OP FRUIT TREES, 49 



advantages of thin planting are said to be : 1. The 

 sun refreshes every tree, the roots, body, and bran- 

 ches, with the blossoms and fruit, whereby the trees 

 are morn productive, and the fruit larger, fairer and 

 better flavoured. 2. The trees grow larger, and 

 are more healthy and durable, 3. When trees are 

 planted too near, the lower branches are smother- 

 ed for want of sun and air, the fruit is never well 

 flavoured, and always small. The object is fruit, 

 and we are not to expect that the quantity will be 

 in proportion to the number of trees in an orchard, 

 for a few trees of a large size will produce more 

 and better fruit, than six or eight times the number 

 of those which grow near and crowd one another. 

 Again, apples are not to be estimated according to 

 their number only, but their size and weight, as well 

 as their superiour flavour, Another advantage is 

 the profit of cultivating the ground tinder and about 

 the trees. The intervening spaces may be culti- 

 vated with various vegetables, or if preferred, they 

 may be filled with some temporary trees of small 

 growth, as dwarfs, which may be removed when 

 the principal standards have attained to a large 

 size. Many apple trees have borne fruit for more 

 than a century ; and when trees show signs of decay 

 at the age of thirty or forty years, it is in general 

 to be attributed to mismanagement, and probably 

 to close planting, Every cultivator must have ex- 

 perienced the great inconvenience occasioned by 

 narrow and crowded intervals. When apple trees 

 stand at the distance of twenty-five or thirty feet 

 only, their horizontal branches will, as we frequent- 

 ly see, in fifteen or twenty years interlope each 

 other, and almost entirely obstruct the intervals be- 

 tween them. Taking into view, therefore, the fore- 

 going particulars, the cultivator, in planting a young 

 orchard, will determine for himself the most con- 

 venient and suitable width of the intervals between 

 his trees. The most generally approved distance 

 7 



