168 



FRUIT TREES. 



may take advantage of this to renovate the stock- 

 branch that has become weak by successive prunings. 

 For this purpose, instead of the crochet pruning, we 

 preserve only the branch B, and cut it long for a fruit- 

 branch. During the summer all the shoots that ac- 

 company a fruit must be preserved, besides the one 

 which is nearest the base, and also one of the buds 

 appearing at A. At the end of a year we have ob- 

 tained the result represented by fig. 149. The primitive 

 branch B is then cut at C, and the branch which it 

 bears at its base at E : this last will be the fruit-branch. 

 The branch F is cut at Gr above two wood-buds which 

 furnish the replacers for the next year, at which time 

 the stock-branch becomes useless and is cut oflP at H. 



Training the Peach in Simple Oblique Cordon. 



Ten or twelve years are generally required to perfect 

 the wood of peach trees, trained as Verrier palmettos, 

 or one of the other large forms now in use. 



Now the average duration of a peach as an espalier 

 is twenty years ; it appears, therefore, that we employ 

 the h^lf of their existence to form their wood, and that 

 half the surface of the wall remains unoccupied during 

 five years. 



Considering that the care and attention necessary to 

 obtain these forms, even the least complex of them, are 

 so complicated as to be beyond the time and means of 

 ordinary gardeners, we now propose a method that 

 will avoid these inconveniences altogether. This 

 method (see fig. 160) is the same that we have re- 



