164 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY 
Mr. Spickerman: In small trees that are three or four inches in 
diameter, how close to the body do you saw off the limbs? 
Pres. Underwood: If you take a well formed tree three or four 
inches in diameter, it would have branches running out three or 
four feet and then divide. I would take all of it off to just below 
where the two limbs branch. The idea is to have a nicely formed 
top. If you have a good eye, you want to use it to know just what 
shape you want the tree. 
Prof, Pendergast: How large a limb would you saw off? 
Pres. Underwood: In this state you could not get anything too 
large. You can readily heal overa limb two inches in diameter and 
from that down to a whip—as readily as you can an ordinary limb. 
Mr. Spickerman: I suppose the idea of sawing off close to the 
tree is that when that graft has once become united to the tree it is 
not so liable to break off as if it were a foot or more from the tree. 
Pres. Underwood: Iam going to plant next year about 200 Dartt 
crabs; I may make a mistake, but I have a great deal of respect for 
the originator and, I was going to say, more respect for the tree 
(Laughter). Iam going to planttwo hundred and let them grow 
and graft every limb. May be the Hibernal would be better stock, 
perhaps the Virginia would be better, but I am going to try the 
Dartt anyway. 
Mr. Dartt: Just youtry it. (Laughter). 
Mr. Kimball: I think there is a guestion of congeniality 
concerned between the scion and the stock. Much of the early 
grafting was done on Transcendents. Some did not produce 
any apples, and some produced apples profusely. In some way the 
stock and scion were notcongenial. Thatisa point that this society 
should explore very fully. Mr. Philips uses the Virginia, and he 
has found it to fruit freely, but the question of the blight in the 
Virginia is a very serious one. Up to two or three years ago Mr. 
Philips denied that there was any blight. Mr. Cutler discarded the 
Virginia and uses the Shields instead for stock. I am interested in 
the Hibernal for stock for two or three reasons. As I have not been 
able to ascertain or learn of any varieties it has been placed upon, 
it may not be congenial for fruiting, but while it may not be con- 
genial to all sorts itseems at the present time to be so. One trouble 
with the ordinary farmer in grafting the Virginia is the rampant 
growth of suckers made about the scion, and if they are not very 
closely watched they will kill the scion, and in that way the work 
will all be destroyed; while the Hibernal does not make as rampant 
a growth, and the Hibernal has fewer limbs to make the top. 
Mr. Beckley: Where two scions have been put in and both grow, 
should one of them be removed after they have grown to a certain 
extent? 
The President: If the limb was the size of this mallet(indicating), 
I would split it across there and put it in two grafts, and I would 
leave both of them to growthe first year and take one out the second 
year. The two scions will help to heal over that cut surface. I have 
even putin as many as fourin a largelimb, and when the surface 
was healed over I would cut out the extra ones, but I would not do 
it until this surface was healed over 
