Pruning the Cherry. 219 
the tree with a covering of its own foliage. This was early. in- 
sisted on by the late Mr. Geiger, of San Jose, and as we have 
mentioned it, we will proceed first to describe his method of 
growing the cherry tree, as shown by the following illustration. 
Natural and Trained Growth of Voung Cherry Tree. 
The first figure shows the way unpruned young trees usu- 
ally grow in this State, shooting upward quickly and exposing 
their stems to sunburn and borers. The second figure shows 
Mr. Geiger’s method of developing spurs from the ground up to 
the head. These spurs not only furnish leaves to shade the 
trunk, but soon become fruit spurs and bear well. But this fig- 
ure also shows Mr. Geiger’s way of shaping the upper part of his 
tree by carrying up a leader with a regular system of side 
branches. He heads back at planting to two feet, pinching off 
the shoots below the head as stated, and allowing the shoots 
which form the head to grow larger, but they too are all pinchea 
