32 GARDENING 



drained. Brickbats strewed over the bottom and 

 then covered with cinders and some decayed leaves, 

 is one of the best ways for preparing the soil. 



They require top dressing every year, in May. 

 The blossoms require protection early in the spring, 

 and disbudding, which is best performed gradually, 

 and which is done by using a sharp, small-bladed 

 knife, and cutting off all shoots which tend back- 

 wards and forwards, taking care not to go too near 

 the tree so as to injure it. Disbudding should be 

 completed a little before midsummer ; but I advise 

 all amateurs to have a skilful gardener to come and 

 do the disbudding, which will answer as a lesson for 

 the future. 



Pruning will have to be done in the autumn. 

 Thinning the fruit is very necessary, and must be 

 done at several times, and most carefully, so as not 

 to disturb the fruits. The first thinning should be 

 done when the peach is about the size of a cob-nut, 

 the second thinning when the size of a walnut, and 

 the last as soon as the stone is hard. 



It is best, of course, to have a skilful gardener 

 to prune peach and nectarine trees ; but if an 

 amateur wishes to prune, it should not be done 

 before the bloom-buds are distinguishable, as, before 

 that, there is a risk of shortening back the branches 

 to a bloom-bud, which causes the destruction of 

 that particular shoot. In pruning back young 

 shoots, it is necessary to cut back to a wood-bud 

 to preserve it ; and if a wood-bud cannot be found, 

 any other point than at the end. It should be left its 

 whole length. A wood-bud from a blossom-bud is 

 known by the latter being long and pointed, the 

 former nearly round. 



The chief point in successful peach culture is to 



