WINTER -INJURED PLANTS 143 



1895-6. It was heavily pruned in the spring 

 of 1896, and in the fall had made a ring of bright 

 new wood, which was amply sufficient to maintain 

 the tree in perfect health for a long life. This 

 appearance is common in nursery stock the year 

 following a very hard winter, but such trees may 

 not be permanently injured. 



"There are instances in which this heavy head- 

 ing-back seems to do more harm than good. 

 These are cases in which the entire tree is almost 

 uniformly injured, and the plant seems to need 

 the stimulus of all its buds to bring out the 

 feeble life which is still left to it; but these cases 

 are comparatively rare. It is probable that the 

 greater number of reported instances of death 

 due to heavy pruning of winter -injured trees are 

 of such trees as would have died under any treat- 

 ment. Winter -killed -plants often retain suffi- 

 cient vitality to enable them to leaf out or to 

 bloom, and sometimes even to begin growth, but 

 when the stored vitality of the tissues is ex- 

 hausted the plant perishes. This explains the phe- 

 nomenon which, after a bad winter, nearly always 

 puzzles the unobservant fruit-grower, of trees 

 starting into feeble growth, and then suddenly 

 dying when warm and dry weather approaches." 



There are many unsolved problems associated 

 with the pruning of winter-injured trees in very 

 severe climates. There are evidently two factors 

 concerned in the question, the general effect of 



