Pruning of Deciduous Trees 67 



After their third winter's pruning apricot trees 

 are either cut back annually at their winter's prun- 

 ing, according to time-honoured custom, or simply 

 have their surplus growth cut clean away and the 

 tops of the branches left entirely uncut, according 

 to the newer pruning theory of the "Uncut Ter- 

 minal." As this latter method of pruning the apricot 

 and other deciduous trees is coming into favour in 

 the irrigation areas, a separate section of this chap- 

 ter is devoted to explaining its main principles. 



THE PEACE AND NECTARINE. 



For the first few years the peach and nectarine 

 are pruned in a manner similar to that of the 

 apricot. The young tree is trained with a hollow 

 centre with main and secondary arms, having these 

 as nearly as possible equidistant from each other, 

 and pointing away from the centre of the tree. 



As the peach is usually a stronger grower than 

 the apricot, more wood may be allowed to remain 

 at pruning time, and the stronger-growing trees 

 being, of course, less severely cut back than the 

 weaker ones. 



After the third year the top of the tree is either 

 annually cut back to a healthy leaf bud or the 

 growth is turned to an outward-pointing lateral. 

 All strong shoots arising in the middle of the tree 

 are removed, although some of the weaker inside 

 laterals may be left to shade the limbs of the tree 

 and protect the bark from sun scald. 



As the peach tree fruits from shoots made during 

 the previous summer, it is necessary that a succes- 

 sion of such shoots should be maintained. These 

 shoots usually take the form of laterals arising out 

 of the larger limbs of the tree. Where the laterals 

 are evenly supplied with good flower buds for their 

 entire length they may be safely cut back to a 



