PROPAGATION BY GRAFTING. 75 



ding, is the proper removal of the bud. "When it happens 

 that the knife passes exactly between the bark and wood, 

 the bud cannot fail to be good ; but this rarely happens- 

 more or less wood is attached, and the removal of this is 

 the nice point. "Where the buds are flat, the difficulty is 

 less than w r hen they have large prominent shoulders, as 

 the plum and pear have, in many cases. When all the 

 wood is taken out of these, a cavity remains, which does 

 not come in contact with the wood on which the bud is 

 placed, and therefore, although the bark unites well, the 

 bud will not grow. Sometimes, such as these are sepa- 

 rated by making an incision through the bark ; lift the 

 edge of the bark attached to the bud with the knife, and 

 push it off with the fingers. A safer way still is to cut 

 around the bud, and draw a strong silk thread between 

 the bark and wood, thus removing the bud in perfection. 



SECTION 5. PROPAGATION BY GRAFTING. 



Grafting is the insertion of a scion of one species or 

 variety on the stem or branch of another, which is called 

 the stock. Its principal object is to increase certain varie- 

 ties that cannot be reproduced from seed with certainty ; 

 but it is frequently performed with other objects in view. 

 For instance 



To Fruit a Neio Variety. A scion inserted in a 

 branch of a bearing tree, will bear fruit perhaps the 

 second year from the graft ; but if the same scion had 

 been put on a young seedling, it would not have borne in 

 ten years. 



One species is frequently grafted with success upon 

 another, by which certain important modifications are 

 wrought upon both the size and fruitfulness of trees, and 

 the quality of the fruits. Thus, we can graft, in many 

 cases, with highly beneficial results, the peach and apn- 



