230 AMERICAN POMOLOGY. 



Formerly, and in some sections of the country even 

 now, very erroneous notions prevailed upon this subject. 

 Large trees, of several years' growth in the nursery, were 

 preferred by those who were planting orchards : trees, 

 ready to bear fruit, were eagerly inquired for, and prefer- 

 red ; even if they had been crowded together so as to be 

 drawn up to a great hight without any lateral branches, 

 and had formed their heads at the hight of seven or eight 

 feet, so as to be out of the way of browsing by cattle and 

 horses, they were the more admired by the purchasers. 

 Now-a-days there is a great change in the sentiment of 

 tree-planters as to the age, size, and shape of the trees 

 that are to be set out. 



Thrifty young trees are preferred to older and larger 

 ones on many accounts. They are more vigorous and will 

 endure the disturbance of digging, transportation, and 

 change of locality from the nursery to the orchard, much 

 better than larger and older trees. They are more easily 

 dug, and will have a larger proportion of roots removed 

 with them than those which have stood longer in the nur- 

 sery-rows, so as to have pushed their fibres beyond the 

 reach of the spade. Such trees are more stocky, and are 

 furnished with lateral branches, or they should be so fur- 

 nished, but these would be smothered and removed from 

 older trees in crowded rows, as they are usually found in 

 the nurseries. If these younger trees be not already fur- 

 nished with laterals and elements for the formation of low 

 heads, by the judicious treatment of the nurserymen who 

 produced them, the orchardist can at least bend them to 

 his will. He may make of them just what he pleases by 

 his own manipulations at the time of planting or after- 



