SUMMER TREATMENT 523 



fruitful buds, the occurrence of many water 

 sprouts indicates that too limited a number of 

 fruitful buds has been left upon the vine to 

 utilize all the sap pumped up by the roots. To 

 remove these watersprouts, therefore, while they 

 are young is simply to shut off an outlet for the 

 superabundant sap, and thus to injure the vine 

 by interfering with the water equilibrium, or to 

 cause it to force out new watersprouts in other 

 places. Any vigorous vine will produce a certain 

 number of watersprouts, but they should not be 

 looked upon as utterly useless and harmful, be- 

 cause they produce no grapes. On the contrary, 

 if not too numerous, they are of positive advan- 

 tage to the vine, being so much increase to the 

 feeding surface of green leaves. Watersprouts 

 should be removed completely during the winter 

 pruning, and the production of too many the next 

 year prevented by a more liberal allowance of 

 bearing wood. 



TOPPING, or cutting off the ends of shoots, is 

 done by a means of a sickle or long knife. At 

 least two or three leaves should be left beyond the 

 last bunch of grapes. The time at which the 

 topping is done is very important. When the 

 object is simply to prevent the breaking of the 

 heavy, succulent canes of some varieties by the 

 wind, or to facilitate cultivation, it must, of 

 course, be done early, and is well replaced by 

 early pinching. These objects are, however, bet- 



