CHAPTER IV. 



THE BEST KINDS OF STOCKS. 



As a general rule, fruit trees do best when graft- 

 ed on seedlings of their own species. Apples are 

 best upon seedling apple stocks ; pears on seedling 

 pears; and plums and cherries on seedling stocks 

 of their own kinds respectively. Suckers, when 

 their roots diverge evenly on all sides, often make 

 good stocks ; but the uncertainty of finding such 

 roots, and the inconvenience of crooked, one-sided, 

 or stunted trees, so often produced from suckers, 

 renders them on the whole greatly inferior to seed- 

 lings. 



In some cases, stocks of a different kind from the 

 graft are best, where particular objects are to be at- 

 tained. When for instance it is intended to raise 

 dwarf trees of the apple and pear, that they may 

 cover less ground, or bear sooner, stocks of smaller 

 size and of diminished growth are chosen. The 

 quince is used as a stock for dwarf pear trees; 

 the small paradise and the Doucin or French 

 stock, for dwarf apples. Besides increasing the 

 productiveness of some varieties, the quality too is 

 changed and sometimes improved, as described in 



