182 FRUIT TREES. 



checks the growth of the shoot it produces, and the 

 eyes of the lower leaves develop. After six or seven 

 days they must be pinched as before directed. The 

 result of these operations is shown at fig. 163. All the 

 irregular shoots having been pinched the first time, 

 there spring up on many of them one or two genera- 

 tions of shoots. These must be pinched above the leaf 

 nearest to the base, the same as directed for buds 

 proper. These operations result in branches formed as 

 figures 160 and 162. We then cut them at B. 



Fig. 161. Irregular Shoot, pinched too soon. 



Possibly these repeated pinchings practised upon 

 the irregular shoots may result in a small branch 

 covered only with flower-buds (fig. 164). If left to 

 fructify, it will wither after the fruit is gathered, 

 leaving a bare place. To avoid this, it will be advisable 

 to suppress all the flower-buds at the winter pruning 

 (fig. 165), then make a deep incision at A, penetrating 

 below the insertion of the branch. We shall then see 

 at the following spring, near the base, new shoots, 

 better constituted, and which must be pinched short. 



The same kind of incision, practised at the same 

 period, at the base of the long irregular branch 

 (tig. 160), will result in new shoots, but only in the 



