242 PRUNING. 



its leading top, and strives to regain it, assistance 

 should be given, either by means of the knife, saw, or 

 priming-chisel, to enable it to do so. 



The pruning-chisel is the best instrument for this 

 purpose, as the top, where the operation is to take 

 place, is too slender to carry even a light boy, so that 

 long- and short-handled chisels are the best instruments 

 to use for the work, and by them much good can be 

 accomplished. 



3. Where the branches have become dead and 

 withered, which the lower ones of conifers always do, 

 except in the case of single trees standing openly, 

 such branches should always be cut off close to the 

 stem of the tree as soon as vitality has ceased, which 

 is best done by means of a small-toothed sharp hand- 

 saw. If the branches are allowed to remain upon the 

 tree after becoming withered, they get embedded in the 

 wood, and remain attached to it sometimes over seventy 

 years, producing all the while what ultimately forms 

 the lamented black knots, which is one of the greatest 

 detriments to wood, especially when cut into boards 

 or small scantlings. 



The cutting off of withered branches, no doubt, pro- 

 duces a partial evil, by leaving a discoloured streak in 

 the wood, but the evil thus inflicted is infinitely 

 smaller than that produced by allowing the dead 

 branches to remain on. 



4. There is another species of pruning termed dis- 

 budding, which is generally practised upon compara- 

 tively young plants, and is at times useful in directing 

 a leading shoot, or retarding the growth of an ambitious 

 one, or side branch. This practice consists in simply 

 pinching out the large central bud at the point of the 

 shoot, and is best performed in autumn or winter. 



