172 



PRINCIPLES AND PRACTICE OF PRUNING 



taking to the field injuries may occur in the handling, 

 and the very parts most prized may be lost. When 

 pruned after planting the head may not only be started 

 to best advantage at the desired height, but there is a 

 better chance of having the branches in good condition 

 as well as having a larger number among which to 

 choose. Always in doing such pruning the feet should 

 be placed one on each side of the trunk and the cuts made 

 from below upward with a keen-edged knife. When trees 

 are transplanted in autumn, the pruning should be say 6 

 inches beyond the point where the frame limbs are de- 



FIG. 124 EFFECT OF WIND ON UNSTAKED TREES. WINDBREAK NEEDED 

 Only by the most careful pruning can these trees be balanced and then only 

 with the greatest difficulty. Staking would have helped many of them. 



sired, because there ma be more or less winterkilling. 

 The final pruning should be given just before growth 

 starts in the spring. (Compare 121.) 



148. Lengths of nursery tree trunks. Because tree 

 planters in the past have generally called for trees with 

 trunks of certain lengths the nurserymen have pruned 

 off the lower limbs, especially when the trees were to be 

 sold when two years old. Formerly the height of the 



