2820 



PRUNING 



PRUNING 



shrubs that may be pruned after flowering (while in 

 leaf), are deutzias, diervillas or weigelas, forsythias, 

 lilacs, flowering almond, wistaria, exochorda, and many 

 spireas and viburnums. It may be advisable, however, 

 to prune such plants in winter for the purpose of 

 thinning them, thereby allowing the flower-buds that 



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3205. Pear trees trained on a wall. When once the wall is 

 covered, the tree is never allowed to increase in surface area. It is 

 cut back to spurs each year, much as grape-vines may be treated. 



remain to produce larger bloom. In most ornamental 

 plants, however, it is the number of flowers rather than 

 the size of each which is desired. 



Plants that bloom late in the season, as hydrangea 

 and most species of clematis, make their flower-buds 

 on shoots which arise that very season. With such 

 plants, it is well to prune rather heavily while they are 

 dormant in order to cause them to throw up a profusion 

 of strong shoots in the spring. These shoots will bear 

 that summer. Among the summer-flowering shrubs that 

 may best be pruned when dormant, are hydrangeas, 

 althea or hibiscus, ligustrums, trumpet creeper, 

 ceanothus, potentillas, vitex, symphoncarpos, ana 

 many kinds of clematis, lonicera, jasminum, and some 

 spireas. 



Pruning to make the plant assume some definite form 

 is essentially a method of shearing or heading-in. If 

 it is desired to have a very regular and definite shape, it 

 is well to shear the plant at least two or three times a 

 year in order to keep down the exuberant growths. It 

 is a common practice to shear the plants only in the 

 winter, but if this shearing is somewhat violent, as is 

 usually the case, the plant throws up numerous strong 

 shoots very early in spring and it remains shapeless 

 during a large part of the growing season. Except in 

 very special cases and for formal landscape work, it is 

 much better to let shrubs and trees assume their 

 natural and characteristic forms: these forms, in fact, 

 constitute the beauty of the species. 



Training. 



There is relatively little careful training of plants in 

 North America, largely because of the expense of the 

 skilled labor necessary to perform it. Land is also 

 relatively cheap, and room can be given for the natural 

 development of most plants. In many parts of the 

 Old World, fruit-plants must be grown in very small 

 areas, and it may be necessary to train them on walls, 

 sides of buildings, or on trellises of various kinds. 

 Trained fruit-trees may generally be referred to one of 

 three categories: the wall tree, which is trained against 

 a continuous surface; the espalier, which is trained on a 

 trellis, the branches starting at nearly right angles 

 from a central shaft; the cordon, or training to a single 

 or double strand near the ground. Properly, an espalier 



is a trellis (page 1146), but the word is commonly used 

 for the plant that is trained on the trellis. There are 

 many variations in the methods of training and pruning 

 in each of these three classes, and the methods are such 

 as can scarcely be well elucidated in writing. The Old- 

 W T orld literature is replete with instructions. In recent 

 American literature, the fullest account is to be found 

 in "The Pruning-Manual." In order that trees may be 

 well trained on walls, espaliers, and cordons, it is neces- 

 sary that the training be begun in the nursery. The 

 Old-World nurseries grow plants that are trained for 

 various uses, but the American nurseries do not. If, 

 therefore, the American is to train trees in any of these 

 formal shapes, he should secure specimens that are not 

 more than one year from the bud or graft, and begin 

 the training himself. The illustrations (Figs. 3204-3206) 

 suggest some of the special methods of training fruit- 

 trees. On such trees, if skilfully trained and carried 

 out in patient detail, the best excellence in individual 

 fruits may be attained. 



Pruning after frost-injury. 



When woody plants have been much injured by 

 freezing, it is the best practice to remove all dead parts 

 as soon as the line of demarcation is evident. 



The kind of corrective pruning to be employed when 

 trees have been much shattered by winter cold is a 

 subject that needs further investigation. It is not a 

 single or a simple problem, as much depends on the 

 previous state of the trees and on other conditions. 

 Speaking of peach trees, Chandler writes (Research 

 Bulletin No. 8, Missouri Experiment Station): "Prun- 

 ing the trees severely following a winter when the wood 

 has been killed, although apparently in the best con- 

 dition of maturity, seems to reduce the amount of 

 killing. However, such pruning following winters when 

 the wood has been killed on account of its not having 

 reached the proper condition of maturity in the fall, 

 generally due to the presence of wet weather following 

 a drought the season before, is liable to result in greater 

 loss than if no pruning were done." 



On the proper practice to pursue in the case of frozen 

 citrous trees, T. F. Hunt issued the following advice 



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3206. Apple tree trained on an espalier. 



