Peach - Culture. 8 5 



oughly,' and mark ofT the rows for the trees. The trees to be set should be 

 only one year from the bud, and, when set, should be cut back to within a 

 foot or fifteen inches of the ground, or about that distance above the bud 

 if it be a budded tree. The trees will make good growth ; and the next and 

 each succeeding spring, before the buds begin to swell, the extremities of 

 the branches should be shortened at least one-half, for the reasons wc have 

 already given. When three or four years old, fair crops of fine fruit may 

 be expected ; and, with good treatment, the trees ought to continue healthy 

 for fifteen or twenty years, yielding large quantities of fruit. The greatest 

 care should be taken to secure stones from healthy, thrifty trees free from 

 the yellows. This disease has, without doubt, been extensively disseminated 

 by using the stones from diseased trees, and by buds from the same. Seed- 

 ling trees are generally more free from disease than budded trees ; and, if 

 it were possible to secure such as would yield good fruit without budding, 

 it would be a great advantage. We have known a few varieties that would 

 produce their like from seed ; but they were not good enough in quality to 

 be valuable. 



When the ground is wholly given up to peach-trees, they should be planted 

 about fifteen to eighteen feet apart each way ; and, for a few years, the plough 

 or cultivator may be run each way through the rows, and the land kept in 

 good condition at small expense. Some cultivators object to ploughing 

 and cultivating among trees during the summer, as it destroys the fibrous 

 roots that come near to the surface. This will depend much upon the 

 nature of the soil : if light and thin, the roots will naturally work near the 

 surface. And the best treatment such an orchard could have would be a 

 thick coating of mulch ; while, if the soil was richer and deeper, the roots 

 would mostly strike down out of the way of the plough-point. 



The land should not be planted with peach-trees the second time with- 

 out a long interval of rest between the plantings. 



In planting an orchard, no poorer policy can possibly be adopted than 

 that of buying trees of inferior sorts merely because they are cheap ; for 

 such trees always prove to be dear in the end. Good fruit will always 

 command a ready sale, even when poor fruit cannot be sold at any price. 

 Trees that will only produce fruit fit for pigs should not be allowed lo 

 encumber the land. In planting extensively for market-purposes, it will 



