ORCHARD-HOUSE PRUNING AND TRAINING. 135 



Is much the best way of shortening such close- 

 lying shoots. Old-fashioned primers will not 

 readily abjure the use of the fatal knife, which is 

 only useful to trim those larger branches which 

 must sometimes be sawn away. When this is 

 done let the pruner remove the branch entirely, 

 and quite close to the part left. With this excep- 

 tion, a pair of scissors kept very sharp, and about 

 four inches long, have served for the whole of my 

 trees of every kind for years, both in-doors and in 

 the open air. 



In figs. 20 and 21 we have three types of shoots 

 which are most common on bush trees, after being 

 several seasons in pots. They are taken from 

 photographs. In either of them we readily recog- 

 nise the shorter shoot, a certain fruit-bearer in the 

 orchard-house, class 5. In fig. 20 we have, besides, 

 the shoot called fruit spray, class 7. This is also a 

 common and productive type, having single fruit- 

 buds and a terminal leaf-bud. It is common on 

 old trees to see whole branches, whose office seems 

 only to be to carry these fruit-bearers, which must 

 not be pruned. Fig. 21 is given mainly to show 

 the short and beautiful shoot of class 2, fruit shoot 

 properly so called. In long pruning this is the 

 mainstay of the system. It is rarely seen so short 

 out of doors, but being photographed from the 

 Stanwick Nectarine, which is a very strong-growing 



