HOW TO TREAT PEACH-TREES. 



again, and restore them to good condition. This, as I have satisfied myself, may 

 be done by " heading-in," which is notliing else than cutting back the ends of the 

 principal limbs — say from two to four feet — in order to make the tree throw out 

 a new head of young, healthy bearing wood. Of course, this proceeding loses 

 you the crop of fruit for this year; so, that if that is important, you must take 

 one side of the tree this year, leaving the other side to bear, and next year head-in 

 the other side. In this way I have restored old apricot and jteach-trees that were 

 "given up by the doctors" as superannuated and worn out in service, to a pretty 

 respectable condition of youth again ; good at least for half a dozen years more. 



It is the fashion nowadays, when the chemists and doctors wish to know what 

 is to be done to help a plant or tree, to examine its ashes. It is, in truth, not a 

 bad plan, and is evidently founded on the old doctrine that the new grows out of 

 the old ; " ashes to ashes and dust to dust." Exactly what the elements of the 

 peach-tree ash are I don't know, for I have not been able to find any analysis ; 

 but I conclude they are pretty largely litne and potash, for I have found by re- 

 peated trials that ivood-ashes is the very substance (along with sufficient manure 

 in the soil, mind), to maintain a healthy, substantial, and productive habit in a 

 peach-tree. 



Don't be so foolish (as many persons are, when they are going to give an extra- 

 ordinary relish of a new-fangled manure to a plant), don't be so foolish as to 

 content yourself with sprinkling four or five handfuls of ashes around a peach 

 tree and expect its leaves to turn color with a lease of new life. Take half a peck 

 of /e«c/?ec? ashes to a young tree, or half a bushel to a full grown tree — in that 

 proportion at least ; put not a dust of it around the trunk (that is, so far as bene- 

 fiting the roots go), but make a calculation with your eye of how far the roots of 

 the tree spread ; it may be two feet, it may be six feet every way from the trunk. 

 Then, having satisfied yourself about where the greater part of the young Jihres 

 are, spread the ashes on the surface of the ground, over them, and turn it under 

 about three inches with the three-pronged spud, or a light spade. If such treat- 

 ment as this don't give you healthy trees, then your stock is radically diseased, 

 and only worth a place on the wood-pile. 



That little enemy, the peach-worm, will very likely have established himself iu 

 your trees; he is already there to a dead certainty if you are not wide awake to 

 his sapping and mining habits. If, therefore, you have not been over your trees 

 last fall, and got the upper hand of him for the next six months, altogether the 

 best way of doing business with this gentleman is to Lynch him on the spot, by 

 ferreting him out of his hole, in the neck of the tree, just below the surface of the 

 ground. You can do this good turn for a peach-tree in five minutes, by lifting 

 the soil around it two or three inches deep, laying bare the stem just between 

 wnnd and water, as the old sailors say. If all looks clean and smooth there, very 

 well ; replace the soil again. If, on the other hand, you see gnm, then look out 

 for the enemy. Scratch a moment with your knife where the gum oozes out, and 

 you will get on his trail ; cut into the bark till you find him — in the shape of a 

 white grub, three-quarters of an inch long — and when found, " make no note of 

 it," but settle his accounts as rapidly as you can. 



This grub comes from an q^^ laid in the bark, in summer, by the winged in- 

 sect. Unless, the creature is wonderfully abundant, it contents itself with looking 

 about for the tender bark at the surface of the ground. On this account it is a 

 good plan to outwit the rascal by heaping up a little cone or i)ile of wood ashes, 

 tan or sand, say six inches high, around the trunk. The sole object of this is to 

 guard the soft place in the bark at the neck of the tree. On this account 

 must clear away the pile every fall, so as to let the bark harden again. If 



