142 PRUNING AND MANAGEMENT OF THE PEACH TREE. 



of wood and leaves only. Its vigour is equally distributed, and 

 the eyes with which it is furnished are of nearly the same size. 

 It abounds in young trees, and occasionally the terminal shoots of 

 older trees are of this description. 



The over-luxuriant {gourmand), which is a strong shoot of the 

 sort just mentioned, differs from it in its broad base, in its dis- 

 proportionate growth, in its length, in its thickness, in its greyish 

 bark speckled with brown, and in the distance of its eyes from 

 each other, the lower ones of which are nearly obliterated, whilst 

 those at the top are large, drawing all the sap to themselves, and 

 inclined to push out laterals. The over-luxuriant shoot shows a 

 bad circulation of the sap ; and is seldom found on any but very 

 young Peach-trees, or on those that are badly managed. It is 

 most frequently taken off; but this should be done before it has 

 attained too great a size ; still there are circumstances, which 1 

 will point out, where it can be made useful by pruning. 



24. Second sort. The mixed shoot, as previously observed, is 

 that on which both wood and flower-buds exist. 



25. D. Of the Branch. It is now understood that every shoot 

 is, in general, the origin of a branch, on which, by the influence 

 of pruning and the continuance of growth, the buds with which it 

 is furnished break forth. Some of these buds give rise to young 

 shoots only ; others to both young shoots and flowers. 



26. Hence it follows that, as I only allow of two sorts of 

 shoots (22), I recognise but two sorts of branches, namely : 1st, the 

 wood-branch ; 2nd, the fruit-branch. I make use of the latter 

 expression because it is usually adopted, although improperly so, 

 as branches bearing fruit only rarely exist on the Peach-tree. 



27. First sort. The wood*branch is the second state of the 

 shoot, of which all the buds are wood-buds. The first branches 

 that a young Peach-tree makes are of this sort, because, being 

 nourished by a strong-flowing and as yet imperfectly elaborated 

 sap, they cannot, during the first year of their existence, give rise 

 to anything but wood-buds, which become successively young 

 shoots, mature shoots, and branches. They afterwards remain 

 wood-branches during the life of the tree ; and they preserve the 

 power of producing wood-buds at any age, whatever may have 

 been said to the contraiy. 



I dwell so much upon this fact, because it is hardly admitted ; 

 and many persons yet maintain that the Peach-tree never forms 

 shoots from the old wood. 



Whatever be the mode of training, the wood-branches form the 



