HOW I DISCOVERED CLOSK ROOT-PRUNING. 



II 



ive article before the American Pomological Society five years 

 ago, at Washington, which, if it was ever read, certainly pro- 

 duced no other result except perhaps to stamp me as a wild 

 and woolly Texas crank! 



But to return to my story. We pitched in, and in short 

 order had the whole 

 five thousand trees 

 reduced back to cut- 

 tings again, at least 

 in appearance, for 

 we did not stop at 

 any half-way close- 

 pruning, like thou- 

 sands will who try it 

 with fear and doubt. 

 We both agreed that 

 it was a plain case 

 of no need for root 

 at all, and off they 

 came, as close to the 

 ends as we could cut 

 them, for our inten- 

 tion was simply to 

 stick them back in 

 the rows as cuttings, 

 after reducing the 

 tops to one foot. 

 And we treated the 

 whole five thousand 

 just that way. If 

 a single tree died, I 

 never saw it, and by 

 fall those rows pre- 

 sented a picture of 

 vigorous and even 

 growth, many trees 

 being eight to ten feet high, like the tree 1 hold in my hand in 

 the illustration, though the root-pruned tree in the other hand 



TREE IN RIGHT HAND GROWN IN ONE YEAR FROM 

 ONE LIKE THAT IN LEFT HAND. 



