102 PRINCIPLES AND PRACTICE OF PRUNING. 



such sorts as have small or flat buds may need a more severe 

 cutting-back than others, in order to arouse the buds into 

 action and induce them to break into shoots. 



T. G. Yeomans, a successful cultivator of the dwarf pear 

 for market, gives the following excellent practical directions 

 for pruning the trees, suited to orchard management : 



" Experience has convinced me, that with good trees of 

 well-chosen varieties, on any good corn-land which is never 

 too wet ; and with the culture a good farmer gives his other 

 crops, and the important nay more, the indispensable requi- 

 site to success thorough pruning, no one need fail of attaining 

 a degree of success highly satisfactory and profitable. 



" A dwarf pear-tree should never be planted at one year 

 old. A good one-year-old tree consists of a single upright 

 shoot or stem, from three and one-half to five feet high, and 

 should be cut off at about two feet from the ground ; and in 

 order to give a smooth, handsome stem or trunk, let the buds 

 be rubbed off to the height of one foot from the ground leav- 

 ing on the upper portion six to nine buds, more or less ; with 

 the tree standing in its original position in full vigor, and cut 

 back as above stated, each one of these buds will throw out 

 a good strong branch, which gives a full round distaff-form 

 to the tree ; and this is the time and manner, and the only 

 time, when that desirable shape can be given, on which the 

 future form of symmetry and beauty so much depends ; and 

 to avoid a fork-topped tree, in which the two uppermost 

 branches are about of equal vigor and height, let the second 

 branch from the top be pinched off, when about nine inches or 

 a foot long, which will check and weaken it, while the upper- 

 most one becomes a strong central leader. Whereas, if the 

 tree be transplanted at one year old, and cut back as above 

 stated, the vital forces of the tree will be weakened half or 

 three-fourths by transplanting, and, as the result, only two or 

 three (more or less) of the buds on the trunk will grow so as 

 to form branches, and they, perhaps, only at the top or all on 

 one side, while the remaining buds remain dormant, never 

 afterward to be developed, as the other branches form new 

 channels, which will more readily carry the sap to the other 

 and upper portions of the tree. 



" For transplanting, therefore, let a tree be two years old 



