CHAPTER V. 



Root Pruning How Demonstrated at Washington. 



A SYSTEM .OF TREATMENT AT TRANSPLANTING WHICH 

 DISPROVES OLD THEORIES. 



BY THOS. L. BRUNK, 



Former Professor of Botany and Horticulture, Maryland Agricultural College 

 and Experiment Station, Mayfair, Cook County, 111. 



IT has long been the belief that in removing a tree from 

 the nursery, the ideal operation would be to save every 

 root and rootlet intact, that the shock of transplanting 

 may be reduced to the minimum. Downing states: "A 

 transplanter should never forget that it is by the delicate and 

 tender points or extremities of the root that trees take up 

 their food, and that the chance of complete success is les- 

 sened by every one of these points that is bruised and de- 

 stroyed. If we could remove trees with every fiber entire, as 

 we do a plant in a pot, they would scarcely show any sign of 

 their change of position. In most cases, especially in that 

 of trees taken from nurseries, this is, by the operation of 

 removal, nearly impossible. But, although we may not 

 hope to get every root entire, we may, with proper care, pre- 

 serve by far the larger portion of them, and more particu- 

 larly the small and delicate fibers." 



Thomas says : "If a tree could be removed with all its 

 roots, including the numerous thread-like radicals and all the 

 spongelets, and placed compactly in the soil, precisely as it 

 stood before, it would surfer no check in growth. The nearer 

 we can approach this condition, therefore, the greater will be 

 our success." American Fruit Culturist, p. 59. 



Numerous citations could be made similar to the above ; 

 in fact, I do not find that any of our highest authorities vary 

 from the ideas expressed in them. They all advocate trans- 



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