282 BOAKD OF AGRICULTURE. 



After the vine is set, it requires but very little care the 

 first year. There are two systems recommeuded of growing 

 it. One is to take the shoot that grows, train it to a stake, 

 and allow nothing else to grow. It makes one cane perhaps 

 two or three feet long, the first year. Another plan is w^hat 

 may be called "the lazy man's system"; to let it alone. In 

 that case, it will not make one shoot only, but three or four, 

 or half a dozen will grow ; that is its natural tendency. 



There are some advantages in "the lazy man's system." 

 I very seldom patronize that kind, but in this case I do. I 

 think we shall find that the character of the top of any plant 

 determines to some extent the character of the root. 



If a grape-vine makes a shoot three or four feet long, with 

 no side branches, I think its tendency is to make one root 

 three or four feet long, with few side branches. If it is 

 allowed to grow as it will, or if by pinching off the leading 

 shoot it makes half a dozen branches, you will be likely to 

 find half a dozen roots corresponding. I do not say that it 

 will follow in all cases, but I say that is the tendency. You 

 will find this illustrated in our grass-lands. Take any of our 

 closely-shaven lawns, that are kept cropped all the season; 

 there is no depth to the root ; you can cut the sod with the 

 greatest ease imaginable. On the contrary, herdsgrass, for 

 instance, that grows up and goes to seed, has very few fibrous 

 roots on the surface, but it goes down deep ; it has a tap-root 

 corresponding to its stem. I think that the class of trees 

 which make an upright shoot, or an extension of that kind, 

 are apt to have roots of the same character — tap-roots. Take 

 the walnut, for instance. I had some experience in planting 

 walnuts years ago. The first year, each plant made a straight 

 stem about three inches long, and nothing else. I trans- 

 planted them, and to my surprise, I found a root certainly 

 ten times as long as the top. The habit of the grape is to 

 make an upright shoot and a down root. We do not want to 

 encourage the formation of a single root in a grape-vine. 

 We want to supply it with a whole system of roots, and I 

 think in this way we are more likely to do it, than we are by 

 growing it as a single cane. There is one thing, however, 

 that ought to be thought of. If you let it alone, if you let it 

 sprawl, you are very apt to break off the tips of the shoots 



