Heading. in Fruit Trees. 293 
of unrest which is apt to be fatal to the best produc- 
tiveness. 
The question of heading-in of trees is one which 
is commonly misunderstood, and upon which there is 
the greatest demand for information. It is impossible 
to give any dogmatic statements as to whether the 
operation shall be practiced or not. There are two 
or three considerations which the grower should 
chiefly bear in mind, which may help him to think 
out the problem for himself. In the first place, it is 
largely a question of the type of training which the 
grower prefers: that is, every good fruit-grower will 
set before himself a certain ideal type or form of 
tree, and he will bend all his energies uniformly and 
consecutively to the working out of this idea through- 
out all the years of the plantation. If his ideal is 
for trees which shall have round and dense heads, 
then he will, of course, head-in the stock from year 
to year; if, however, he sets for himself the ideal 
of a tree with the natural form and open head, he 
will not head-in, as a rule. Whichever purpose the 
grower sets in his mind should be worked out sys- 
tematically and logically from first to last. The 
other factor which chiefly determines the question of 
heading-in is that of redundant growth whilst the 
plants are young. As a rule, young trees grow 
more thrifty and upright than old ones do, and the 
grower should, therefore, {not be misled into thinking 
that his trees will keep up their present pace after 
they have come into maturity and bearing. Kieffer 
pears, for example, make a very tall and narrow 
