The Planting of the Fruit-Farm 97 



back the vine; restrain its growth; force it to 

 fruit instead of to foliage and you have many large, 

 compact bunches of superior fruit. The practical 

 problem is to concentrate the vitality of the vine 

 [into fruit. But this is also the constant problem 

 in the orchard; it is the basis of the art of fruit- 

 growing. 



The first explorers of the Lake Shore Valley, 

 La Salle, La Hontan, Charlevoix, two hundred and 

 I fifty years ago, took note of the abundance of the 

 wild grapevines, along the shore of Lake Erie, run- 

 ning to the tallest tree-tops and hung with many 

 clusters. The progeny of those vines is vigorous 

 in the Valley to this day, — creeping over the rocky 

 bluffs of the lake, and hiding the lofty cuts and 

 chasms, — ^locally known as ^'Hogs' Backs," — 

 made by the sixteen streams, — of which La Salle 

 makes mention, in the sixteen gulches which 

 traverse the ancient Devonian hills walling in the 

 Valley along the south. The wild grapevine will 

 live anywhere in America except in the arid wastes, 

 — ^the "Great American Desert*' mapped out 

 in the school-books of our childhood, but which 

 has vanished with the "West.** It yields to 

 cultivation, like other fruit stock from the wild, 

 and prospers best in deep, rich, well-drained soil. 

 The vine grows in two sections, — one below, one 

 above ground, their surface exposure in earth and 

 air quite equal. Trimming the upper vine concen- 

 trates vitality in the roots and upon the fruit-buds. 

 Every vine, capable of fruiting, buds to reproduce 



