2CXD Over- Cr offing. 



OVER-CROPPING. 



By George Jaques, Worcester, Mass. 



Near akin to the negligence by which trees are suffered to smother 

 and deform themselves with superfluous wood, is the custom — almost 

 universal in this country — of allowing them to carry an unreasonable 

 quantity of fruit. This over-cropping, indeed, is one of the greatest, as 

 it is one of the most obstinate evils that horticultural science is strug- 

 gling to eradicate. Under the various artificial influences to which 

 fruit-trees, in' gardens and orchards, are subjected, they often overbear. 

 The best cultivators, however, make it an inflexible rule not to allow 

 any tree to carry so much fruit as to necessitate a propping up of the 

 branches. But the number of this class of thorough practitioners is 

 exceedingly small. All over the country, in fact, propping is the rule, 

 and thinning of the fruit is the rare exception. The operation seems, 

 it is true, to demand a certain sort of courage that only veteran culti- 

 vators can command. To cut off" the outermost of the two or three 

 clusters on every shoot of a grape-vine, to pull off" half, or more, of the 

 specimens from a fine Bartlett or Seckel pear tree, oppressed by the 

 weight of its own generosity, requires nerve^ such as can hardlv be 

 expected from raw recruits in the business. Still, so extremely satis- 

 factory are the results of this operation, that, wherever it has been once 

 resolutely begun, it never fails to be followed up in future years. 



In the performance of this, as of other work among trees, a little 

 experience proves more serviceable than a great deal of teaching. As 

 a general rule, supported by the practice, as stated above, of the best 

 cultivators, no tree should be permitted to retain any more of its fruit 

 than it can carry to maturity without being tied up, or suppoi'ted in 

 any way. This, where trees are overloaded, necessitates a removal of 

 from one fourth to three fourths, as the case may require, of the young 

 specimens left growing after the fall of the blossoms. The super- 

 fluous fruit ought to be picked oft' in June or July. At the time of this 

 first thinning, however, it is advisable to leave about double the quan- 

 tity on the tree that it is intended shall ripen there. Going over the trees 

 a second time, in August, the number of specimens should be finally 

 reduced so as to complete the operation, taking care to select for re- 

 moval all fruits that are wormy, deformed, badly situated, and unprom- 

 ising. On dwarfs, and smallish standards, such a thinning out — with 

 the fingers and thumb-nail, as the most convenient implements — may 



