ON THE FOUR BEST PRUNES 



thinned when the fruit is about half grown, to 

 prevent damage to the tree. 



I have found that a very satisfactory and simple 

 device for doing this is to tap the limbs gently 

 with a piece of ordinary three-quarters inch rub- 

 ber hose five to six inches long, fastened on the 

 end of a cane or bamboo pole. The hose causes 

 no injury to the branches, and, by striking just 

 hard enough, the fruit can be made to fall evenly 

 and leave the amount desired. 



The need of thinning, however, may be largely 

 obviated by proper winter pruning. 



When this variety was first offered, grafting 

 wood was sold at $10 per foot. That the invest- 

 ment was a profitable one even at that price is 

 shown by the following quotation from a letter 

 written by one of the first purchasers: 



"I was one of the first to introduce this fine 

 fruit into our locality, the first year the grafting 

 wood was placed on the market. I bought seven 

 feet of wood for $70. The same was grafted into 

 Tragedy prune trees, using one bud for each 

 cion. The following fall and winter I sold about 

 $600 worth of buds and cions from the ten trees 

 which I had grafted with the Sugar prune cions." 

 THE BEST PRUNE THE "STANDARD" 



Pre-eminent as are the qualities of the Sugar 

 prune, there is always room for improvement. 



[121] 



