56 EPICORMIC BRANCHES, STOOL-SHOOTS, SUCKERS [CH. 



some cases even to the regular alternations of nodes and 

 internodes on the twigs and branches. 



When an old tree is suddenly exposed to freer access 

 of light and air, by the felling of its hitherto closely 

 crowding neighbouring trees ; or when such a tree 

 suffers severe pruning by the knife, or by the loss of a 

 large limb by breakage under the leverage of w-ind 

 or the weight of snow, it is a common result that the old 

 trunk rapidly puts out innumerable shoots — " Epicormic 

 branches " — which push their way apparently through 

 crevices in the bark. The question is, whence arise these 

 shoots, or the buds from which they spring ? 



Before answering this question, we may put another case. 



It frequently happens that when an old tree is felled, 

 or when the wheel of a heavily laden cart severely abrades 

 the base of the trunk of a vigorous standing tree, multi- 

 tudes of buds, followed by the outgrowth of crowded 

 shoots — " Stool-shoots " — make their appearance from the 

 cut or injured tissues in close proximity to the wood. 



And yet a further case. 



Every grower of fruit trees and roses knows that many 

 old trees of such species as Plums, Pears, &c., or of Roses 

 budded on briar stocks, are apt to send up vertical shoots 

 — " Suckers " — from the soil around, at such a distance 

 from the stem that he has no escape from the conclusion 

 that they have sprung from the roots radiating into the 

 area round the tree. In many trees — e.g. the Robinia, 

 White Poplar, &c. — such " suckers " may arise from the 

 roots long after the death or removal of the super- 

 terranean parts of the tree, and even after an interval 

 of time long enough for the memory of the tree to have 

 passed away : in some cases these suckers spring up many 

 feet distant from the tree, or from the spot where it once 

 stood. 



