78 THE PEACH 



roots and the knife at the limbs, destroying or 

 palliating for a time to a considerable extent the 

 incipient stage of the disease in the tree, whether 

 it arises from the agency of an insect or from the 

 ravages of a parasitic fungi ; in either case it af- 

 fects the body and branches as well as the roots of 

 the tree. "While the plow cuts and turns up the 

 entire network of surface roots, and destroys as 

 well the active agent of disease, the knife performs 

 a like office by cutting in the limbs and branches, 

 destroying to a large extent the active agent there, 

 thus divesting the tree to the extent of the loss of 

 its diseased roots and branches of the fell enemy, 

 leaving the tree in its full flow of sap to throw out 

 its thousands of new surface roots as feeders to 

 work in the more healthy soil which has just been 

 turned down by the plow. The shortened limbs 

 in the new growth now in active sympathy with 

 the roots, respond in a more healthy current of 

 sap the life-blood of the tree in a vigorous 

 growth of wood and root for another year of pro 

 ductiveness. 



This system of culture of the peach tree, plow- 

 ing and cutting in the branches, with the addition 

 of a bold operation in eradicating the diseased 

 trees, if any, as they appear, attended by its re- 

 versing effects of health and returning vigor, is 

 one among the strong evidences that this infection 

 is caused by fungi. A pruning of the roots and a 

 judicious cutting of the branches and limbs in the 



