40 Oil forcing Cherries. 



pillar, or some black fly, makes its appearance : these are some- 

 times scarcely to be met with in the daytime ; but, on going into 

 the house at night, the caterpillar will be found crawling on the 

 leaves and eating them. Fumigation with tobacco, and hand- 

 picking, are the only remedies for these insects. Ants sometimes 

 make their appearance when the trees are in blossom ; and, 

 though they are not so injurious to the cherry as they are to 

 the peach, yet still they ought to be destroyed by pouring 

 tobacco-water into their nests. Till the ants' nests are destroyed, 

 the insects may be prevented from getting at the blossoms by 

 tying pieces of paper round the stems of the trees, and coating 

 them over with a mixture of tar and grease : the paper should 

 be of a coarse spongy kind, so as to absorb the tar and prevent 

 it from running down the bark of the stem when the tempera- 

 ture of the house is high ; or yarn may be used instead of paper. 

 In either case, as soon as the tar becomes hard, the ants will 

 walk over it, and, in that case, it must be renewed. When the 

 trees are in blossom, it will facilitate the setting of the fruit if 

 bees can be introduced ; which may easily be done, by setting in 

 a hive, or, what is preferable, by fixing a hive immediately in 

 front of the lower part of one of the front sashes, and so as to 

 touch it, and having an entrance for the bees at the back of the 

 hive, as well as the usual one in front of it. Corresponding 

 with this back entrance, a small hole may be cut in the bottom 

 rail of the sash, and a stopper, or slide, fitted to it, through 

 which the bees may be admitted to the cherry-house at pleasure. 

 When the fruit is fairly set, it should be thinned out with the 

 grape-scissors; removing from one fourth to one third of the 

 cherries, according to the vigour of the tree, and the number of 

 fruit it has set. When once the fruit is set, it is not liable to be 

 injured by cold, as in the case of peaches and grapes: on the 

 contrary, I have turned cherr}' trees in pots out into the open 

 garden, by M'ay of experiment, after the fruit was set; and the 

 frosts which damaged the leaves had no effect at all upon the 

 fruit, except to retard its growth. After the fruit had begun to 

 stone (which is generally about a fortnight after it is set), the 

 trees should be watered freely at the roots; but in eight or ten 

 days, when the kernel begins to harden, the quantity of water 

 may be diminished. The temperature of the house, except in 

 sunshine, should never exceed 60°, either by night or by day, 

 from blossoming up to the time of stoning ; but in three weeks 

 after setting, when the stoning will generally be found com- 

 pleted;, and the pulp of the fruit beginning to assume a pale red, 

 the temperature may be raised to 70° at night, and even to 70° 

 or 80° in the day during sunshine, and when abundance of air 

 is given. After the fruit is ripe, water should be withheld till 

 it is gathered. 



