Page 28 



BETTER FRUIT 



March 



It takes the fuss 

 out of breakfast 



THANKS to Ghirardelli's— break- 

 fast-making is not the job it 

 used to be. There's no fuss— no 

 muss — no time lost. 



If a chocolate pot does not happen to be 

 handy — you use an ordinary stew-pan. It 

 takes but a minute or two. And then — 

 you have the most delicious of all food- 

 beverages steaming hot, ready to serve. 



An ideal blend of ideal foods — cocoa and 

 pure sugar — Ghirardelli's supplies the max- 

 imum nutriment at minimum cost. Al- 

 ways keep a can on hand. 



In % lb., 1 lb. and 3 lb. cans; a 



tablespoonful —one centos -worth — 



makes a cup. 



D. GHIRARDELLI CO. 



Since 1852 Saa Francisco 



Ground 

 Chocolate 



Power Drag Saw does theWorK of 10 Men 



f WEIGHT c^A^i One man can move machine from, cut to cut on log. Two men can 



285 lbs .» MX$^^ S ^<2 carry it. Cuts through 3'/4 foot log in three minutes. Approxi- 



Z . ■ \^mately25cordsaday. 4 H. P. gasoline engine warranted. Steel 



'iVVjiL) wheel cart $10.00 Send for catalogue. manufactured by 



PVice -4J/ REIERSON MACHINERY CO. 



Com plete 145.— i;92 hood street, porti and. Oregon 



S20 s. DIVISION AVE.J GRAND RAPIDS, MICH. 



■THE only 

 pruner 

 made that cuts 

 from both sides of 

 the limb and does not 

 bruise the bark. Made in 

 all styles and sizes. All 

 shears delivered free 

 to your door. 



Write for 

 circular and 

 prices. 



WHEN WRITING ADVERTISERS MENTION BETTER FRUIT 



are formed. If they are not present 

 during the period of fruit-bud forma- 

 tion (under our conditions July and 

 August for most apple varieties) the 

 fruit spur remains vegetative — that is, 

 it produces a terminal leaf bud and 

 docs not flower. Recent investigations 

 carried on by the Oregon Agricultural 

 Experiment Station indicate clearly 

 that to a very large degree each indi- 

 vidual spur is dependent upon its own 

 resources for its supply of elaborated 

 food. That is, each spur must manufac- 

 ture in its own leaves the carbohy- 

 drates that it uses. It cannot draw any 

 considerable quantity from neighbor- 

 ing spurs or from adjacent shoots. 

 Plant physiology teaches us that the 

 manufacture of starches and other food 

 materials in the leaves is almost directly 

 proportional to light supply, other con- 

 ditions remaining the same. This 

 means, then, that if the spurs in the 

 two-year-old and older wood are to set 

 fruit buds freely they must have an 

 abundant supply of light. As has been 

 pointed out, thinning-out of shoot 

 growth admits more light to the interior 

 of the tree, to the region of the fruit- 

 spur system. On the other hand, 

 heading-back the shoot growth tends to 

 make the tree more compact and bushy, 

 and thereby tends to decrease the light 

 supply available to the fruit spurs. 

 Thus it is seen that these two pruning 

 practices tend in opposite directions so 

 far as their influence upon fruit-bud 

 formation is concerned — thinning-out 

 making the trees more productive and 

 heading-back making them less pro- 

 ductive of fruit buds. 



It is generally recognized that the 

 color of apples is dependent to a very 

 large extent upon the amount of sun- 

 light that reaches them previous to and 

 during their ripening season. Apples 

 that are more or less completely shaded 

 develop into second or third-grade 

 apples, if color enters into the grading 

 rules. After what has been said, the 

 relative influences of thinning-out and 

 of heading-back shoots upon the color- 

 ing of fruit will be obvious. 



Heading vs. Thinning Two-Year and 

 Older Wood 

 Thus far the discussion has been lim- 

 ited to a consideration of the influences 

 of heading and thinning shoots only. 

 In the pruning of older trees we have 

 to deal with two-year-old and older 

 wood. The question may well be raised 

 as to the comparative effects of thin- 

 ning and of heading these older 

 branches. Let us analyze the situation 

 briefly. It is obvious that either head- 

 ing-back into, say, a three-year-old 

 growth or cutting it out entirely (thin- 

 ning) would remove all the shoot 

 growth that it produced the past season. 

 Therefore, the two operations would 

 effect exactly the same reduction in 

 lateral and terminal leaf buds on 

 shoots. Theoretically, then, the two 

 operations should have the same effect 

 on new-shoot formation and upon new 

 fruit-spur formation — greatly reducing 

 both. Probably the effects of the two 

 operations are almost identical in their 

 check to new-spur formation; but in 

 many cases such a heading-back would 



