572 GARDENING FOR THE SOUTH. 



on the shelves of a cool, dark fruit room, each one sepa- 

 rately enveloped in paper or loose cotton. This is not 

 necessary with the summer varieties. Pears, like apples, 

 must be gathered by hand, with the same precaution to 

 prevent bruises, or they will soon decay. Winter pears 

 should hang as long as may be upon the tree. A week or 

 two before their proper time to ripen, bring them from 

 the fruit-room into a warm apartment; this will much 

 improve their flavor. 



Propagation and Culture. — Pears are propagated by 

 budding or grafting on seedling pear stocks or on certain 

 varieties of the quince. Pear suckers should never be 

 employed for this purpose, for they seldom have good 

 roots, and the trees are short-lived; a great deal of preju- 

 dice exists against pear culture from this cause. Seed- 

 lings raised from the thrifty-growing kinds that are found 

 about the country are much more healthy than those 

 raised from the improved varieties. 



Sow the seed thickly in autumn, in drills eighteen 

 inches apart, or, better still, mix the seed with sifted sand 

 in a box, and place it out doors during winter, and sow in 

 the spring, when they begin to sprout, in good, rich 

 earth; the latter mode saves the seed from being de- 

 stroyed by ground mice. 



Ashes are an excellent application to the seed-bed; the 

 soil should be moist, as much of the value of the stocks 

 depends on vigorous and continued growth the first 

 season. Take up the stocks in November or December, 

 shorten the tap-root, and reset them in rows four feet 

 apart, putting those together which are of about the same 

 size. The best of them, if in a good, rich soil, will be fit 

 to bud during the next summer, and nearly all the balance 

 can be whip-grafted the ensuing spring. 



Many kinds of pears grow well on the quince, and come 

 some vears earlier into bearing. We have found the com- 



