274 Sunimcr-P niniug of the Grape. 



amount of growth reduced to what the phrnt is capable of sustaining to 

 advantage. A vine which may have been wholly neglected in the winter 

 can still be thoroughly pruned for all the practical purposes of pruning by 

 thus removing the surplus shoots, rubbing them out as they appear. 



Some vine-dressers depend upon this plan of reducing their crop, instead 

 of severe winter-pruning, which is the more direct method usually adopted. 

 Sometimes, indeed, it may be advisable to trim the canes long, when there 

 is apprehension that a portion of the buds have been winter-killed . Now, 

 if they still break regularly, the excess can thus be reduced to the proper 

 standard. In some vineyards the whole summer-pruning is done at once 

 by the systematic and severe removal of a large portion of the shoots by 

 rubbing them out, so as to thin the crop, which is afterward left to take 

 care of itself. 



Certain insects are busily at work at the time of this rubbing-out, doing 

 a similar work by eating a portion of the buds ; but we cannot depend upon 

 their judgment in the matter, and should kill the beautiful Haltica chalybea 

 while we are disbudding our vines. 



The second division of the subject, or pruning to efiFect the greatest de- 

 velopment of the foliage, and to produce new leaves during the season 

 upon the fruit-bearing branches, is accomplished by systematic, judicious, 

 and early pinching-in of the ends of the shoots. This operation should be 

 done as soon as it is seen which are the best and strongest, and before 

 the blossoming of the vine ; so soon, indeed, as the bunches can be seen : 

 it is often practised at the same time as the rubbing-out, at least on the 

 strongest shoots. This pinching is a very simple matter : it is done with the 

 thumb-nail and the fore-finger. The point only should be removed. Some- 

 times one leaf, sometimes two, or even three, are left beyond the outer clus- 

 ter of grape-buds ; but, to produce the best effect, the former point is advised. 



It has been observed that an early and close pinching is always followed 

 by a remarkable development of the thrift and size of the foliage. The 

 leaves attain double the size of those on an unpinched shoot, and the 

 aggregate of the evaporating surface presented by them will be greater 

 than that of all the leaves that would have been produced by the shoot if 

 left alone. But this is not all : at the base or axil of each of these en- 

 larged leaves the new buds will become very prominent, and will soon 

 burst, and produce laterals. These are again pinched at one or two leaves, 



