FARMERS' REGISTER— REARING FRUIT TREES. 



303 



tlie very crows themsoh'cs seemed to make a re- 

 cruit around the fatal place when they came in 

 vievv of tile tliickly sown burial ground on the 

 skirts ot" the deserted villajrc. 



THOUGHTS ON REARING FRUIT TREES. 



To the Editor of the FaniK rs' Kogister. 



Prince Edward Coiinly, July 9th, 1834. 



Much has been said and written, and a great 

 deal of useful knowledge has been presented relat- 

 ing to the best modes of rearing orchards; yet by 

 far the greater part of wliat I Iiave heard and read 

 upon the subject, has been but opinion bottomed 

 upon nothing better liian opinion, without any 

 certain knowledge, or known facts, to sustain those 

 opinions. The truth is, that orchards do well in 

 some soils and situations, under almost any course 

 of management, attended with the least care; 

 whilst witli like care and manac:ement, in other 

 soils and situations, they utterly fiul. Few persons 

 live long enough, and still fewer are suiTicientiy ob- 

 serving and attentive, to draw any just conclusions, 

 as to the best modes of rearing orcliards of any 

 kind of trees, which are long in coming to maturity, 

 being for the most part utterly ignorant which may 

 be the best, of any t^vo modes which have been 

 practised. Records have been still more rarely 

 kept, and seldom contained much useful infortna- 

 tion, yet they must be the main reliance, lor trans- 

 mitting any large iiortion of valuable knowledge to 

 posterity, upon all subjects which require many 

 years to bring them to maturit3^ 



It is now tolerably well understood, and believed 

 to be the fact, that the stock of fruit trees wears 

 out, and that they assume in early life, the decrep- 

 itude of old age, by being raised by grafting re- 

 peatedly from different sets of trees, raised the 

 first from a vigorous seedling stock, the next ti"om 

 a grafted tree, the third froin the second grafted 

 tree, and so on: and the ill effects are thought to 

 be greatly increased, by grafting from old bearing 

 trees; which if true, as I believe it is, threatensin 

 time to extinguish the different races of our best 

 fruits. Is there any remedy known for this evil? 

 I propose an alleviation: perhaps it may prove to 

 be a remedy. Graft always with water sprouts or 

 suckers, and never use limbs from the bearing part 

 of the tree for grafting, nor any limbs that would 

 probably blossom or bear fruit the same year they 

 are grafted, if they had been lefl: to grow on the 

 parent tree. Trees raised by grafting with water 

 sprouts, it is well known are more thrifty, than 

 those raised by s:raf\ing with the bearing twigs: 

 and equally well known, that the water sprouts re- 

 quire much longer time to arrive at the bearing 

 state; from which it may bepresunT^d they will be 

 longer lived. To tliose who can afford the means. 

 I propose what will perpetuate the same, or in all 

 reasonable probability full as good stocks of apples 

 and pears, and more certainly of all stone fruits. 

 Plant seed of the most choice kmds in drills, say 

 six feet apart; let the trees stand 18 inches apart 

 along the drills, which will give 4840 trees to the 

 acre. At this distance they may be forced to bear 

 fruit in four or five years, wlien with good land 

 and tillage, they will probably be an inch tlrick 

 four feet from the ground — when, as soon as vege- 

 tation begins in the spring, cut round the bark of 

 the trees, quite down to the wood, in two rings, 

 rather less than a quarter of an inch apart, and 



talce out the belt of bark entirely to the wood. 

 Those narrow belts will commonly heal over be- 

 fore winter, and next year the trees will bear fruit, 

 when all the worthless kinds may be destroyed, 

 and the good may be preserved. If the good 

 should not stand in such regular order as would 

 be desirable for an orchard, twigs might be grafted 

 from the best kinds in regular order, as there would 

 be certainly a great abundance of stocks for the 

 purpose. If only one tree in 100 should be of the 

 same, or as good a kind as the seed sown, it would 

 give 48 good kind of trees to the acre, which 

 would be more than enough to raise to full growth 

 in an orchard. It is doubtless known to many of 

 your readers, that the discovery of forcing young 

 trees prematurely to bear fruit, is not nev/, but has 

 been published a considerable time. Its only use 

 to which I have applied it, is in forcing young 

 seedling and other unknown kinds of trees to bear 

 fruit early, that I maj^ not be at the trouble and 

 expense of raising Avorthless trees to full gro^vth 

 for bearing before I know what kind of fruit they 

 will bear — and that I may commence the rearing 

 of good kmds at the earliest periods. If the belt- 

 ing at the height of foiu" feet should cause the top 

 of the tree to assume the appearance of age and 

 decrepitude, it may be cut oft at the belt, and suf- 

 fered to form its top from limbs coming out below 

 the belt. Trees of sufficient size and height, 

 might be belted as high from the ground as might 

 be desirable to top them, if tour feet should be 

 thought too low. 



I can say little on the subject of prur.ing. I 

 have found it sometimes of infinite service. No 

 stout limb should ever be cut off near to the body 

 of a tree, nor near to the trunk of a large limb, as 

 decay immediately commences, and the trunk or 

 body becomes doated, rotten, or hollow. If it 

 should ever be found necessary to prune off stout 

 limbs, let them be cut ofl'smooth, at such distance 

 from the trunk or body, that the stumps may not 

 die down to the main limbor body of the tree. This 

 will however be productive of considerable trouble, 

 as the stumps of limbs almost invariably send out 

 many sprouts, which it will be proper to keep 

 pruned off. 



It seems to me certain, that the best season for 

 pruning, is firom the time vegetation becomes ac- 

 tive in the spring, till the descent of the sap; say 

 from the first of April till the first of July. AVounds 

 inflicted on trees at this season, commence imme- 

 diately the process of healing, the wood appearing 

 predisposed to re ain life and soundness, up to the 

 wound; whilst late in the fall and winter, wounds 

 inflicted, become dead and dry to a very consider- 

 able depth, and and p-robablyincipient putrefaction 

 commences, before the process of healing begins. 

 It may possibly be as well to prune later in the 

 summer than the first of July; but lam inclined 

 to the opinion that it is not. Praning can be more 

 conveniently done in winter. — Cuts or wounds in 

 the sides of trees or limbs, having any considera- 

 ble extent of branches above the wounds, heal 

 more rapidly late in summer and in autumn than 

 in spring; the case is different where the branch is 

 severed entirely from the tree, which being done 

 in the season of active ascending vegetation, will 

 very soon shoAV a ring of tender new bark, form- 

 ing round the upper end of the limb where it is 

 cut off, attempting to close in the wound. 



I have seen most beneficial eflects from wash- 



