1540 



ENCYCLOPEDIA OF PRACTICAL HORTICULTURE] 



jured, trees of compact form, if they liave 

 beeii animally pruned, should have their 

 main limbs shortened so as to leave only 

 a few inches of the new wood. If, how- 

 ever, the limbs are getting long and strag- 

 gling they may be cut back into two or 

 even three-year-old wood. Before severe 

 cutting is done the grower should be cer- 

 tain that there are not enough live buds 

 left to produce fruit. The peach sets such 

 an abundant quantity of fruit buds that if 

 a small percentage of them have escaped 

 injury there may still be enough to pro- 

 duce a paying crop of fruit. 



5. When the winter is so severe that 

 not only the fruit buds are killed but 

 the wood of the tree is badly discolored, 

 the trees may be invigorated by cutting 

 them back quite severely. The following 

 is a summary of results of pruning peach 

 trees during the severe freeze of 1898-9: 



6. Peach trees which were not pruned, 

 or in which only a part of the new wood 

 was removed after the severe freeze of 

 1898-9, started into growth first in spring, 

 and for two weeks after growth began 

 they appeared to be in more vigorous 

 condition than did pruned trees. 



7. This apparent vigor of trees that 

 were not severely pruned was only tem- 

 porary, however. Some of them died a 

 little later and none of them made satis- 

 factory growth throughout the season. 

 They seemed to have used up all their 

 energy in making a start. At the close 

 of the season they had made but little 

 new growth and this was confined main- 

 ly to the tops of the branches, the old 

 limbs and trunks containing only dead 

 twigs. Their annual layer of new wood 

 was very thin and some of their roots 

 died. 



8. Trees of bearing age that were cut 

 back so as to leave only the trunk and 

 bases of the main limbs died in some 

 cases, and where they did live, their 

 growth was unsatisfactory, many of the 

 sprouts starting from the unreliable seed- 

 ling stock below ground. 



9. Trees of bearing age which were 

 cut back into two-year-old wood in case 

 of young trees, and to three or four-year- 

 old wood in older trees, thus leaving 



stubs of the main limbs from three to 

 four feet long, made the best growth. 

 They made from six to nine feet of new 

 growth and entirely renewed their heads 

 during the following season. They also 

 developed a good layer of new wood on 

 their trunks and formed a good crop of 

 fruit buds. 



10. In the case of two-year-old trees, 

 those that were cut back so as to leave 

 the trunk and spurs of the main branches 

 two or three inches long did best and 

 made fine heads. 



11. One-year-old trees that were cut 

 back nearly to the original bud and had 

 a single sprout trained up during the 

 growing season made fine trees. 



12. The principal growth took place 

 near the extremities of the parts of the 

 tree that were left after pruning. Trees 

 that were cut back into more than 

 four-year-old wood failed to grow at all 

 in some cases, showing that in very old 

 wood the buds are too dormant to be easi- 

 ly started into growth. The amount to 

 cut away in renewing winter injured 

 trees requires good judgment in choos- 

 ing between leaving too much wood 

 (which results in weak growth and too 

 high heads) and cutting back too far into 

 old, dormant wood that will not start 

 new limbs. 



13. Experiments to determine the best 

 time to prune showed that trees that 

 were pruned any time after the severe 

 cold spell up to the time the buds began 

 to start in spring grew equally well. 



14. Good cultivation is of more than 

 usual benefit to peach trees during the 

 spring and summer following severe win- 

 ter injury. 



Pruning When Fruit Buds Have Been 

 Killed 



Occasionally the fruit buds of the peach 

 are killed by a severe winter. As soon 

 as the cold spell is over it is easy to tell 

 whether or not the buds are injured by 

 cutting through them. If the pistil in the 

 center of the bud looks fresh and green 

 the bud is all right. If the pistil looks 

 brown and shriveled, leaving a dark spot 

 in the center of the bud, the latter is 

 dead. Usually some of the buds winter- 



