292 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



ing but the stubs sticking up. He let them go that way, and the 

 next year they made the finest growth I ever saw. It did not hurt 

 them a bit. That is a little instance of fall pruning where no dam- 

 age was done. I don't believe in fall prunmg. 



Mr. Oliver Gibbs : I notice all the speakers say they wax over 

 the limbs when half an inch or more in diameter. I would like to 

 ask why they do not wax all of them. 



Mr. Philips: If we cut off a limb that is less than half an inch 

 in diameter it will heal over nicely before fall without putting any 

 wax on it. 



Mr. O. F. Brand : My observations have been to the efifect that 

 when nature prunes a tree, for instance in August or September, 

 it splits the limbs right out and takes out all the wood that belongs 

 to the limb and the wound heals over perfectly. I have noticed 

 after hurricanes or tornadoes where limbs have been broken ofif in 

 August and September, they have healed over perfectly sound, leav- 

 ing apparently no dead wood. I have had in my own experience 

 trees pruned in August that next year bore the largest and finest 

 apples I had on the place. This year I have done considerable 

 pruning, and I did not commence until late in August, and I pruned 

 trees thirty years old. I have trees six years old and a good many 

 hundred trees from eight to twelve years old which I pruned in 

 August and September and in October, and the wounds have healed 

 over perfectly. If I want to grow wood I would prune the latter 

 part of March or the fore part of April, just before the frost comes 

 out of the ground, then I would get a good growth of wood, but 

 I do not believe it leaves the wood as sound as late summer prun- 

 ing properly done. 



Mr. S. D. Richardson: I saw an object lesson in pruning 

 cottonwoods. A man thought it would be of advantage to saw che 

 tops out as it would make better looking trees. He cut them out 

 in the spring, and the following spring they were all dead. He made 

 a failure of it. 



Mr. Bentz (S. D.) : I would like to ask a question relative to 

 this pruning matter. I understand the conditions vary according 

 to location. I would like to ask whether the horticulturists in the 

 southwestern part of this state as a rule prune but very little, and if 

 it is not the general tendency to allow the limbs to form close to 

 the ground and prune just as little as possible. The conditions in 

 the southwestern part of this state are almost identical with the con- 

 ditions as they exist in our locality, and we are of the opinion that 

 we should prune very carefully and very little indeed and allow 

 the limbs to grow right from the butt of the tree. I would like to 

 hear from the gentlemen who live on the open prairie, especially 

 in the western part of the state. 



Mr. Emil Sahler : I am from the southern part of the state, 

 and I found by leaving on all the limbs my trees were shy bearers, 

 and I wanted 'my trees to bear, that is what I planted them for; 

 and so I went to' work and cut at least one-third of the limbs and 

 the next year I found my trees were loaded with the best kind of 

 fruit I ever saw. Where'l sawed off the limbs I put on an applica- 



