176 The Fruit-Growers Guide-Book 



right habit than after they reach maturity and have pro- 

 duced several heavy crops of fruit. 



One part of a plant may live at the expense of another 

 part. Very vigorous shoots will outgrow surrounding 

 branches because they are better supplied with the crude 

 food material collected by the root and appropriate the 

 elaborated food formed in the leaves of their slower grow- 

 ing neighbors. In trees which have just been grafted the 

 stickers which are formed below the graft will outgrow 

 .the branches which arise in the scion, and will outgrow the 

 scion, and cause the starvation and death of the latter. 

 The scion is, in a way, a parasite upon the branch, and the 

 plant tends to throw it off. 



The tendency of plants, and young plants especially, is 

 to grow from the uppermost buds. By heading-in this 

 tendency is overcome, and the plants stimulated into de- 

 veloping lateral buds. An obstruction just above a branch 

 or bud tends to produce strong longitudinal growth in that 

 particular branch, while an obstruction below a bud stops 

 the downward flow of sap and causes a thickening of the 

 parts above. This is often resorted to in the manner of 

 retching or girdling for the purpose of causing the forma- 

 tion of fruit buds or the enlargement of particular speci- 

 mens of fruit. But these factors are associated with modes 

 of training rather than pruning proper. 



When plants are making an excessive amount of wood 

 growth they do not make fruit buds. Checking the growth 

 of the top by pinching or summer pruning will tend to 

 produce fruitfulness. 



And \vhile fruit bearing may be to a large extent gov- 

 erned by the methods of pruning, the habitual production 

 of fruit is better regulated by small amounts of pruning 

 regularly done, than by heavy pruning at infrequent in- 

 tervals. In the case of old trees which have been neg- 

 lected, it may take two or three years after severe pruning 

 before the balance between top and roots can reach an 

 equilibrium and the tree become fruitful. Light pruning 

 every year is much better for the trees than heavy pruning 

 clone occasionally. 



