1871 



THE POMOLOGIST AND GARDENER. 



189 



during the winter and spring of 1871 to produce 

 such a result. A further confirmation of the above 

 position is tlie fact that the peach, the most tender 

 of all the stone fruits in the dormant bud, and which 

 uniformly bears its fruit on wood made during the 

 previous season, is this season bearing an abundant 

 crop, and that too of the finer and more tender 

 buddtil varieties. 



The above theory is given in explanation of what 

 to some may seem a bewildering difllculty. The 

 theory and the facts we think are in strict harmony 

 with each other, and makes tlie solution a clear and 

 easy one. We ofl"er it however only as a theory. 

 If any of our readers can give a more satisfactory 

 solution of the subject we should be pleased to have 

 such solution come before the fruit growing public. 



Should Trees be Pruned. 



Bt the AasociATB Editob. 



In the May number of the Pomologist our friend 

 Elliott, of Cleveland, Ohio, says " we are following 

 Mr. Hovcy's footsteps in advising of no pruning at 

 transplanting, and if we have not read the discus- 

 sion between Mr. Downing and Mr. Hovey some 

 years since on this point it niaj' not hurt us to do 

 so." 



We have not read the controvers}' referred to, 

 but would be much pleased to do so if we had the 

 opportunity, for we have no doubt but it would be 

 interesting and instructive, coming from such able 

 men. 



It is another evidence that there are two 

 sides to the question, and that we are ably sus- 

 tained or rather that we have arrived at the same 

 conclusions others have, without having liad any 

 previous knowledge of what led them to such belief 

 and practice. 



And if friend Elliott could not come to the con- 

 clusion after many years of experience and obser- 

 vation that pruning was necessary, it shows that 

 there has been no evidence to sustain it, for he 

 says: " In a practice of thirty years, I have exper- 

 imented some myself, watched others more, and 

 confess that to-day I know nothing." 



There is one important matter connected with 

 this subject which we must not overlook, which has 

 placed friend Elliott and others in such a bad pre- 

 dicament, that is, they have no facts to sustain their 

 pruning, else they would give them and not admit 

 they "A7iOM nothing." But it is still more remark- 

 ably strange that such persons after admitting they 

 " knoic nothing," they should assume to place all 

 trees under various diseases requiring diff'erent pre- 

 scriptions, for Mr. Elliott says : " Years since, I 

 became satisfied that no line of practice could any 

 more be laid down by line and rule in Horticulture 

 than in Medicine; each individual life needing for 

 its case a distinct and separate prescription ; so that 



while we may give a general prescription of how to 

 prune, or how to manure a variety of vine or tree, 

 without seeing the patient we can do nothing relia- 

 ble, and then not without having a previous knowl- 

 edge of the same disease, and general character of 

 the patient." 



Here friend Elliott places vegetable life naturally 

 in an abnormal condition and then contrasts it with 

 diseased animal life requiring a prescription as in 

 the practice of medicine. This might be a correct 

 method of reasoning if the premises were admitted 

 or proven but this we deny. While we admit 

 plants may become diseased, we do not admit thai 

 they are naturally so, and if thej' were so that dif- 

 ferent manipulations in pi-H/HM^f would restore them 

 to health. Plants like animals have certain condi- 

 tions necessary to their healthy existence. 



It is the study of those in their native homes, in 

 their natural condition, which should be our object, 

 and then place them under congenial circumstan- 

 ces, instead of assuming that plants are naturally 

 diseased and that "each individual life (plant) 

 needed for its care a distinct and separate prescrij)- 

 tion." 



" Electricity " not ! " the Growth of Trees." 



By Sdel Foster, Muscatine. 



In the July number is a reply to my refutation of 

 Dr. Staymau's statement that electricity is the great- 

 est agent in the growth of trees. I said " a tree 

 grows much as the boy whistled — 'it whistled itself 

 —so the tree grows." Now I am prepared to prove 

 this fact, and to disprove that electricity is the prin- 

 cipal agent, or power, in the growth of a tree. 



First, the tree inlierits, maintains and works its 

 own natural powers the Creator established in the 

 seed which brought forth Ihe tree. The first prin- 

 ciple of our trees was iuhcrite(i from their parent 

 trees, assisted, directed and finished by tlie flower 

 which impregnated the seed, and this was assisted 

 by all the agencies which contribute to the growtli 

 of the tree. 



Second, I find a principle in the varied deviation 

 of the new generation of the tree that I am not able 

 to explain, nor has any one as j'et been able to 

 teach it to us, nor can Dr. Stayman credit it to elec- 

 tricity, nor I to "the tree grows itself" It is this, 

 that while the cion of the Rhode Island Greening 

 will always produce the tree, leaf and fruit of itself, 

 the seed of the same tree will not be the Kliode Isl- 

 and Greening. Then we find that while the tree 

 grows itself, it does not grow its own seed itself, nor 

 can we credit it to electricity, nor can we find what 

 to credit it to. Why the seed will differ at all from 

 the parent any more than the leaf or fruit, much more 

 the seeds of the same apple, impregnated by the 

 same flower, the same time, is as far beyond my 

 comprehension as it is that electricity grows a tree. 



