THE PEACHES OF NEW YORK I49 



A stock greatly desired in peach-growing is one that will dwarf the 

 tree sufficiently so that winter-protection for buds and wood is practicable. 

 The late E. S. Goff of Wisconsin tried for some years to find such a stock. 

 He reports ^ working several hundred buds on the dwarf Flowering- Almond 

 without a single union. Better success attended efforts with the peach 

 on the dwarf Sand Cherry, Pruniis besseyii, of the Rocky Mountains. 

 Of the results, as he dismisses the flowering-almond, he says: 



" I next tried a form of the Sand Cherry, grown from pits procured in 

 western Iowa. This shrub is quite dwarf, attaining a height of only two 

 or three feet. With this stock I have been more successful. I inserted 

 a few buds in it in 1893, and while I had less expectation of success than 

 with the Flowering Almond, I succeeded much better. The Peach grew 

 vigorously on this stock, and by the second year had attained the height 

 of about five feet. The past season, although the best growing season we 

 have had for some years, the Peach-trees on this stock have scarcely 

 increased in height. They have branched rather thickly, and at present 

 are well filled with flower-buds, from which I infer that they wiU probably 

 not grow larger than they now are. At this height the trees are readily 

 protected by digging away sufficient earth from the roots, so that the 

 trunk may be bent down readily, when the whole is covered with earth. 

 The trees blossomed the past spring and set some fruit, though the fruit 

 failed to mature." 



In the same report. Professor Gofi mentions trying Pruuus subcordata 

 and a dwarf form of Prunus niaritima as stocks for the peach but with 

 what success does not appear. Dwarf stocks for peaches offer an invitation 

 to experiment which it is hoped some one will accept. Such an experiment 

 requires little more than land, time and material, for it is one of those cases 

 in which nothing succeeds like success and nothing fails like failiire so that 

 he who nms would be able to read. 



Tied up with stocks is another problem. Much is being said about 

 the necessity of selecting buds from trees having certain characters best 

 developed — as vigor or productiveness; large, handsome or well-flavored 

 fruits; or immunity to some disease. As yet there is no body of facts to 

 substantiate the claims of those who maintain that fruits can be improved 

 by bud-selection nor does present knowledge suggest that such a procedure 

 is a means of fruit-improvement. Quite to the contrary the histories of 

 varieties of peaches, as they may be read in this text, suggest that, " Like 

 begets like," while in the light of science a plant propagated by buds is 



' Goff, E. S. Card. & For. 9:448. i8q6. 



