SHAPING THE PEACH TREE 



277 



In the selection of peach trees for planting, a clean, healthy 

 root only should be taken. During recent years there have been 

 a good many young roots affected with knots or swellings from 

 some obscure cause. Such trees should be burned. If planted, 

 the knot sometimes grows to an enormous size and little or no top 

 growth is made. 



PRUNING THE PEACH 



As has already been stated, the peach will carry a top of great 

 fruiting longevity if the grower will do justice to the tree by reg- 

 ular shortening of the growth and forcing out new wood, upon 

 which alone fruit is found. Not only does regular pruning do this, 

 but it promotes longevity and vigor in the framework of the tree 

 upon which these bearing shoots come. Left unpruned, the peach 

 soon becomes bark-bound, and the bark itself becomes hardened 

 and brittle. Lower shoots are apt to give out, and the tree becomes 

 an umbrella of foliage and fruit held aloft by bare branches bark- 

 burned by the sun, invaded by borers, exuding gum, covered with 

 moss and lichens a picture of distress and unprofitability because 

 its owner does not give the tree a chance to re-invigorate itself 

 with large fresh leaves from the new wood which alone can carry 

 them. 



As has been advised for other trees, the peach should be given 

 a low head, developed as described in the chapter on pruning. In 

 its after-treatment, it has been the universal experience that con- 

 stant ''heading' in" is essential to the strength and health of the 

 tree. This also has been considered in an earlier chapter. Illus- 

 trations of the pertinence of these remarks are found in the practice 

 of the most successful peach growers in all parts of the State. A 

 few instances will be given : 



"The peach, fruiting only on wood of the previous year's growth, bears 

 fruit farther away from the body of the tree each year, and tfie small shoots 

 of from one-eighth to three-sixteenths in diameter begin to decline when 

 the fruit is removed. To have healthy growth, all of these small branches 

 must be removed the first winter following their fruiting, when there is 

 a greater tendency to form small new growths, which may fruit the following 

 season. In the peach, it will seldom be found necessary to remove any 

 interior branches, except suckers, until they have produced a crop, when 

 they will begin to decline and should be removed. 



"I would certainly not cut peach trees back less ^ than one-half of the new 

 growth in the winter pruning, and our trees are getting too large for their 

 age even with that amount of pruning. This has suggested, in other localities, 

 summer pruning or shortening in, with success in some places. So far my 

 own experience is favorable. It will be noticed on trees kept growing rap- 

 idly that the fruit buds are near the ends of the shoots, and it seems to take 

 away too many of these buds to cut back one-half in the winter pruning, 

 but by cutting back about one-half the new growth in August, fruit buds 

 are developed lower down, and where they would not be developed without 

 the summer pruning." H. Culbertson, El Cajon San Diego County. 



