54 



THE FLORIST AND POMOLOGIST. 



[ March, 



to cause it to burst. Some varieties are very subject to this, especially in cold, 

 dull weather. The fruit is, moreover, improved in flavour by the roots being 

 kept drier than usual while they are ripening, though as the fruits ripen in suc- 

 cession, it is difficult to pay very strict attention to this. 



The most natural form for a pot Fig Tree is that of dwarf standard, with a 

 clean stem of eight or twelve inches in height. It is of the utmost importance to 

 confine the energies of the plant to this one stem, and the head formed thereon, 

 whatever mode of training be adopted. In forming young plants, as soon as the 

 required height is attained, pinch out the growing point, which will cause three- 

 Or four of the uppermost buds 

 to break ; the new shoots, when 

 they have attained the length of 

 three or four inches, should be 

 pinched in a similar manner. It 

 may be well to state that in 

 pinching back Figs, it is not 

 necessary to take off any ex- 

 panded leaves, but just to break 

 out the terminal bud before it 

 has expanded. By the end of 

 the second season most of the 

 plants will have formed a head 

 of four or five shoots about six 

 or eight inches in length, which 

 in winter should be pruned to 

 one-half their length. During the 

 succeeding summer the pinching- 

 back must be again repeated. 

 This continuous pinching in- 

 duces a fruitful habit, causing 

 the shoots so treated to throw 

 out one or more fruits from the 

 axils of the leaves, while those 

 not pinched rarely do so. 



The annexed cut represents an ordinary specimen of a vigorous kind, as it 

 would appear at the end of the third season. The branches will have elongated, 

 and in order to keep the plant in proper form, and to have the bearing shoots 

 near "home," as it is called, they must all be pruned back, as indicated. The 

 first crop of fruit, which is produced near the points of the shoots of the last 

 year's wood, will be thus destroyed, but a very abundant second crop will be 

 secured, if attention is paid to the pinching of the young shoots during summer. 

 As the plants grow older, they will make more close-jointed wood, which will 



