430 FUNDAMENTALS OF FRUIT PRODUCTION 



at least the advantage of requiring little labor. Experience shows that 

 when a single large limb is removed from almost any part of a tree, water- 

 sprouts develop to take its place and the rest of the top continues to grow 

 as before. The watersprouts arise, for the most part, not from limbs far 

 removed from the pruning wound, but close to the point where the cut 

 was made. There is an unmistakable response to the pruning, but that 

 response is evident within a very limited area. The tree as a whole does 

 not show it. 



Those who, after permitting a leader to develop for a number of years 

 and to form a close centered tree, have finally tried to train to an open 

 center or vase shape can furnish abundant evidence on the question under 

 discussion. The removal of the central leader from trees of this kind 

 (bulk heading back or bulk thinning out, depending on the form of the 

 tree and where the cut is made), is almost always followed by the pro- 

 duction of a number of watersprouts that tend to take its place. The 

 subsequent removal of these watersprouts is followed by the production 

 of still others, nearly always at points near the wound left by the removal 

 of the leader. The unpruned branches seem little influenced by the 

 cutting out of the leader. 



In attempting to train young Yellow Newtown apple or Bartlett or 

 Anjou pear trees to an open center, or the Mcintosh apple or Winter 

 Nelis pear to a closed center, there is difficulty in keeping these trees 

 from growing dense in the center in the first instance and from spreading 

 out or even growing down in the second, though the shoots are cut out or 

 off. Furthermore — a matter of equal or greater importance — there is 

 difficulty in making the other shoots and limbs of these same trees spread 

 out or grow upright, as the case may be and thus profit by the nutrient 

 materials that it is desired to divert from the closely pruned parts. In 

 fact so persistently do the watersprouts tend to replace removed limbs, 

 that the easiest way to develop an open centered tree is not to cut out all 

 of the growth in the center, but rather to suppress it by pruning it a little 

 more severely than the surrounding branches that are desired for the 

 main framework. Even then it is doubtful if the usual characteristic 

 growth of the remaining branches is materially changed. Similarly, when 

 young trees are lightly, or even heavily, headed back new shoots are sent 

 out, but mainly from points where some of them can easily replace the 

 portion removed. It is not common for distant untouched portions of the 

 tree to show a well defined response to pruning. 



Results Attending Spur Pruning. — As they become older, some 

 varieties of apple and pear trees develop large numbers of fruit spurs, 

 which often branch and rebranch until they become fruit spur clusters. 

 Usually when there are such large numbers of fruit spurs only a com- 

 paratively small percentage can flower and fruit in any single season and 

 the record of any single spur, or even spur cluster, especially in an older 



