362 PRINCIPLES OF PBUNING. 



among the most miscliievousj operations that can take place 

 upon a plant. 



The object of pruning is either to influence the production 

 of flowers and fruit, or to augment the quantity of timber, 

 These two purposes demand separate consideration. 



A. Pruning for Flowers or Fruit. 



When a portion of a healthy plant is cut off, all that sap 

 which would have been expended in supporting the part 

 removed is directed into the parts which remain, and more 

 especially into those in the immediate vicinity of it. Thus, 

 if the leading bud of a growing branch is stopped, the lateral 

 buds, which would otherwise have been dormant, are made to 

 sprout forth ; and, if a growing, branch is shortened, then the 

 very lowest buds, which seldom push, are brought into action ; 

 hence the necessit y, in pruning, of cutting a useless branch 

 clean out; otherwise the removal of one branch is only the 

 cause of the production of a great many others. 



This effect of stopping does not always take place immer 

 diately ; sometimes its &st effect is to cause an accumulation 

 of sap in a branch, which directs itself to the remaining buds, 

 and organizes them against a future year. In ordinary cases, 

 it is thus that spurs or short bearing-branches are obtained in 

 great abundance. The growers of the Filbert, in Kent, 

 procure in this way greater quantities of bearing wood than 

 nature unassisted would produce ; for, as the Filbert is always 

 borne by the wood of a previous year, it is desirable that every 

 bush should have as much of that wood as can be obtained, for 

 which every thing else may be sacrificed; and such wood is 

 readily secured by observing a continual system of shortening 

 a young branch by two-thirds, the effect of which is to call all 

 its lower buds into growth the succeeding year ; and thus each 

 shoot of bearing wood is compelled to produce many others. 

 The Peach, by a somewhat similar system, has been made to 

 bear fruit in unfavourable climates (Hort. Trans., ii. 366) ; and 

 every gardener knows how universally it is applied to the Pear, 

 Apple, Plum, and similar trees, and even to the Fig-tree. 



