84 THE NEW HORTICULTURE. 



account for the early decadence of our latter-day orchards ? 

 The planter, in his haste for fruit, demands big trees, with 

 plenty of roots and top, to support which, and to make them 

 live, the nurseryman often transplants several times. This 

 gives a mass of fibrous roots, which will undoubtedly, if the 

 season is good, make the trees live, but practically dwarfs 

 them and destroys their future usefulness. While Samson 

 lost his strength by cutting off his hair, a tree is forever 

 weakened by leaving its "hair" roots on when set, for it 

 seems then compelled to re-establish itself by emitting new 

 fibrous roots entirely from these. This results in a perma- 

 nently lateral and surface system. Sink a spade around such 

 a tree a year, or even two, after planting, and a slight pull 

 will lift it from the ground, but a short root-pruned tree will 

 resist any effort. The whole theory of the latter method is 

 simply copying nature. She starts her trees from seed with 

 neither tops or roots, and universal experience has shown 

 that these, and trees grown from cuttings (which are prac- 

 tically seed), if never moved, are the strongest, healthiest, 

 longest-lived and most productive. The advantages I claim 

 for this method over the all-important one of giving far 

 better trees are : 



1. An enormous saving to the nurseryman in digging 

 his stock, which now must be taken up with roots a foot or 

 more long. 



2. An equally great saving in packing. Instead of 

 great bales of tops, roots, moss, bagging and rope, and the 

 labor of putting up the same, or large boxes containing thou- 

 sands of pounds of the same useless dead weight, a thousand 

 root- and top-pruned trees could be packed in a medium-sized 

 tight box, with a layer of wet moss in the bottom to main- 

 tain a moist atmosphere, and shipped with perfect safety 

 around the world. 



3. The saving to the buyer will be even greater. As 

 an instance, several years ago I ordered five thousand grape 

 vines from California, and wrote specific directions for root 

 and top-pruning, as well as packing, and offered to pay for 

 the extra pruning, the box to be sent by express. The nur- 



