LUTHER BURBANK 



It takes time to grow a tree, and it is peculiarly 

 fortunate that the would-be fruit grower can se- 

 cure almost anywhere an abandoned orchard that 

 may almost immediately be restored to a condition 

 of productivity. But of course the orchardist who 

 wishes to operate on an extensive scale will not 

 be content with the renovation of an old orchard, 

 however lucrative that process may prove, but will 

 wish to produce a new orchard that may lack the 

 defects of the old one. 



The ancient tree made over will still retain, in 

 such important matters as height and spread of 

 limb, the evidence that it really belongs to a past 

 generation, however insistently the fruit that its 

 grafted branches bear may seem to belie the evi- 

 dence. 



But the trees of the new orchard may be trained 

 in accordance with modern ideas; and it is not to 

 be denied that ideas as to tree pedagogy have 

 changed as rapidly in recent years as have the best 

 conceptions of human pedagogy. 



Take the very important matter of height of 

 tree as a case in point. Not long ago the orchard- 

 ist, in developing a young tree, was careful to see 

 that it was trained in the nursery so that its lowest 

 branches were several feet from the ground. 



But the well-informed orchardist of today 

 heads his tree in such a way that the bearing 



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