252 NEBRASKA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



My object is not to improve on these papers, but ratlier to confirm 

 them with reference to our own local conditions, and my own personal 

 experience. 



The average orchard as we find it today is not trained in a form to 

 produce the best and most economical results, either as to the amount 

 of fruit produced or as to the best quality. 



In the first place the trees in our older orchards are in most cases 

 headed too high. It is not usually advisable to change this however. 

 Secondly, they are allowed to grow too tall to be profitably worked. The 

 height of the trees can be reduced and the method of pruning greatly 

 improved upon. The errors as we find them are mainly two: On the one 

 hand the tops have been allowed to grow too thick from an almost total 

 lack of pruning. On the other hand they are often thinned out too much, 

 forcing the fruiting wood near the ends of the branches toward the tops 

 of the trees. The result of either method is equally pernicious. 



OPEN-HEAD PRUNING. 



Those who have had experience generally recognize the fact that if 

 the tops are more than 15 to 20 feet high the trees cannot be sprayed 

 nor the fruit handled to the best advantage. This method has brought 

 about the introduction of the open-head method of pruning now practiced 

 on the new orchards of the West, and of which we now wish to speak, 

 with reference to the old orchards of the East. As a result of this form 

 of pruning we have the cut-back orchard, or as Mr. Drew says, we prune 

 down those trees which other people have pruned up. 



Most orchardists and some horticulturists do not advocate the cut- 

 ting down of high trees on theoretical grounds. They do not believe that 

 the wounds will heal or that the desired results can be obtained. We 

 know now by actual experience that these objections have been over- 

 come with perfectly satisfactory results, even outstripping our highest 

 expectations. 



It is hard to lay down an exact rule for cutting as the types of trees 

 vary somewhat, but in all cases if the tree be too high to be economically 

 worked it should be lowered by removing the central or vertical branches 

 at the crotch, or as near the crotch as possible. With trees of upright 

 growth like the Newtown, the resulting form resembles an inverted um- 

 brella, when the tree is dormant. When the tree is loaded with fruit 

 the remaining branches bend down assuming the graceful drooping form, 

 so much sought after by the man who grows the fancy box fruit. In 

 dealing with trees like the winesap, the principle is the same, but the 

 form of cutting should be varied slightly from that employed with the 

 more upright and closer gi'owing varieties. Sometimes, for example, 

 instead of removing a central or upright shaft from the tree, the removal 

 of one or two side branches which have been allowed to grow too high, 

 will reduce the tree to the desired form. 



The practical orchardist needs only to be reminded merely that the 

 two or three-story tree can be lowered to the basement without evil re- 



