PRUNING AND TRAINING. 



135 



others near them. We recommend this form of training 

 only for gardens, and other places where space is limited. 

 Still, a person can produce more than twice the amount of 

 fruit on an area of two rods square four square rods by 

 having that amount of ground occupied by three fan-shaped 

 trees, than one tree would yield if allowed to grow in its 

 natural form. 



The great advantage of training an apple-tree in the 

 form of a fan is, all the branches, from the central stem to 

 the extremities of the longest arms, can be filled with fruit, 

 most of which will appear on the outside of the branches, 

 where it will receive the full benefit of the sunlight and air. 

 When of this form, the annual cutting back of straggling 

 twigs or rampant branches can be performed more advan- 

 tageously than if the head were round. Besides this, heads 

 of such a form are more convenient than round heads, when 

 hunting depredators, when thinning out the fruit, and when 

 gathering it ; as fruit-ladders can be placed close by either 

 side, within reach of every apple on the tree. There is no 

 doubt that it would pay where ground is scarce to raise 

 three fan-shaped trees on the same 

 ground that is appropriated to one 

 tree with a globular or conical head. 

 In addition to the foregoing advan- 

 tages, the trainer has all the oppor- 

 tunity that can be desired to renew 

 the bearing twigs, by cutting them 

 back. 



Fig. 62 represents a young tree 

 which is being trained with a fan- 

 shaped head. The dotted lines in- 

 dicate where the ends of the branch- 

 es should be cut back, when they 



grow tOO long and slender. Training a fan-shaped tree. 



Fig. 62. 



