132 



CALIFORNIA FRUITS: HOW TO GROW THEM 



freezing, but a drop of two or three degrees below the freezing 

 point which is feared, and during recent years such a temperature 

 has wrought havoc with some fruits, in early valley regions partic- 

 ularly. Later pruning, even after the bloom and foliage have 

 appeared, has worked no injury to the trees, but it is less conven- 

 iently done than when the trees are free of foliage. 



Summer Pruning. Summer pruning, to induce bearing, is, as has 

 been previously intimated, but little employed in this State, for the 

 constant tendency of our trees is to bear early and to overbear. 

 Enough has, however, been done in individual cases to show that 

 fruit-bearing is promoted by pruning after the chief growth of the 

 season has been attained. If the pruning results in forcing out 

 laterals late in the season it has been done too early. What is 

 desirable is the strengthening or development of fruit buds, am} 

 this will be accomplished after the energy has been too far dissipated 

 to make new wood growth. 



Summer pruning to check the too exuberant wood growth of 

 some kinds of trees is employed to some extent, chiefly in the 

 warmer parts of the State, where the vegetative process in some 

 trees seems fairly to run riot, and unless checked is apt to ruin the 

 tree by breaking to pieces when the wind and weight of fruit test 

 its strength. The methods of summer pruning employed in different 

 parts of the. State for different fruits will be considered in connection 

 with the special chapters on these fruits. 



Summer pruning to preserve form is another matter, and relates 

 in the main to pinching in, to check undesirable extension and to 

 direct the sap toward shoots in which growth is desired. This prac- 

 tice is approved by most of our orchardists, and is employed by 

 them to a greater or less extent. More people believe in than prac- 

 tice it, however, because the summer months, with their long suc- 

 cession of fruits to be gathered and shipped or dried, and the addi- 

 tional consideration that there is always a scarcity of labor at this 

 time, give the orchardist so much work to do that he is more apt to 

 confine his "pinching" to a little that he may do now and then when 

 he has a few -moments' leisure than to do the work thoroughly and 

 systematically. The result is that the regular winter pruning is the 

 main operation for tree shaping in this State. 



There is such a great difference in opinion about summer pruning 

 that it will be very difficult to make any assertions about it which 

 will not be disputed. Much of this difference comes, of course, from 

 different conditions prevailing in different trees and in different 

 parts of the State, and some of these will be met, as already prom- 

 ised, in following chapters. Leaving these wholly out of considera- 

 tion at this time, it is safe to advise those who wish to secure sym- 

 metry or any particular term in any kind of a tree, that they can 

 resort to summer pinching with advantage, and can sometimes to 

 advantage remove wood too large for the thumb and finger to sever. 



