THE GENESEE FARMER 



187 



mouths for the nourishment annually given them by 

 surface dressings and liquid manure." 



This course may not only be adopted with dwarf 

 fruit trees, but with standards also — the Apple, Cher- 

 Tj, Plum, Pear, Peach, &c., grown upon their respect- 

 ive stocks, not excepting the gooseberry and cui-rant, 

 where space is an object. 



CRITICAL REMARKS ON THE CULTIVA- 

 TION OF FRLIT TREES, AND POMO- 

 LOGICAL LITERATURE. 



More fruit trees are grown for commercial purposes 

 and private use in the neighborhood of Rochester, 

 than in the vicinity of New York, Boston, Philadel- 

 phia, or any other city in the Union, or in the world. 

 Having no interest in any of these extensive and 

 valuable nurseries, we are in a position to judge im- 

 partially of the merits and defects of each, and to 

 speak of them without the suspicion of any bias to 

 warp an honest judgment. It is not unreasonable to 

 assume that intelligent men, having a lai-ge amount of 

 capital invested in Tree-culture, would give the sub- 

 ject that degree of study, cai-e, and business attention, 

 which would render their long experience productive 

 of useful improvements. Such improvements, we feel 

 confident, are now in progress ; and for the benefit of 

 the whole community, we shall point them out so far 

 as we are able to discover them. 



It has long been the common error of nurserymen 

 to attempt to raise too many trees on an acre of 

 ground. Trees are sold by the hundred or thousand, 

 and numbers, therefore, are the measure of profit, 

 rather than the quality of the article. The rearing 

 of defective fruit trees in crowded nurseries, is still 

 further encouraged by the lack of general knowledge 

 of what a young tree ought to be for successful trans- 

 planting from a nursery into an orchard. Sometimes 

 a whole Apple or Peach orchard proves a failure, be- 

 cause the plants were burdened with immature wood, 

 had long flexible stems, like the little saplings that 

 grow up so densely in wind-falls, although while stand- 

 ing in straight rows in the nursery, nothing appeared 

 more promising of fruitfuluess. Had each plant been 

 allowed four times the ground, with its solar light and 

 heat, and a free circulation of air and wmd, in the 

 nursery ; and had its side leaves and small branches 

 been unpruned and left to elaborate food for the 

 growth of a large and solid stem instead of being 

 pinched oft' prematurely ; had the earth been proj^erly 

 cultivated around each isolated plant, instead of allow- 

 ing them to grow up like an Alder swamp, where one 

 may cut good fish-poles ; young fruit trees would be 

 so nursed as to make their transition from the nursery 

 to the orchard the gentlest thing imaginable. For 

 such a change of position, they ought to be duly 

 prepared ; and not only so, but so soundly grown 

 that the organization of both healthy wood and 

 healthy fruit may be reasonably expected in future 

 years. Of course, nurserymen are in no wise respon- 

 siljle for the bad treatment of trees after they are 

 taken out of their hands ; but before they leavt; tlieir 

 premises, thousands and millions, purchased at ])rices 

 that ought to supply trees of the very best quality, 

 have been so badly managed that constitutional 

 weakness and unfruitfulness are impressed on every 



cell and tissue bought to form a long-lived and valu- 

 able orchard. To develop fully and wisely the vital 

 powers of seedlings and buddings, is one of the high- 

 est attainments of pomological art, and physiological 

 science. All seeds are but a m-ass of cells, and en- 

 dowed with but a limited amount of vital force. 

 Buds have a similar structure, and may become, un- 

 der favorably circumstances, the parents of new gen- 

 erations. No physiologist has been able to distinguish 

 the vitality of a' seed from that of a bud ; while the 

 life in each may be shortened by bad treatment, or 

 prolonged by good treatment. To distinguish one 

 kind of treatment from another, and be able to say 

 with confidence and truth, that such and such treat- 

 ment is injurious, and tell why it is so, and such and 

 such treatment is beneficial, and tell why that is so, 

 implies more learning than most practical men have 

 found time to acquire. And yet, the experience, close 

 observation and extended researches of the last one 

 hundred years, have developed many facts, and a 

 pomological Hterature worthy of our best attention. 

 To collect, collate and scrutinize these facts, and prune 

 the over-luxuriance of this literature, is a labor that 

 we shall not shun. Our best books on pomology are 

 disfigured and rendered uninviting, by a barbarous 

 nomenclature, and an excess of such phrases as 

 "Crawford's Late Melocoton;" "Crawford's Early 

 Melocoton;" as though " Melocoton " expresses the 

 word peach better than to say Crawford's Early 

 Peach. If a man by the name of Crawford origi- 

 nated the fruit, it is proper to designate it by his 

 name ; but that done, why mystify the matter by sup- 

 pressing the word peach, and using "Melocoton" in 

 its place ? Grant that this specific name once desig- 

 nated a particular variety or kind of peach ; such 

 distinction by the lapse of time, by changes of soil, 

 climate, and perhaps the hybridization of Crawford 

 or others, is now effete, and valueless. By covering 

 up a mass of ignorance in the verbiage of needless 

 professional terms, pomologists injure nobody so much 

 as themselves, and their honorable and useful calling. 

 Students are required to master so many hard words 

 to understand a few hundred sorts of apples, peaches, 

 pears, plums, cherries, quinces, grapes, apricots, and 

 other fruits, that the principles of pomology are never 

 learned by one in a thousand. Those that overwhelm 

 you with a perfect deluge of pomological jargon, 

 learned by heart with great labor, are generally inno- 

 cent of any knowledge of the alphabet of vegetable 

 physiology. Big words that signify nothing have so 

 crammed their heads that there is really no room left 

 for a single scientific idea, or thought. A reform in 

 tills matter is the first step toward the substantial 

 advancement of fruit-culture in the United States. 

 The popular understanding demands more sound rear 

 soning and less ver1)iage, from professional pomolo- 

 gists. Sound principles are to be elucidated, incul- 

 cated in language not above the comprehension of 

 the millions engaged in farming and gardening. In- 

 struction is what they need, communicated not in 

 French, Latin, Spanish, Italian, German, or Creek; 

 nor in a bad compound of all these with the addition 

 of a little Enghsh. L. 



^»»-^ 



The currant and gooseberry came from Southern 

 Europe. 



