JAN.] 



THE FRUIT GARDEN. 



45 



prevail. As to pruning and planting the various kinds, when not 

 done in October or November, it will be better to defer this business 

 till the latter end of February, or beginning of March; except in 

 such of the States as the severity of the frost does not interrupt the 

 tillage of the ground during winter ; in which you can perform this 

 business now with safety, agreeably to the directions given in Oc- 

 tober. 



PRUNING THE RASPBERRY. *'*?' 



The accompanying figures represent the wood of the preceding 

 summer's growth. 



The portion with buds, marked a a, is from the upper part of 

 the shoot; that with buds, 



marked b b, is taken from Fig. 7. 



the lower part of the shoot 

 or cane. The buds a a, 

 can scarcely be termed 

 blossom-buds, inasmuch as 

 they do not contain the 

 rudiments of flowers like 

 the blossom-buds of larger 

 fruit ; but each of them 

 possesses the power of pro- 

 ducing a branchlet, and on 

 this blossom-buds are form- 

 ed. The buds b b, on the 

 lower part of the cane, do 

 not generally push unless 

 the upper have been cut 

 away, and then the lower 

 are stimulated, producing, 

 however, shoots and fruit 

 later in the season than 

 those obtained from the 

 buds a a. Advantage has 

 been sometimes taken of 

 this, to procure a succes- 

 sion of fruit in autumn. 

 Raspberry shoots, or canes, 

 growing up in one summer, 

 and producing fruit in the 

 next, and then dying to the 

 ground, a succession hav- 

 ing, meantime, sprung up, 



the pruning usually consists in the obvious operation of cutting 

 away all the dead wood that which has borne fruit; and, in the 

 shortening that which is alive, thinning the canes so as to leave 

 three, four, five, or six, from a plant, according to its strength. 



An improvement may, however, be effected on this general mode. 

 As the finest and best of these fruits are, in all cases, the produce of 



