26 PEEPAEATION OF THE SOIL. 



is, indeed, benefited by them in acquiring capacity 

 for early fruiting 



MANURING. 



Undoubtedly, the most thorough preparation for an 

 orchard or fruit ground would require the enriching 

 of the whole soil nearly as well as most cultivators 

 do the space immediately around the tree,. As it is 

 intended that the entire body of earth within the 

 limits of the fruit ground shall be occupied by the 

 roots, it is important that it should contain sufiicient 

 nourishment for their sustenance. During the first 

 few years, it is true, they would be supplied with 

 the pabulum they find immediately around the tree, 

 and that in a light soil much of the nutriment at 

 first supplied would have escaped before the trees 

 were fitted by age and growth for its appropriation. 

 But for such a soil, the manure should be adopted to 

 its peculiar condition, and be composted with a large 

 bulk of clay, or swamp-muck, or other organic matter, 

 which will enable a hungry soil to long retain the 

 fertilizing agencies applied to it. A soil, however, 

 which has- been naturally supplied with but a moderate 

 proportion of vegetable mould or clayey loam, will 

 not forget for many years the influence of a manure 

 which has been deeply deposited. Used in this manner, 

 manure will exhibit its influence upon the growth and 

 fruiting of the pear tree in a much greater degree than 

 in any subsequent application. It not unfrequently 

 occurs, that sufficient manure for the whole space of 

 ground to be fertilized is not readily obtainable at the 

 time of planting. 



