THE PEAR TREE ] 193 



are taken up again, grafted with one scion, and planted 

 apart at proper distances in the nursery to complete 

 their development. Well-rooted suckers if strong enough 

 may be dealt with in the same way. The system of 

 transplanting the pear or the quince, or indeed any other 

 rosaceous deciduous fruit tree, including the apple, the 

 peach, the nectarine, the apricot etc. in October or early 

 in November, has the advantage that the root system 

 starts growing at once and becomes partly established 

 before its activity is definitely stopped by the cold of 

 winter ; but the gardener when transplanting young 

 trees still in leaf should be careful to strip them of 

 their leaves, leaving only the terminal leaf of each 

 branch or twig in order to prevent the buds from pushing 

 out or moving, along with the movement of the roots. 



All varieties of pears will do well on "own roots," 

 that is grafted or budded on pear seddlings. Their 

 growth is vigorous, and attain a large size, but they 

 take a long time to come to fruit, and generally 

 when they commence bearing, the first fruits are of 

 inferior quality, although later on when the tree has 

 nearly reached adult size and has lost the original 

 vigour of the first years, the fruit improves in quality, 

 and as a rule enormous crops are produced every year. 

 On stiff clayey soils and on deep red soils which are 

 highly charged with clay and are therefore of a retentive 

 nature, pear trees grown on own roots will do much 

 better than those on quince stock, and will give better 

 results as regards longevity and productiveness, and 

 are also less affected by the wood borers. For shallow 

 and light red soils, resting on an open and porous 

 subsoil in warm localities, the pear grown on quince 

 stock is more suitable, as the pear grown on own 

 roots will disagree with such soils and if it survives 

 at all, is sure to become stunted and unproductive. 

 On these soils the quince stock, also, thrives better and 

 produces stronger and finer trees than on clayey soils. 



