398 THE MONTHLY BULLETIN. 



most commonly made in pruning apple orchards is the cutting away of 

 these spurs. Unintelligent pruners will almost always begin cutting 

 from the ground and the removal of these valuable spurs is the result. 

 Orchardists should insist that pruning be done very largely from a 

 ladder, as the top of the trees needs a large share of the attention in this 

 work. In fact, if heading has been well done there should be practically 

 no cutting except possibly of a few succulent sprouts, from the ground. 



Pruning Mature Trees. 



Correct heading and careful annual pruning of the apple tree for the 

 first five years simplifies the pruning operation for the years to follow. 

 Except in cases of accident to trees there should be no large branches 

 to take out. The work thus far should have been done with the idea of 

 leaving just enough large branches to form the best possible head 

 without any interference or crowding. Just as soon as such takes place 

 in later years all branches that have a tendency to interfere with others 

 should be taken out before they attain a large size. More or less cutting 

 back will be necessary each season and a study may be made of the 

 habits of growth of different varieties and cutting to outside buds or 

 branches or the opposite may be practiced according to the needs of the 

 variety. In most cases fruit spurs should be preserved and it may even 

 be necessary to encourage the development of such. 



W. H. Volck, County Horticultural Commissioner of Santa Cruz 

 County, in co-operation with W. S. Ballard of the Bureau of Plant 

 Industry, has been carrying on some very interesting experiments for 

 the past few years to determine the feasibility of developing fruiting 

 spurs from the so-called water sprouts that always grow more or less in 

 every orchard. Mr. Volck 's article in this numjjer of the bulletin tells 

 of the work done in these experiments and the results obtained. 



EXPERIMENTS WITH COVERCROPS IN SOUTHERN 



CALIFORNIA. 



By W. M. Mertz,* Riverside, California. 



The question of fertilizer is undoubtedly one of the most important 

 issues now before the citrus grower. Were you to walk through the 

 plats constituting the fertilizer experiment at the Citrus Experiment 

 Station, you would note that wherever nitrogen had been used there 

 was increased growth, better color and heavier yields. This holds true 

 whether the nitrogen had been added through the medium of dried 

 blood, nitrate of soda or stable manure, with the best results following 

 the use of the organic sources. 



Dried blood is a product which is produced in very limited quantities 

 and could not be had in anything like sufficient amounts if all desired 

 to use it. Again, it is very expensive and thus its use is becoming 

 almost proliibitive to many growers. 



♦Address before the State Fruit Growers' Convention, Davis, California, June 1 

 to 6, 1914. 



