110 SELECTING, 



DEPTH OF PLANTDsG. 



'No part of fruit culture has attracted more attention, 

 and elicited more speculation, than this. In one point 

 all are agreed, that, with few excej)tions, fruit-trees 

 should never be planted deeper than they grew in the 

 nursery. The part of the tree called the collar, where 

 the bark of the roots meets that of the trunk, the natural 

 position of which is a little below the surface of the 

 ground, marks the limit to which it should be usually 

 buried. Although the earth may be temporarily 

 heaped higher than this, around a tree just planted, 

 yet it should generally be removed soon after growth 

 commences. 



A Mr. Comstock created some sensation, not long 

 since, by his claim to have discovered the grand secret 

 of successful fruit culture. He acquired some money, 

 and a sort of fame, by lectures upon what he termed 

 the science of Terra-culture^ — or, cultivation with- 

 out disturbing the rootlets which till the soil. His 

 theory was, that a tree planted below its natural 

 depth threw out a new stratum of roots, by which the 

 equilibrium was lost, and it became thenceforth a 

 maimed tree, incapable of producing its maximum 

 of fruit. But his theory was only a repetition of 

 the old story of human error — a jDart taken for the 

 whole. 



In planting in a dry and deeply pulverized soil, 

 the pear tree may with safety be placed lower than 

 its original position. According to my own expe- 

 rience, it is quite essential to success, after removing 

 a pear tree from a heavy to a light soil, that it be 



