THE KANSAS PEACH. 53 



THE PEACH ORCHARD. 



Notes from Bulletion No. 11 of the Alabama Experiment Station. 



In March thirty-six varieties of budded peaches were planted upon 

 a sandy ridge, which produced the previous year only 136 pounds of 

 seed cotton per acre without manure. By the side of these twenty- 

 two seedling trees, grown from selected seed out of choice seedling 

 peaches, were planted. Next to these one row was planted with seed 

 from which a dozen healthy trees were grown and left where they 

 sprang up. The object in view was to compare the productiveness, 

 hardiness and longevity of transplanted budded trees, transplanted 

 seedlings, and seedlings not transplanted, and at the same time to se- 

 cure a record of the habits, jjeculiarities and merits of the varieties 

 of budded fruit. All of the trees were well grown, one year's growth 

 from the bud. These were planted, after having the roots examined 

 to see that they were free from borers, in well-prepared soil, liberally 

 manured in the drill with compost and kainit. The trees were all cut 

 back to two or three feet when transj)lanted, and have been pruned 

 each spring since, by the classes in the school of agriculture. The 

 objects had in view in pruning have been : (a) To train each tree to 

 shade its own body to jjrevent sun-scald, (h) To distribute the 

 growth of limbs uniformly around and above the body, to secure 

 symmetry, and to have the weight of fruit uniformly distributed 

 around the point of support, (c) To strengthen the limbs by short- 

 ening back to enable them to sustain a crop of fruit, (d) To reduce 

 the quantity of fruit by a judicious shortening of the shoots bearing 

 the fruit-buds, (e) To so direct the growth that the crop of fruit 

 could be gathered by a man standing upon the ground. 



All of these objects have been attained in nearly every specimen. 



Notwithstanding the immense crop of fruit borne last summer, the 

 trees were neither broken nor rendered ill-shapen, while trees not 

 jjruned were often stripped of all their branches. 



THE BORER. 



In October each year the earth is removed from the collar of the 

 tree until the large roots are exposed ; a careful search for borers is 

 then made, and the tree left thus exposed until the following March, 

 when another search is made for borers and the earth raised around 

 the bodies of the trees a few inches above the general surface. When 

 the earth is removed the collar is scraped free of soil and gum and the 

 knife freely used to find and destroy the borers. Any not found at 

 that time may be readily detected a few days later by the brown cast- 



