PRUNING AND MANAGEMENT OF THE PEACH TREE. 173 



for the latter is often too scarce in the lower branches. The 

 removal of young shoots in well-managed trees ought, therefore, 

 to be made at different times as circumstances may require ; for 

 if we wait till there be too great a number of young shoots to be 

 suppressed, it might cause the loss of the tree. There are, how- 

 ever, some cultivators who disbud only once, usually in July, and 

 who cut off in one day all the useless young shoots. This is a 

 great error ; the absence of fruit-branches in so many Peach- 

 trees at Montreuil is almost solely attributable to the removing, 

 at one time, all the useless young shoots and laterals. 



The second disbudding is performed with the pruning-knife, 

 cutting off the young shoots that are to be removed as closely as 

 possible to their insertion. 



VII. On Pinching. 



125. This is a most important operation. It consists in the 

 suppression of the herbaceous extremities of young shoots. These 

 are taken off by pinchiug them between the nails of the thumb 

 and forefinger. It is done with the view of diminishing the 

 growth of those shoots which push too vigorously ; whilst at the 

 same time the sap that these would have otherwise appropriated 

 is turned to the advantage of the weaker shoots. Pinching differs 

 from disbudding, inasmuch as it is only a temporary way of 

 checking the excessive growth of a young shoot ; whilst disbud- 

 ding is its total extinction. 



126. For this reason we pinch nearly all the young shoots, the 

 growth of which we find it necessary to moderate, wherever they 

 may be situated ; and this is also frequently done with the view 

 of assisting the development of other shoots. Thus we pinch the 

 terminal shoot of a branch that has reached the desired length, in 

 order to stop the sap, and turn it to the advantage of the lower 

 shoots and eyes, a greater development of which is necessary to 

 the end in view. 



127. Pinching requires a great knowledge of the mode of 

 vegetation of the Peach-tree. It is indispensable for trees on walls, 

 and it is more especially necessary for the upper parts where the 

 sap flows most strongly. This operation is performed at no fixed 

 period, but is done when the tree requires it. It must be several 

 times repeated from the end of April till August, the particular 

 periods being regulated by the state of vegetation in different 

 trees, and by that of different parts of the same tree. When the 



