PRUNING SAW AND POLE SAW. 403 



PRUNING TREES. 



is very vigorous, the buds will break 

 strongly and run into wood too strong to 

 form blossom buds. The remedy in this 

 case is to break the young shoot near th? 

 third bud from the main branch, leaving 

 the broken part hanging down. The time 

 for this operation is about the middle of 

 March. The broken part, while it droops, 

 nevertheless draws up a portion of the 

 wood sap. The following winter, when 

 the buds are turned into blossom buds and 

 become fruitful, the hanging shoot should 

 be neatly pruned away, when a fruitful 

 bearing spur will be formed. But this 

 brings us to the consideration of pinching 

 and twisting shoots for the production of 

 fruit spurs, for which see Pinching, Ra- 

 tionale and Mode of. 



Pruning Saw and Pole Saw. 



Ordinary saws are constructed for cutting 

 dry wood, while the saws used in gardening 

 and forestry are used only for cutting green 

 wood. Thus, an ordinary saw, although 

 green wood may be, and frequently is, cut 

 with it, is liable to hang in the damp timber, 

 and get choked with the moist fragments 

 that are torn away by the action of the 

 teeth, because the blade is thinner and far 

 more flexible than that of the pruning saw, 

 while the teeth are not so widely set apart 

 as those of carpenters' saws. Sometimes 

 the pruning saw, especially when wanted 

 for the severance of small boughs only, is 

 in the form of a knife, the blade being made 

 to close up into the handle. They are 

 chiefly useful for sawing off boughs in 

 positions such that they cannot be con- 

 veniently operated upon by the pruning 

 knife or billhook. V/hen the saw is used, 

 it must be remerr bered that it is necessary 

 for the well-being of the tree to smooth 

 over the cut with a chisel or sharp instru- 

 ment. Pole saws are longer and wider in 

 the blade, and have the blade, as the name 

 implies, at the end of a pole or long handle, 



for the purpose of getting at boughs that 

 otherwise would be out of reach without a 

 ladder. Saws for green wood, it should be 

 added, when the bough to be cut is on a 

 level with the arm and hand of the operator, 

 j cut equally well whether pulled towards 

 him or thrust from him ; the teeth nib away 

 the fibres of the wood. The ordinary saw, 

 on the other hand, cuts only on the down- 

 ward stroke. Pruning saws cost 2s. and 

 2s. 6d. each. 



Pruning Shears. 



In ordinary shears (see Shears] the blades 

 move on a common centre, but in the prun- 



DIAGRAM SHOWING CONSTRUCTION OF 

 PRUNING SHEARS. 



ing shears, as in the Improved Sliding Prun- 

 ing Scissors shown in the accompanying 

 illustration, the broader and straighter lower 

 blade has a slot in it, through which a pin 

 is passed that is riveted to the upper blade, 

 the upper cutting part of which is curved. 

 When the bough is grasped by the shears 

 and the handles brought together, the upper 

 blade is thrown upward by the action of 

 the bar by which it is further attached to 

 the lower blade, and delivers a drawing cut 

 instead of a crushing cut, which has the 

 effect of leaving a clean, smooth surface 

 after the severance of the bough. Pruning 

 shears cost from 6s. to 8s. each. 



Pruning Trees. 



The principles of physiology, as relating 

 to trees generally, are applied to the 



