88 FIELD NOTES ON APPLE CULTURE. 



Low trees give as many wind-falls as high ones. The 

 apples on the under side of these low heads are gener- 

 ally inferior. They are small, green, speckled and insipid. 

 They get little sun, and, in consequence of dampness, 

 they mildew. A very low tree is an abomination. I had 

 ratlier have a very high one, if I could not have the 

 golden mean. 



It is a difficult matter to train some varieties into a 

 a satisfactory head. The Eh ode Island Greening is an 

 unmanageable grower. At least some of the sorts of 

 Greenings are ; for Greening, like some other of our 

 names, is one which covers a series of very nearly related 

 sorts rather than one well-defined variety. Some thirty 

 Greenings were trained up to the height of a horse when 

 they were young. Until they were fifteen years old they 

 were pruned regularly and judiciously, but at the expira- 

 tion of that time the lower limbs of twenty of them 

 touched the ground. The ten remaining ones continued 

 to hold their limbs horizontally, but in three or four 

 years they began to drop. Some of the trees formed a 

 perfect arbor, with a cool, still nook around the trunk 

 and measuring from fifteen to twenty feet in diameter. 

 On younger trees I tried many devices in the way 

 of pruning to keep the branches upright, but sooner or 

 later, with a few exceptions, their ends went down. A 

 few show an upright habit, but I do not believe that they 

 are true Rhode Island Greenings. There is no remedy 

 for this provoking habit of the branches. The drooping 

 can be delayed, and it will be less aggravating when it 

 does appear, if the lower branches are made stocky. If 

 all the side limbs are cut off for some distance, and a 



