur. Actually, the 

 difference is rather one of degree than 

 of kind. 



The relation of each class of buds to 

 the productivity of any particular va- 

 riety is of greatest importance. All va- 

 rieties of apples and pears produce 

 fruit spurs, and after the tree comes 

 to full bearing age the greater portion 



Home Life 



Industrial Life 



Na 



Armij 



The Basic Structure of our National Life 



Home, Industrial, Army and Navy Life all rest on the Food Supply, which 

 in turn rests entirely on Crops that are dependent on Farm Machinery. 



