594 THE PEACH. 



when we have the fruit before us, but it may be referred to, for the sake 

 of verifying an opinion, at any time during the season of foliage. 



There is also another class of characteristics to be found in the blos- 

 soms, which is constant and valuable, though not so much so as that of 

 the leaves, because it can only be referred to for a few days in the 

 spring. The blossoms afford two well-marked subdivisions : 1st. 

 Large flowers, always red in the centre, and pale at the margin ; 2d. 

 Small flowers, tinged with dark at the margin.* 



The most desirable peaches for market-growers in this country are 

 very early and very late kinds. These command double the price in 

 market of kinds ripening at the middle season. For New England and 

 the North only the earliest kinds are desirable, as the late ones seldom 

 mature well. 



In describing peaches we have embodied their character as Free- 

 stones or Clingstones in the text descriptive. 



RAISING PEACHES IN POTS. The uncertainty of peach culture in the 

 open air has become so common in many sections where once the crop 

 was as sure as that of the apple, that many persons are resorting to or- 

 chard houses, or artificial in-door culture, both for supply of families and 

 also as a profitable item of fruit-growing for market. 



" Two modes are adopted : one without fire-heat, the crop maturing 

 a little earlier than in common orchards ; the other, where by the use of 

 fire-heat the fruit is obtained two or three months earlier than in open 

 ground." The former mode has been successfully prosecuted by Messrs. 

 Ellevanger and Barry, Rochester, N. Y. ; and the following, written by 

 P. Barry and published in Thomas' American Fruit Culturist, we copy : 



" We have now fruiting in wooden boxes, ten by ten inches, fifty-three 

 varieties of peaches, eleven varieties of nectarines, and seven of apricots. 



" Age, Potting, and /Soil. The trees are now three years from the 

 bud. They were taken up in the fall of 1861 ; heeled-in and covered 

 during winter ; potted early in spring March, I think ; soil a mix- 

 ture of about three parts yellow sandy loam and one part of old hot- 

 bed manure. 



" Summer Care. After potting they were kept in a cool house, 

 partly covered with glass, until they had made shoots four or five 

 inches long, and the danger of cold weather over. They were then 

 plunged to the rim of the boxes in an open border until the fall. They 

 were carefully watered when necessary during summer, and the shoots 

 kept as much as possible in uniform vigor by pinching. 



" Pruning. When potted the yearling trees were cut back to six or 

 eight inches, and in some cases to four inches, or only two or three 

 buds above the union of bud and stock, the object being to grow them 

 in the form of bushes. We now find that those cut back farthest are 

 the best trees. [Fig. 350 represents the yearling tree ; Fig. 351 the 

 same, cut back ; Fig. 352 the tree set in a pot ; and Fig. 353, the same 

 after a year's growth.] 



" Wintering. On the approach of very cold weather, or just before 

 the freezing of the ground so as to prevent out-door work, they were 



* Lindley makes a third division, embracing a few sorts with blossoms of an 

 intermediate size . But it is of no practical value, as any doubt as to which of 

 the two divisions any blossom belongs is immediately set at rest by the color of 

 the blossom. 



