LUTHER BURBANK 
branches start only eighteen inches or two feet 
from the ground. 
Where formerly high ladders were required to 
pluck the fruit, a modern orchardist, for a good 
many years after his trees are in bearing, can stand 
on the ground and reach the main bulk of the 
fruit; and even that which falls is not mutilated 
and bruised as it used to be. Also the trees are 
much less apt to be broken or blown over by the 
wind. 
And in this I am not referring to such “freak” 
trees as, for example, my little bush-like quinces, 
scarcely waist high yet almost breaking under 
the weight of mammoth fruits. I am speaking of 
the commercial orchard, and have in mind in par- 
ticular the apple tree, because it is with regard to 
this tree that the most conspicuous transforma- 
tion has been effected. Plum trees and peach trees 
were never very large, but it used to be taken for 
granted that the apple tree should be of gigantic 
proporticns; so the half dwarf trees on which the 
best apples of today are grown might seem to the 
casual observer to belong to a different family of 
plants from their progenitors. 
GAUGING YouR CLIMATE 
As to other desirable qualities, much depends 
upon the location of the orchard and the market 
that the orchardist has in view. 
[56] 
