72 CULTURE AND MANAGEMENT 



HEADING DOWN OLD DECAYED APPLE TREES. 



According to Mr. Forsyth, when the tops of the 

 branches of apple trees begin to die from old age or 

 other cause, they ought immediately to be regenerat- 

 ed by giving them a new top. This is done by cut- 

 ting off a few feet of their extremities over the whole 

 tree, so as to leave it in a proper form. If the trunk 

 is yet tolerably sound, the new branches will grow 

 thriftily, and bear luxuriantly ; and if you wish to 

 vary your fruit, the sprouts, after one year's growth, 

 and most frequently the same year, will be fit for in- 

 oculating, which succeeds equally well in the old as in 

 the young trees, In heading down old decayed ap- 

 ple trees for the sake of symmetry, it will be necessa- 

 ry to cut at the forked branches as near as can be to 

 the upper side of the fork, cutting them in a sloping 

 manner to carry off the wet, and at the same time 

 rounding the edges ; and if any of the branches should 

 have the canker, all ^the infected parts must be cut 

 out. The composition must be immediately applied, 

 to prevent the bun and air from injuring the naked 

 inner bark. This operation should be performed in 

 April or May, and, in the course of the summer, long 

 thrifty roots should be thrown out; these should not 

 be shortened the first year, but in the following spring 

 they may be cut to six or eight inches long, according 

 to their strength. In the next spring, after the first 

 branches are headed, the remaining old branches may 

 be cut out, and these will soon fill the head of the 

 tree with fine bearing wood. In three years, if prop- 

 erly managed, trees so headed will produce more and 

 finer fruit than a maiden tree that has been planted 

 upwards of twenty years. The method above detail- 

 ed should be adopted with some caution, for it has 

 been found, that trees will not survive the loss of all 

 their branches, if lopped off in one season ; it is pref- 



