708 GARDEN MANAGEMENT. 



§ 4.— The Fruit-Garden. 



2220. December is the month of rest here as in other departments of the 

 garden ; but there is much to be done which is too often left undone. Planting 

 may now be presumed to be over ; at least, unless the weather is unusually 

 mild, it will be well to prepare the ground, and leave the planting vmtil the 

 early spring. 



2221. Peaches, nectarines, and other wall-trees, now require pruning, and 

 the shoots selected nailed in ; but both operations should be avoided in frosty 

 weather, pruning in such weather being apt to lacerate the sap-vessels and 

 destroy the shoots, which die back under its influence. 



2222. Standard apples and pears should now receive their final autumn 

 pruning and thinning out, the latter being chiefly exercised on the interior 

 branches oi the tree, so as to admit of a free current of air through it ; badly- 

 placed shoots remove ; espalier trees, and trees planted against a wall for 

 horizontal training, do best when the shoots are tied down ; in the absence ot 

 ti'ellis on the wall, therefore, studs should be driven into the wall at conve- 

 nient distances for that purpose, in order to avoid the stiff and formal distor- 

 tion the branches undergo in the old process of nailing with shreds. 



2223. The modern system of dwai-fing fruit-trees, by which space is so much 

 economized, is produced by a special course of pruning, commencing a year 

 from gi-afting, when the apple-tree should be pruned back, leaving about eight 

 buds on the shoots. In the second year the head will exhibit eight or ten 

 shoots, and a selection must now be made of five or six, which shall give a 

 cup-like form to the head, removing all shoots crossing each other, or which 

 interfere with that form, thus leaving the head hollow in the centre, with a 

 shapely head externally, shortening back the shoots retained to two-thirds or 

 less, according as the buds are placed, and leaving all ol nearly the same 

 size. In the course of the summer's growth the tree will be assisted by 

 pinching off the leading shoots where there is a tendency to overthrow the 

 balancing of the head. At the third year's pruning the same process of 

 thinning and cutting back will be required, after which the tree can hardly go 

 wrong. The shoots retained should be short-jointed and well-ripened ; and 

 in shortening, cut back to a healthy, sound-looking, and well-placed bud. 

 After the third year, little or no shortening back will be required, especially 

 where root-pruning is practised ; the tree should now develop itself in 

 fruiting stems, which will subdue the tendency to throw out gross or barren 

 shoots. 



2224. Large standard trees in their prime only require pruning once in two 

 or three years. At these intervals cross-growing or exhausted shoots, espe- 

 cially those in the centre of the tree, require thinning out, bearing in mind 

 that the best fruit grows at the extremities of the branches, and keep those 

 branches under control. 



2225. The apple is somewhat capricious ; some affecting clay soils, while 



