Page 8 



BETTER FRUIT 



December 



I u.i hi, ;J3 — At left. Tj-pirat five-year- 

 tree after pruning. Note tliat tlie center 

 indication of l)eari!is a crop, antl it" i 

 back next 



111 Winlei ^eli^. At rifiht : Same 

 s Ijeing suppressed. This tree gives 



t simuld will stanii heavier cutting 



season. 



Chon,se one which will giow as a 

 leader for the branch and do not cut 

 this back as heavily as you do the sec- 

 ond branch, which you will suppress 

 more heavih' in order to make it grow 

 as a side branch and not as a main 

 branch. In this way you will get rid 

 of the weak crotch, which is one of the 

 fundamental jjrinciplcs to remember in 

 pruning trees. This second summer 

 these trees should be so well estab- 

 lished that by .lune you can give them 

 a second pruning. Each one of these 

 branches that you left on the tree has 

 grown 15 or 18, or in some cases as 

 much as 30 inches or even more in 

 length. We would advise, instead of 

 letting them go the entire summer, that 

 whenever they have made sullicient 

 growth they be cut back in order to 

 force out a new set of laterals. The 

 following spring in all probability 

 about all the pruning you will have to 

 do will be a little thinning out here and 

 there, and in case the laterals which 

 come nut as a result of the pruning in 

 June have made a very vigorous 

 growth and are getting too rangy, you 

 will have to cut them back somewliat, 

 although it will only be in extreme 

 cases that you will have to practice 

 much cutting on these branches. Mod- 

 erate clipping back is often advisable 

 to prevent the terminal bud from con- 

 tinuing growlh and producing long 

 willowy growth. So you continue this 

 pruning right along for two or three 

 years, never leaving as a rule more 

 than about two branches where you 

 had one before. 



At the beginning of the fourth \ear 

 I would suggest a modilication of the 

 pruning. It is coming time now to let 

 down on the heavy pruning. If you 

 practice as severe pruning as you did 



the first four years, you are constantly 

 going to force the tree into wood. 

 Many growers thin out the laterals ex- 

 cessively, force an enormous terminal 



growth and cut back this lerminal 

 growth vigorously, thus forcing out 

 new laterals. We believe that loo 

 many growers make a mistake by 

 pruning too vigorously at this time. It 

 would be to advantage to leave more 

 lateral wood than most growers leave. 

 Just how much is advisable to leave in 

 all cases is very hard to say, because 

 we have not worked out dellnilely just 

 what is the relalioii of shade to the 

 formation of fruil spurs or fruit buds. 

 I'ntil that can dclinitely be worked out 

 it won't be possible to give very ex- 

 jjlicit directions, but we would rather 

 let the tree grow a little brushy, be- 

 cause after it comes into bearing this 

 excess wood can very easily be thinned 

 out. The summer pruning now changes 

 from the former early summer piuning 

 and should now be done at the time 

 the terminal buds form, rather than 

 early in June as already described 

 under summer pruning. The rule, then, 

 with trees from four to seven years of 

 age, is simply to cut back the terminals 

 sutTiciently so they will not run away 

 with the tree, and just thin out so that 

 the tree does not become too dense. 

 More pruning than this we would not 

 recommend. We feel that if this is fol- 

 lowed there will be a tendency for 

 young trees to come into bearing 

 earlier than they otherwise would. 



The amount of pruning that trees 

 which have just come into bearing will 

 stand will, of course, vary tremen- 

 dously according to their vigor. The 



I-"ir,iiRi; .3 I — .\I left; l-'ive-year-old Winter- N<'lis showing oth- branch growing 



al the e\| ense of the r<'si of the tiec. .\l right: Same tree pruned. Note 



thai the stioiigcst blanches liave been cut the hardest. 



