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WHEN BEST TO PRUNE. 
For the winter pruning of- deciduous trees June, July, and 
August, and in late sorts as late as the middle of September, are 
the best months. Pruning may be started directly the wood is ripe, 
when the leaves fade and begin to drop off. It is recommended to 
give to apricots and cherries a preliminary pruning in the late 
summer, after the crop has been gathered. Trees thus pruned are 
less subject to gumming and dying back, and the leaf buds have thus 
more time to transform into fruit buds, and to perfect themselves. 
Varieties which shed their fruit often become more fruitful by 
being thus treated. 
As a rule older trees are ready for pruning before younger 
ones. 
In frosty localities, where stagnant, cold air hangs about 
hollows and gullies, it is advisable to delay the pruning of vines, 
peaches, and plants whose sap moves early, until later in the season. 
This delays the period of active growth, and may save the crop, 
ensuring a better setting, and also in some seasons warding off the 
early attack of the Black Spot or Anthracnose. As regards the 
grape vine, later pruning is, if anything, also preferable to early 
pruning, in respect to yicld of the crop and earliness of the period 
of maturity; but, of course, where wide areas have to be gone 
through it is not possible to delay until the right moment, this opera- 
tion. 
Summer pruning, on the other hand, is done when the tree is 
in active growth, as will be explained in a further chapter. 
VINE PRUNING. 
Pruning at Time ‘or TRANSPLANTING. 
In Western Australia, where the summer season is dry and 
protracted, rooted vines are more in favour than cuttings when 
planting a vineyard. The figure below shows how a typical rooted 
vine from the nursery bed is cut back prior to planting. The 
bruised roots are trimmed off, as shown at C, as well also as those 
fibrous roots along the stems: these, were they allowed to grow, 
would be too close to the surface, and would in the long, dry 
summer fail to maintain through the plant the requisite flow of the 
nourishing sap. If the rootlings are planted with a dibble in 
deeply prepared ground that has previously been manured, the 
roots may be cut back to stubs half an inch long. They will de- 
velop a deeper and stronger root system than vines with long roots 
set in holes dug in more shallow ploughed soil. Two good buds 
