134 AGRICULTURAL REPORT. y 
below this temperature, the water produces an opposite effect, increas- 
ing the degree of cold; and if above, the water will not have any effect, 
for the clevated temperature will already have exercised its baleful in- 
fluence. Jeger believes this method applicable on a large scale to the 
vine-growing countries. where the spring frosts are calamitous; simple 
hand-engines, placed at various distances in the plantation, will afford 
the surest guarantee against this scourge.* 
A horticulturist made cuts in the bark of a young nut-tree injured by 
the frost. The bark thus treated assumed a darker tint, and a thick 
liquid, resembling the juice of boiled fruit, exuded from the trunk. He 
removed the bark, and even entirely stripped some trees from near the 
root up to the healthy branches, and then rubbed the trunks with liqui- 
fied clay. This operation arrested the escape of the thick liquid, the 
bark quickly reformed, acquired in a short time the thickness of a line, 
and the tree in the same year put forth strong branches. Those trees 
which had not received the same treatment died. f 
It is asserted that, if a fruit tree be enveloped with straw or hempen 
ropes, and the lower end of the rope be put into a tub of water, the 
tree will not be injured by the frost. ¢ 
Another horticulturist has for three years made use of a net-work 
prepared from the filaments of Spanish broom, (Spartium junceum,) for 
sheltering ‘espaliers from the frost: The nets were placed obliquely 
against poles, of the height of the walls, and at a distance of about 
three feet from the espalier. They served to break the force of the cold . 
’ winds and the beating rains, and to neutralize the effects of the frost. 
The morning after a frost these nets, viewed horizontally, showed each _ 
mesh armed. with needles of ice, which melted in the first rays of the ~ 
sun. Trees protected in this way did not suffer from those first frosts 
which are so pernicious to vegetation. This shelter unites all the bene- 
fits of air and warmth, and the fruits produced under it are excellent 
and of remarkable size. § 
Chateauvieux does not advise the immediate cutting down of branches 
which the frost has affected, and which are supposed to be dead. De- 
seending below the parts completely destroyed by the frost, as far as 
those cells which have not been injured, the disorganization gradually 
diminishes. The power of vegetation may, for this reason, be reéstab- 
lished to a degree more or less elevated, according as circumstances 
are more or less favorable. This author has seen, in the middle of the 
summer, the branches of a fig tree apparently injured beyond any hope 
of vegetation, but which, through neglect, had not been cut off, putting 
forth in a surprising manner. The plum trees of Portugal, the Cotgnas- 
siers of Japan, the laurel, &c., have given, some time after freezing, in- 
dications of vegetation in their higher branches. The above precau- 
tion favors the recovery of certain trees which sprout again on the old 
wood with difficulty, and also diminishes the evil that heavy rains occa- 
sion to the trees. It is not necessary to cut down to the quick in these 
cases; a little wood should be left above it to prevent the air from com- 
ing in contact with those parts from which we may expect new shoots, 
and which at first are in danger of becoming dry on account of their 
diminished force of vegetation. In two cases only will this precaution 
prove injurious; first, “where the frozen parts contain foul juices which 
are likely to attack the healthy portions; in this case it will be neces- 
* Witrtemb. Correspond. des Landwirths. Vereins. September, 1825, vel. viii, p. 139. 
+t Ann. Pomolog. d’Altenbourg, 1826, vol. 1, p. 232. 
Journal of the Franklin Institute, 1826, vol. 1, p. 173. 
§ Annales de la Société Linnéenne. Paris, 1827, p. 145. 
