54 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTUKB AND COTTAGE GAKDENEB. 



[ January 15, 1874. 



Dr. Hogg is a white Grape of the Frontignan class, but both 

 in bunch and berry much superior in size to the old White 

 Frontignan, though possessing the same exquisite Muscat 

 flavour. It is a very free setter, with long tapering bunches, 

 slightly shouldered ; berries round and of good size, and it ia 

 an extraordinary bearer. The plant fruited here last summer 

 was grown in an ordinary 10-inch pot ; it was by no means 

 strong, for it came from Mr. Pearson as a planting cane, but 

 being anxious to see the fruit I allowed it to bear, and was 

 rewai'ded with six fine bunches, which finished well, and 

 weighed in the aggregate 8h lbs. So fine were they, that I 

 was able to exhibit three bunches in a collection of fruit at 

 one of our local shows, where it was pronounced by many 

 good judges to he one of the best new Grapes yet sent out. I 

 have no doubt that when better known, and when grown under 

 more favourable conditions, it will hold a prominent place 

 among the best established varieties. — J. W. 0. 



DISBUDDING MAEECHAL NIEL— MANETTI 

 STOCKS. 



I HATE in the open ground a Marfiehal Niel Eose on the 

 Manetti stock. It was planted in November, 1872, and last 

 season threw out a shoot some 6 or 7 feet long, but did not 

 bloom. I have this shoot well staked, and every point on it is 

 now showing bloom. I counted on the Ist inst. twelve fully 

 formed buds — I believe there are more. Ought I to remove 

 the buds, or let them take their chauce? It I remove them, 

 are the same points likely to bloom again ? Hitherto we have 

 been vmable to bloom this Kose here, and it is the only one we 

 have not succeeded with, our Eoses performing creditably at 

 our local flower shows. I should perhaps mention that the 

 Eose is not against a wall or protected in any way, but we are 

 fairly well sheltered, and the season has been an exceptionally 

 mild one here. 



I shall also feel obliged if you will give me a hint as to where 

 I can procure Manetti Eose stocks. I cannot obtain them 

 from our nurserymen hei-e. The Manetti is the only stock on 

 which I can bloom my Koses to perfection, but certainly my 

 soil is very light. — A County Dublin Amateue. 



[We should advise you to let the buds remain. It all de- 

 pends upon favourable weather whether they will open or not, 

 but it will not interfere with its future blooming whether you 

 leave the buds on or not ; and if they fall off this spring, merely 

 shorten the shoots to a sound eye, and do not cut back too 

 hard. Manetti stocks can be had from several English nursery- 

 men, as Mr. Cranston, King's Acre, Hereford, or Mr. Harrison, 

 of Darlington. Once get a few good plants, it is easy to per- 

 petuate jour stock by cuttings.] 



TO YOUNG GAEDENEBS ON BENOVATING OLD 

 FBUIT TBEES AND OTHEB SUBJECTS.— No. 2. 

 If there is any one thing more than another in which modem 

 gardeners have advanced, it is restricting over-vigorous growth 

 by root-pruning instead of by excessive branch-pruning, and so 

 causing the production of bloom-buds rather than brushwood. 

 Of course root-pruning is only resorted to when growth is made 

 at the expense of fruit-bearing. To secure the full benefit of 

 this system it is necessary to commence with young trees, 

 although when practised with care and judgment it is likewise 

 advantageous to old trees of rampant growth. In no case, 

 however, should it be carried to excess, otherwise in a few 

 years the tree will be exhausted by over-production. If we do 

 not carefully study the right balance the fruits will be small 

 and of indifferent flavour, and the channels for the flow of the 

 Bap will be so contracted that they will hardly expand, if at all. 

 In such an event, therefore, it is needful to head-down, in 

 order to secure new channels through which sutiicient nourish- 

 ment can pass to allow of the free development of the flowers 

 and fruits. It is not from scrubby fruit buds that we obtain 

 the best fruit, nor from a thicket of wood caused by excessive 

 pruning, and furnished with a few weak bloom buds, but from 

 young shoots of few years' growth. Here, then, is the happy 

 medium between an assemblage of starved buds and over- 

 growth — such, for instance, as that resulting from injudicious 

 heading-back, where numbers of contending watery shoots de- 

 stitute of fruit are produced. With espalier trees, again, I 

 have seen a clean sweep made of all the spurs, leaving the 

 branches like so many bean sticks. What can be expected 

 from such treatment, if the tree is healthy, but a mass of 



shoots, not a few blanks, and no bloom buds? "Pinch-in," 

 some will say. So you may, and fresh growth will be the 

 result. Eoot-pruning, however, in the autumn after this un- 

 practical and unnecessary treatment may effect the object in 

 view. 



It is well known, when a tree has been subjected for years 

 to excessive pruning, and has formed large masses of useless 

 spurs full of eyes, that these are ready at any favourable moment 

 to break into rampant shoots, which by their broad-gauge 

 channels draw away the sap to such an extent that the con- 

 tracted ways to the weak surrounding blooming spurs have 

 not the least chance of carrying any nourishment, and the 

 flowers unfold only to fall from want of this. It is generally 

 found that the wood-producing clusters proceed from the main 

 branch with a clean base of even a few inches long, and often 

 the bloom-spurs around it likewise spring from the main branch. 

 Here, then, is the opportunity to at once remove with a small 

 saw or a knife the useless clusters, and leave the bloom spurs 

 to appropriate the whole supply of sap that previously was 

 consumed in building-up wood to be at once displaced. The 

 whole economy of the tree is disordered should there be bloom 

 buds intermingled with the clusters of wood-producing eyes, 

 and not around and beneath. In this case have a fine saw or 

 pair of French nippers, as I call them, and take out all except 

 the bloom buds. I have often made trees which were considered 

 shy bearers before produce a good crop by this treatment. 



The preceding remarks mostly have reference to horizontal- 

 trained trees, but the same treatment can be employed for bush, 

 pyramid, standard, or any other form that has to be subjected 

 to gpur-pruning. As to trees that have not been kept pruned, 

 I will give one instance of renovation out of many : Some large 

 Blenheim Orange Apple trees, said to date from the first in- 

 troduction of that noble variety, had grown with a clean stem 

 of 2 feet high, and had then been allowed to spread out their 

 branches without interference. This had been going on for 

 years. Being in a soil and situation well suited for fruit trees 

 they had grown as only the Blenheim Orange can grow, but 

 produced little fruit for their size. At length the garden had 

 to be re-arranged, and these trees, being in the middle of it, 

 were quite out of place. To grub them up was not to be 

 thought of ; to head-down such vigorous trees was also voted 

 impracticable. What, then, was to be done ? Just this: Take 

 a chisel with a long handle and mallet, and remove all the 

 extended straggling branches, which are the proper parts ta 

 attack — not those near the stem, the removal of which causea 

 ugly wounds. The heads were thus brought into something like 

 uniformity in shape, light and air admitted to the middle of the 

 tree ; and the result was that all the smaller branches studded 

 with weak bloom-buds were thrown into a state of high produc- 

 tiveness. Meanwhile the garden was trenched three spades deep, 

 and all straggling roots judiciously shortened, not as we have 

 lately read — viz., by taking out a trench 2 or 3 feet from the 

 stem, with an axe rudely demolishing all roots even if as thick 

 as one's leg, then fiUing-in the hole with dung, &c. No : If 

 this is the only practicable method that can be adopted to- 

 renovate, it is best at once to replace with young trees. Bear 

 in mind, the soil was weU suited for fruit-culture, being a 

 marly loam 3 feet deep on an open subsoil of a gravelly nature, 

 formation volcanic, aspect south. If it had been otherwise, no 

 doubt it would have been necessary to have mined under the 

 trees, to cut off any roots going down into subsoil. 



A tree in a weak or exhausted condition requires different 

 treatment. It is well to reduce the head considerably, and 

 then look to the roots, not cutting off those which arc sound 

 and healthy, but carefully removing all old exhausted earth, 

 replacing it with new, sound, rich soO. Eemember not only 

 to place it within 2 or 3 feet of the stock, but also for as many 

 yards. Here you will fall in with the feeders, which wOl at 

 once appropriate the food obtained. Do everything to encou- 

 rage vigorous growth ; displace old with young wood ; should 

 this become too gross and not fruitful, prune the roots, but 

 with great care. Avoid whenever possible the amputation of 

 large roots or of the branches of large trees ; the shock to the 

 system is too severe. — J. T., Maesgwynne, S. Wales. 



An Old Teuepennv. — As all kindly notices relative to gar- 

 deners are acceptable to your readers, I forward you the 

 epitaph of one copied from a tombstone in the old church- 

 yard of Hunstanton, Norfolk. — G. E. Crick. 



" John Eipping,4le, n faithful And attached retainer, seryed for seventy 

 years as gardener dming five generations of the L'Estrange family, one of 



