GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF PRUNING 127 



dred per cent, of roots to support fifty per cent, of top, and of 

 course the top is going to be better supported. It is going to 

 make a tremendous growth to try and take care of all the food 

 that the root is supplying. This is an especially important princi- 

 ple in renovating work, which is discussed in Chapter XVI. 



Very Rank Growth Opposed to Fruit-hearing. — A second 

 general principle which ought to go with this first one, though it 

 it not strictly a principle of pruning, is that very rank MOod 

 growth is opposed to fruit-bearing. One will rarely find a tree 

 which is growing very vigorously that is also bearing heavily. The 

 two things simply do not go together. The young tree, so long 

 as it remains vigorous and growthy, does not come into bear- 

 ing. In general it is those varieties, like the Wagener and Olden- 

 burg apples, w^iich are not extremely vigorous growers, that bear 

 early in life, while the strong growing sorts like Gravenstein and 

 Spy require more time to come into fruit. So it is with the heavily 

 pruned old tree. It at once starts a very vigorous growth of top 

 but does not bear fruit until it has time for this growth to subside. 



The lesson Avhich these two principles teach is very fre- 

 quently overlooked by the man who does the pruning. He gauges 

 his success by the amount of wood he takes out of the tree, and 

 then when the tree fails to bear the following year he blames 

 the practice of pruning instead of the operator. 



On the other hand, a tree must be making a reasonably good 

 growth in order to bear well. In recent years the tendency has 

 been to put less emphasis on the danger of vigorous growth. Un- 

 less the tree reaches what might be described as very vigorous 

 growth there is little danger. Probably more orchards have their 

 bearing reduced by too little growth than by too much growth. 



Influence of Summer Pruning. — A third principle is that when 

 pruning is done in the winter the tendency is to promote a 

 strong growth of wood, while pruning done in the summer 

 tends in the opposite direction, or towards the production of 

 fruit. There can be no question about the first part of this. 

 It is the same fact that was given in the first principle, only 

 stated a little differently. The strength of the tendency will 

 correspond exactly to the severity of the pruning. Prune a 



