PRUNING WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO PARTICULAR FRUITS 467 



Pruning the Brambles. — Most of the bramble fruits are perennials, 

 with biennial canes. The dying of the canes at the end of their fruiting 

 season the second year necessitates their removal. Experience demon- 

 strates that it is good practice to cut out and destroy the old canes 

 promptly after the fruiting season. Their retention until the following 

 fall or spring can serve no useful purpose and they prove a source for the 

 spread of diseases and insects to the new growth if they are allowed to 

 remain. 



The early spring pruning of this group usually consists in some thin- 

 ning out of the cane growth that is to bear fruit during the following 

 summer and at the same time a heading back of the main canes or of their 

 laterals, or perhaps of both. This pruning is done almost exclusively for 

 the purpose of thinning the crop. If done properly it reduces the number 

 of fruit buds but results in little or no reduction in the total yield. Natur- 

 ally its severity varies greatly with variety and with the environmental 

 conditions. The moisture supply during the ripening season limits yield 

 in the bramble fruits probably more frequently than any other single 

 factor. Consequently the severity of the pruning should be influenced by 

 the prospect for available water during and just before harvesting. 

 Under conditions of ample rainfall or abundant irrigation water and of 

 relatively high atmospheric humidity this pruning may be much less 

 severe than when summer drought is likely. The bulk of this spring 

 pruning of dormant or nearly dormant canes should consist in heading 

 back rather than in thinning out. The laterals from the median and 

 more basal fruit buds generally produce larger clusters and their indi- 

 vidual berries are larger than those from the more apical buds. It is a 

 good plan to delay this pruning until the buds are swelling in the spring so 

 that the winter-injured ends of the canes may be removed without extra 

 labor. 



The summer pinching of the bramble fruits has been discussed under 

 the heading of Pinching and need not be treated at this point. 



Few or no data are available showing the best methods of pruning 

 certain types of the blackberry that have perennial canes. However, 

 observation indicates that they can be handled best by treating them as 

 ordinary varieties with biennial canes. That is, their canes are pruned 

 out as soon as they have fruited once, even though they would bear a 

 second crop were they allowed to remain. 



The so-called everbearing or fall-bearing raspberries produce their 

 late summer crop terminally on the main shoot or on sub-terminal laterals 

 of shoots of the current season. The following main-season crop is 

 borne on laterals coming from lower parts of the same canes. They 

 should be winter pruned in the same way as related mid-season varieties. 



Pruning the Grape. — More has been written about pruning and 

 training the grape than any other fruit. Many different systems or 



