PfctTNING. 93 



formed, they become furnished with fruit-producing buds. 

 The vigorous one-year shoot of the cherry (B) is mostly sup- 

 plied with leaf-buds; but the short spurs on the second 

 year's wood, which are but shortened branches, are covered 

 with fruit-buds, with only a leaf-bud in the centre. 



This also explains the chief reason that young and vigor- 

 ous trees, whose wood and bark are comparatively soft and 

 yielding, and through whose large and unobstructed vessels 

 the sap flows without restraint, do not bear so freely as 

 those whose older and more rigid parts impede the circula- 

 tion. A young tree kept in a very thrifty condition may 

 not produce fruit-buds for many years ; while if checked in 

 its growth by imperfect culture, it will bear at a much earlier 

 age. Some free-growing varieties, as the Bartlett pear, 

 from a constitutional peculiarity, will bear at one-third of 

 the age required for others, as the Dix and Tyson. 



The production of fruit-buds may be accomplished artifi- 

 cially by checking the growth of vigorous trees ; but such 

 treatment, out of the ordinary course of nature, though some- 

 times useful, should be cautiously applied, as the first crop 

 gives still another check, and often materially injures the 

 tree and the quality of its subsequent crops. 



Summer pruning. Another and an unobjectionable mode 

 of attaining the same end, is summer pruning, which is 

 effected by pinching off the soft ends of the side-shoots after ' 

 they have made a few inches growth. In these the sap 

 immediately accumulates, and the young buds upon the 

 remainder of these shoots, which otherwise would produce 

 leaves, are gradually changed into fruit-buds. To prevent 

 the breaking of these buds into new shoots by too great an 

 accumulation of the sap, a partial outlet is left 

 for its escape through the leading shoot of the 

 branch, which at the same time is effecting the 

 desired enlargement of the tree. In the an- 

 nexed figure (c) a branch is represented with 

 its side-shoots thus undergoing conversion into 

 fruit-spurs, the dotted lines showing the position 

 which these shoots would have taken if left 

 unpinched. 



It will be seen that two great objects are here 

 attained, — the fruitfulness of the tree, and the ^ 



