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THE ART OP 



late in the season, and its branches should be tied up together 

 some time before grafting, and then- tops cut off immediately 

 afterwards. It very frequently happens with the damson and 

 St. Julien in dry soils, or with old stocks, that the sap ceases 

 Sowing in the middle of summer. In that case it will be pru- 

 dent to have pinched the scion-branches beforehand, so that 

 their buds may be sufficiently matured to be grafted early. 

 Should there be an after-How of the sap, those buds which 

 have missed can be replaced. In nursery quarters, this re- 

 placement is often made with buds of the apricot, peach, or 

 almond, instead of the same kind of plum. The stock is not 

 headed down till after winter. Young scions grafted close to 

 the ground on the Myrobalan stock should be secured to stakes 

 as soon as they have grown about 20 inches high. The heel 

 of the graft should be removed before the fall of the leaves. 

 Plum-trees which are branch-grafted do not suffer so much as 

 other kinds from being transplanted at the time of grafting. 

 Ordinary cleft-grafting is the most certain. It is performed 

 when the sap begins to flow in March, or before its complete 

 subsidence in September. In crown-grafting the plum, the 

 scion should be cut sufficiently thin beyond the pith as far as 

 the inner bark. Tall standard plums are obtained by grafting 

 either close to the ground or otherwise. But, with a stunted 

 stock, the dwarf bushy kinds, such as the Alirabelle, form a stem 

 with difficulty. In such a case a robust and vigorous inter- 

 mediary should be employed, such as Imperiale ottomane, 

 ]\Iitchelson, St. Catherine, Eeine-Claude de Bavay, &c. This 

 grafted close to the ground on the stock will, in its turn, be 

 grafted as a tall standard with the tender kind in at least two 

 years after the first grafting. The stocks which are intended 

 for standards should be cut back when one year planted. The 

 varieties Eeine-Claude, Mirabelle, and Quetsche are mostly 

 propagated by seed, but it is better to graft them, selecting 



