CHAPTER IV 

 BUDDING 



THE budding of young fruit stocks is a very simple operation and 

 can be easily learnt in a very few minutes by those who are so 

 minded. It is, however, an operation requiring great care, and 

 along arbitrary lines, for there are not several ways of doing it. 

 To all intents and purposes it is a surgical operation, and calls for 

 even fastidious care. 



But because a thing calls for care and precision it does not 

 necessarily follow, on that account, that it is intricate or difficult, 

 providing simple rules are observed. Failure will undoubtedly 

 follow slipshod or haphazard methods, and these are entirely 

 reprehensible, because when buds do not " take " it is not the 

 value of the stock or the bud which counts, but the loss of a year, 

 which is a far greater and more irreplaceable thing. This should 

 be borne in mind, especially by young budders ; and we write 

 this because when we were but fourteen years old we had already 

 budded several thousands of stocks, and had considerable experi- 

 ence of the mechanical part of the operation long before we had 

 anyone sufficiently interested to impart to us the ethical. So, as 

 there are doubtless as many youthful budders as ever there were, 

 we have ventured these few words for their benefit. 



Much depends upon the condition of the stocks as to when they 

 should be budded. If they were planted in accordance with our 

 remarks in the preceding chapter, and were kept clean during the 

 spring and summer, they should be in full sap and ready for budding 

 during the first half of August. To the general nurseryman this 

 is a most convenient time, as he pushes on with the rose budding 

 throughout July and is then able to go straight on with his fruit. 

 Any earlier date is not so suitable for budding in quantity, as the buds 

 would scarcely be ready ; and the driving it off till a later date 

 exposes us to the danger of seeing a sudden stoppage of the sap if 

 dry, hot weather sets in. It is essential to successful budding that 

 the bark of the stock should run very freely, otherwise the cut 

 cannot be forced open without more or less bruising the bark or 



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