FILLING TREES 97 



ology was gleaned from the booklets of tree sur- 

 geons, once said to the author, who was in the act 

 of painting with tar an incision in an apple-tree, 

 " I suppose that the apples will taste of tar for a 

 year or two, won't they?" When these ideas 

 become a little more widely disseminated it is 

 to be expected that progressive growers will be 

 found pouring liberal doses of " Red-eye " into 

 holes in their apple trees, by way of preparation 

 for marketing their fruit in the prohibition States. 

 It cannot be too emphatically stated that no 

 cement filling, nor any other filling, nor the re- 

 moval of decay that precedes the filling, can have 

 any physiologically beneficial effects upon the tree. 

 Decay is harmful in exactly the same way that a 

 hole cut in the tree with an ax is harmful. It 

 interrupts, in proportion to its extent, the exchange 

 of sap between the roots and the leaves, and it 

 removes a certain part of the physical support of 

 the tree. It is to prevent the increase of these 

 very dangerous processes that the decay is cut out. 

 But the excision does not, obviously, remedy the 

 harm which has already been done. Indeed, it 

 actually increases the damage to the tree, for the 

 hole is always larger than the decay-spot it was 

 made to eradicate. If better foliage sometimes fol- 

 lows the putting in of fillings, it is because the trees 

 are often pruned severely at the time they are 

 filled. No real advance in the work of repairing 



