ICROPPING. 231 



often mntUsited and destroyed, and the crops -tliemaelves oompete with 

 the roots of the trees for the food and moisture designed for the trees- 

 only. The best covering for such borders is doubtless one of cordon, 

 trees, as already pointed out. These perform most of the more important 

 functions of a good mulching material, with little or no injury to the roots> 

 and may often yield a crop of fruit almost as Taluable as that of tha 

 trees on the wall. Bead mulchings may also be of two kinds, which may 

 be designated as active and passive. The latter may consist of litter of 

 any sort, such as rotten straw, fern fronds, cocoa fibre refuse, long and 

 weather washed manure, &c. Its chief or only function is to resist the^ 

 extremes of cold and heat and'conserve the strength of the soil,. Active. 

 mulchings consist of manures more or less rich, that feed and enrich 

 the soil in addition to performing all the functions of the passive ones. 

 They are of great service on poor exhausted soils, and often reinvigorate. 

 exhausted trees or minimise the evils of overcropping. Either character 

 of mulching, that of conserving, or enriching, may be best, under different 

 circumstances. This mode of enriching peach borders by the employment 

 of rich top dressings is far better than the use of any manure in the 

 original, composition of the border. 



The soU itself may be , converted into an equivalent for mulching by 

 simply keeping an inch or two of its surface loose by frequent stirring. 

 The mass of the borders for peach trees should be pretty firmly consoli- 

 dated. They should neither be dug nor forked up at all deeply. But in 

 the absence of any proper enriching or surface cropping it is often very 

 useful to the trees and conservative of the best qualities of the soil to 

 preserve a loose surface. 



CROPPING. 

 7. — Setting. 



This is generally effected ^without any direct help from the cultivator in 

 the open air. In districts where bees are scarce, however, it may be well 

 to go over the blossoms a few times, touching each lightly with a dry camel 

 hair pencil. This wiU be sure to distribute the pollen freely. If bees 

 are seen on the flowers leave the work to the bees, as they wiU do it 

 better. During dry weather, too, several overhead syringings may be 

 given when the trees are in flower. For fear, however, of adding to the 

 power of frosts over the blossoms, such syringings should be given about 



