206 



On Grafting. 



Vol. VIII. 



but intends making the experiment the en- 

 suing season on a small scale, and desires 

 nothing more than that his plan may pass 

 for what it may be thought to be worth. 

 The following is the plan proposed : — 

 Measure oft' from your corn-stalk field as 

 much land as you desire to plant with pota- 

 toes ; then haul on the manure, giving it a 

 very liberal coat of the best you can obtain; 

 spread it carefully, then sow it with plaster, 

 at the rate of three or four bushels to the 

 acre; prepare your seed, and as the mode 

 now is to plough around the field ; as you do 

 this tor oats, drop the potatoes one foot apart 

 in every furrow ; and as the furrows are 

 generally about a foot wide, you will then 

 have a cutting on every square foot of 

 ground, and admitting tlie plants would 

 yield an average of two ordinary sized po- 

 tatoes each — it has been ascertained that 

 280 middle sized potatoes make a bushel — 

 then as there are 43,560 square feet in an 

 acre of land ; and calculating 280 potatoes 

 to the bushel, we have a yield of 311 bush- 

 els to the acre, wliich being sold at one- 

 third of a dollar per bushel, would amount 

 to over a hundred dollars ; and they ot^en 

 sell much higher. All the labour you have 

 after they are planted, is to harrow the 

 ground about the time of their coming up; 

 the tops will so effectually cover the ground 

 as to prevent the weeds from materially in- 

 juring them ; being planted eai-ly, they will 

 be ready to harvest by the time you plough 

 your oat-stubble for wheat, they can then 

 be turned out with the plough and grappled 

 with the fork in the usual way. 



A Farmer. 



Chester county, Fourtli mo. 1st, 1843. 



On Grafting. 



Grafting is a very ancient custom, as we 

 read of it in very early writings. It is more 

 than probable that it was first practised in 

 the cultivation of fruit trees, to perpetuate 

 a favourite kind, which could not be proi)a- 

 gated with certainty by sowing the seed. 

 All the wild originals of our garden and or- 

 chard fruits have been, by accident or con- 

 tinued culture, changed from comparative 

 worthlessness to valuable products, in size 

 as well as in quality. In the accomplish- 

 ment of these results, the art of grafting 

 has been mainly instrumental ; for by trans- 

 ferring a shoot of an improved variety to the 

 young stem of a kindred seedling, the true 

 kind was thereby obtained, and in any de- 

 sired number. 



The advantages of grafting are manifest, 

 and its effects upon the constitutional habit 

 of both graft and stock are various, and form 



a valuable portion of the cultivator's know- 

 ledge. It is a subject well worth inquiring 

 into, as it may lead to a right understanding 

 of the operation itself, as well as to the at- 

 tainment of those advantages which may be 

 derived from a proper choice of the graft 

 and stock. 



We may first premise, that experience 

 has taught us that perfect union by grafting, 

 can only take place between congenial na- 

 tures. Two individuals of the same genus 

 of plants, and in some instances two indi- 

 viduals of the same natural order, which the 

 improved science of botany hath associated, 

 will unite by grafl;ing, and become one tree. 

 We may next premise, that almost all plants, 

 and certainly all fruit trees, have to pass 

 through a season or stage of adolescence, 

 during which they are naturally barren. If 

 a cultivator intend to raise a fruit tree from 

 seed, he must wait with patience until the 

 stripling arrives at a mature age, before he 

 can expect it to bear fruit. In this case, 

 the advantage of grafting a mature part of 

 the head of an old tree upon the vigorous 

 stem of a yor.ng one, is very obvious ; be- 

 cause its period of youth is much curtailed, 

 or wholly disappears, as grafts have been 

 known to bear fruit in the first year. This, 

 however, but seldom happens, nor indeed is 

 it to be wished, as no fruit tree should be 

 allowed to bear before it has acquired a rea- 

 sonable size of head. 



Besides the advantage of transferring aged 

 and mature wood to young stocks, the ope- 

 ration has another effect, which is equally 

 serviceable to the cultivator, and that is, its 

 tendency to check luxuriant growth — a cir- 

 cumstance which renders the grafted tree 

 at once more dwarfish, and more fruitful ; 

 and, as these circumstances are usually con- 

 sequences of each other, it is an improve- 

 ment clearly attributable to the operation of 

 grafting. 



The practicability of grafting, as well as 

 budding, depends on the readiness with 

 which the elements of the scion and stock 

 unite; the living members of both, being 

 placed in close contact at flie season when 

 both have begun, or are about to begin, to 

 swell under the flowing sap, instantly co- 

 alesce. If the scion and stock be nearly of 

 a size, the junction becomes so complete, 

 that in a few years it is scarcely discernible, 

 more especially if both are equal in habit of 

 growth or membranous structure; but if one 

 be of a grosser habit and ranker growth than 

 the other, they increase in diameter un- 

 equally. If an apple scion be grafted on a 

 white thorn, or a pear on a quince stock, 

 the grafts in both cases are engrossed much 

 faster than the dwarfer-growing stocks; of 



