j 9 8 THE FJRCIT GROWER'S 



suffice for u crop in apples and pears, the spurs being 4 to 6 inches apart. Other kinds 

 of fruit needing thinning will be treated under their special heads. The finer the fruits 

 are wanted, the greater must be the distance between them. The crops must also be 

 apportioned relatively to the vigour of the trees. Weakly trees must have the fruit 

 much thinner than vigorous ones, and weak branches should not be allowed to carry 

 so many fruits as those which are robust. By apportioning the fruit in the manner 

 indicated, weakly trees and parts are invigorated, whilst those trees or parts verging 

 on grossness have their luxuriance subdued and their fruitfulness increased. 



Several fruits in a truss of apple, cherry, pear, plum, or strawberry may collectively 

 outweigh one or two ; an apricot, nectarine, or peach branch loaded with fruit may bring 

 down the balance on the opposite side of the beam where is placed a properly-thinned 

 branch ; and a cluster of wedged grapes may be heavier than a similar-sized bunch with 

 less than half the number of berries, but the latter will be fourfold greater in value. Six 

 Ecklinville apples weighing a pound are not so valuable as two of that weight. Severe 

 thinning, however, except for a special object, is not advised, but a judicious removal 

 of small and ill-shaped productions, in view of securing full-sized, highly-coloured, repre- 

 sentative fruits. 



Trees that produce a fair burden of fruit do so the most constantly and continuously, 

 but overcropping exhausts the trees, the fruit being indifferent in size, quality and value, 

 whilst blossom buds cannot develop concurrently, and therefore the trees are barren the 

 following season. This is the explanation of many trees bearing only " every other 

 year." 



The production of many fruits means a proportional increase of stones and seeds. 

 These exhaust the trees and impoverish the soil much more than an increase of flesh 

 does. The flesh of three fruits embodied in one increases its usefulness and value with 

 benefit to the tree, because there are obviously less seeds in one than in three fruits. A 

 heavily-laden tree, having its fruits thinned to the extent of a third in number, benefits to 

 that extent ; reduced half, it doubly profits, and the crops are similarly increased in value. 



A bushel of fruit, in five or six dozen select examples, is worth thrice as much as a 

 bushel containing fifteen or eighteen dozen small fruits of the same variety ; yet this 

 comparatively worthless trash abstracts the most phosphoric acid, potash, lime, magnesia, 

 and other mineral constituents from the soil, to be wasted on stones, or rind, core, and 

 seeds, at the expense of flesh, and thus the dietetic and hygienic values of the fruit are 

 reduced to a minimum. It thus becomes apparent that it costs less to grow a bushel of 



