858- < 



JOURNAL OF HOBTIODLTUBB AND COTTAGE GABDWUm. 



I Hty U, Utt. 



dessert or the kitchen with plenty of each variety of fruit as it 

 comes into season. I do not winb, therefore, to alluJe to the 

 cultivation of fruit for commercial purposes, but for the general 

 use of gentlemen's families. 



The same system is, I think, however, eiiually adapted for 

 the gardens of the poor, because the space taktu up by ibo treca 

 is not great, and yet at the same time thoy soon cmie into 

 bearing, and yield heavy crops. The quality of the fniit, too, is 

 far superior to that from ordinary stiindards, and, as far as my 

 experience goes, it keeps much belter. I am not by any means 

 pretending to advocate anything new, as tliis medium system, 

 if I may call it so, of growing bush fruit is one that is now 

 extensively adopted in many gardens. I do not wish to now 

 enter upoii the question of wall fruit, because it is not often 

 that really good walls can be given up to Apides and Pears ; 

 moreover. I wisli to confine my remarks chiefly to orchard and 

 garden fruit gro-svn in the open ground. • ■ ' ' ' 



I have had a very marked instanci ■ of 'thfe comparative 

 growth of bush trees in a kitchen garden where the soil was 

 annually forked and manured, and of trees planted iu nu ordi- 

 nary orchard. Nine yuiirs ago I planted some bush trees in 

 my kitchen garden, and at the same time filled up some vacant 

 places in an orchard. In the latter instance the trees were 

 left alone, and the grass allowed to grow over the roots, and, 

 I am obliged to confess, little or no care taken of them. The 

 soil, however, is very good loam, 3 feet deep, with pure dry 

 sand undei-neath. At the end of nine years, however, I may 

 safely assert that the bush trees that have been annually pruned 

 in, and the soil around them projicrly cultivated, are capable 

 of bearing ten times more fruit than the orcliard trees. Prac- 

 tically the crop has been more than a hundredfold greater, ns 

 I have never picked more than a dish from any one of the 

 orchard trees, and several of my bushes have home yearly from 

 live to seven pecks a-piece. 



As we have had for tlie last four years a very extensive col- 

 lection of Apples and Pcius sent f.ir exhibition to our Yorkshire 



Pomological Society, having had upwards of a thousand dishes I perature, such alter- 

 of Apples and Pears last year at Wiiitby sent for comparison, | uations of heat and 

 not only from Yorkshire, but from many different comities 

 (not for "the sake of competition for prizes, but in order to as- 

 certain what are the best sorts for the north of England, and 

 also the best method of growing them), I h;ive had a very good 

 opportunity, as one of tlie Committee of the Society, of exam- 

 ining and comparing fruit grown in different ways and 

 from a great variety of soils and climates ; and I have been 

 amplv confirmed in my opinion that fruit from hush trees does 

 not suffer by comparison with fruit from pyramids, dwarfs, 

 or espaliers, either in size, quality, or liavour. I think 

 decidedlv the best general collection of fruit shown last year 

 was froiii some voiing bush trees about from five to seven years 

 old. If voung "trees are over-pruned at first it is necessary to 

 root-pruiio as well, in order to prevent the disposition to make 

 nothing but wood shoots. I have found not only in trees 

 under my own care, but by observation in other gardens, that 

 where trees are too much pruned when young, instead of 

 inducing them to fruit early, it ret.ards the period of fruiting— 

 unless, of course, Mr. Kivers's system of lifting and transplant- 

 ing is adopted. Ko doubt, for Mr. Kivers's own method of cul- 

 tivation this is the only plan ; but I think it so contrary to 

 nature thus to check the" supply of sap and to thwart the growth 

 of trees, that it would not be expedient to adopt it except 

 under peculiar circumstances. AVhat I would again repeat is, 

 that in the hands of an experienced cultivator like Mr. Elvers 

 such a method will no doubt succeed ; but I have seen rows of 

 small trees treated in this way in some of my friends' gardens, 

 ■when two or three hungry schoolboys -would have cleared the 

 rows. VCe must bcur iii mind that amateurs do not plant 

 these frees bv the hundred or the thousand, but perhaps will 

 plant ten or twelve, or from that uji to fifty, along the walks of 

 a kitchen garden ; ami it has rarely been my fate to see a good 

 dish of Apples or Pears on one of these trees for the first five 

 or six veai-s of their existence, after which time they begin to 

 fare better, for root-pruning and pinching-in are gradually left 

 off. 



I have little doubt that the Quince stock is the best general 

 stock for Pears, and that much lias to be done and learnt yet in 

 the way of double-working. So, too, I agree with Mr. liivers, 

 that the Paradise stock is most suitable ior dwarf Apple trees, 

 and that the most essential of all qualities for stocks is that of 

 surface-rooting; hnt I still contend that if the ground on 

 ■which fruit trees are planted is properly forked and manured, 

 mulched if necessary during the •winter, and forked, not dug. 



in the spring, the tendency of fruit trees will be to make sur- 

 face roots. Sun and air will penetrate to them, so as to help to 

 elul>oratc and ripen the sap, and improve the quality of the 

 fruit, and there will be no necessity for root-pruning, unless 

 canker or some other disease show that the roots have struck 

 into a subsoil which they do not Like. 



I do not think it wise, on the other hand, to plant standard 

 trees by way of making a permanent orchard ; every orchard, 

 however managed, begins after a certain time to deteriorate ; 

 of course, it much depends on the nature of the soil, how long 

 trees may continue to improve, and bear good fruit, but it is 

 far better to replant and he content to sacrifice trees after they 

 attain a certain age ; and with the system I wo>dd advocate o£ 

 leaving open spaces, those open spaces might be planted five 

 or six years before the other trees are sacrificed. I fancy, wilh |* 

 some "few exceptions, that after twenty to thirty years, trees •''' 

 become too large and unmanageable, and the fruit begins to ;' 

 deteriorate. 



I dare hardly say 

 much on the n'.rala 

 ipursl'w of orchard- 

 houses, for fear of 

 bringing a hornet's 

 nest about my ears ; 

 but unless on a large 

 scale, and in the hands 

 of very competent per- 

 sons, they rarely if ever 

 succeed. I confess I 

 have never seen a small 

 one in the hands of 

 an amateur that really 

 answered or repaid the 

 trouble or expense. 

 Small houses are liable 

 to such changes of tem- 



drought, with cold and 

 moisture, that two or 

 three hours' neglect on 

 a sunny day in Ajiril 

 or May may ruin all 

 the care of the rest of 

 the year. No doubt 



large houses in the hands of such persons as Mr. Bivers, Mr. 

 Pearson, of Chilwell, P.ev. T. C. Brehaut, and others, will 

 answer admirably, but in the generality of cases small houses are 

 pleasant toys, and pot trees are like spoilt children that require 

 a great deal of care and attention, and very often after aU but 

 little repay the care bestowed. So I am afraid my advice to 

 those who wish to build small unheated orchard-houses would 

 be (like " Pimch's " advice to those about to marrj-), " Don't ! " 

 One great objection in my mind to small pyramidal trees, 

 and very dwarf hushes, is that they are so liable to have their 

 blossom's injured by spring frosts ; for though Mr. Rivers is 

 quite right in saying that the radiation from the ground is an 

 essential henefit'in ripening fruit on dwarf trees, yet the -very 

 same causes bring them into premature blossom in the spring, 

 and I need hardlv say that on still frosty nights the nearer the 

 bloom is to the ground the more it is liable to suffer from frost. ^^ 

 and the smaller the tree the less protection it has froin its own 

 leaves and branches ag.iiust the radiation of a spring frost. 

 On a still night iu May, I have known more than 5° difference 

 between a thermometer on the ground, and one 4 feet oft the 

 ground. This often accounts, in my mind, for Apricot trees 

 bearing freely at the top of the wall, while they have but few 

 fruit or none low down.— S. X. Z. 



The above, at 8 feet apart each way and 

 S2 feet Ijetwecn the rows, wonW ropreseut 

 about one quarter of an acre, and would lake 

 eigbtf-eight butih trees. 



rose' MILDEW— FRUITS IX NEW JERSEYv- - 



Is your Number of the 1st of May Mr. Radclyffc repeats the 

 remedy formerly given bv him for Rose mildew. If it came 

 from liny less trustworthy quarter I certainly should hesitate 

 before I allowed so poisonous a salt as blue vitriol to find its 

 way to my Rose roots. Last year I applied the remedy to the 

 lea'ves ot" some Nectarines under glass, and it injured them. 

 I had previouslv tried sulphur, but that had failed to cure. 

 Strange to say.the onlv plants affected ■were Hunt's Tawny, 

 which, although it has glandless leaves, never mildewed with 

 mo before. Last year tlurcc trees out of four were affected. 



