THEORY OF PRUNING FRUIT TREES, &c. 



4. I have four seedlings that bid fair perfectly to resist the curled leaf, as well as the 

 winter's cold. Two of them are glanded and very late; the one a fair fruit for the table, 

 the other fit only for cooking. The other two are glandless; the one early and fine, the 

 other ver}' late, fit only for cooking. 



With the foregoing precautions, I think the evils of the curled leaf will be remedied in 

 part, and in part avoided ; and that bj^ the latter remedy peach trees may be produced 

 whose buds will retain their vitality through the cold of all ordinary winters. 



Such trees as set their fruit safely in May, and ripen in good season in the autumn, are 

 almost sure to find summer heat enough to mature rich and luscious fruit. By these 

 means I hope to see fair and tolerably constant crops of good peaches yet produced, in 

 seasons ordinarily favorable, even in Oneida county. C. E. G. 



Utica, Dec. 23, 1851. 



ON THE THEORY OF PRUNING FRUIT TREES, &c. 



BY L. YOT'NG, SPRLNGDALE, KY. 



Trees and plants cultivated for profit, yield their returns for the most part in secretions 

 of the leaf, or wood-bud system, as timbers, sugars, gums, &c., or in products of the flow- 

 ering system, in the form of blossoms, as hops; seeds, as nuts and cereals; or in coverings 

 of the seed, as fruits, cotton, and the like. Pruning, (except to effect or to promote sym- 

 metry of form, which is not here considered,) in the broad acceptation now given to that 

 term, means any lopping off from the roots or branches of trees or plants in cultivation, 

 with design to stimulate either the leaf-bud system, or its contrar}^, the fruit bearing. 

 To this diversity of motive in the action of the operator, the fact may be added, that the 

 nature of the part amputated, and even the time of amputation, has something to do with 

 the effect of pruning. It need not, therefore, excite surprise when we see it happen, as 

 happen it certainly does, that the most experienced practical cultivators lay down rules for 

 the guidance of others, discordant in themselves. A desire to aid in rescuing these rules 

 from their present apparent confusion, has induced the author of these numbers to submit 

 his views to the consideration of cultivators; and the elementary remarks contained in the 

 preceding numbers, were deemed indispensable to a classification of said rules, upon the 

 plan designed. 



In treating of the antagonistic nature of the wood-bud force, and that of the fruit-bud, 

 I have already said, that according to the books, all the means pointed out as efficient pre- 

 ventives or remedies, in cases where trees or plants were disposed to feebleness of wood 

 growth, from over-bearing, or had already become weak, were in the nature of stimulants 

 or high feeding, either tending to increase the supplies of food thrown into the circulation, 

 or to rid the circulation from the effects of some exhausting influences; while all the 

 means recommended for inducing fruitfulness, in trees so vigorous as to produce wood 

 growth alone, to the exclusion of fruit-buds, are in the nature of debilitants. If, then, 

 fruitfulness be considered as a sort of mean proportion, a state of equilibrium between the 

 wood-bud force in preponderance, which is indicated on the part of the tree or plant by a 

 disposition to produce leaf-buds only; and the fruit-bud force in preponderance indicated 

 by that condition in over-bearing trees or plants in which few or no wood branches are 

 duced, then do these propositions become two elementary truths, touchstones 

 by which to try every rule of practice before its adoption as part and parcel 



