PRUNING AND TRAINING. 



407 



plant may be thrown into the flower-buds and 

 the shoots that produce them. Shrubs are, 

 however, much neglected in this respect, and 

 by far too little care is taken to thin them of 

 superfluous wood, to remove that which becomes 

 old and decayed, and of no other use than to 

 overcrowd the plant, and prevent a free circu- 

 lation of air from passing through it. Flowering 

 shrubs should be deprived of their decayed 

 flowers as soon as they fade, if the production 

 of seed be not an object. A want of precaution 

 in this respect exhausts the plants more, in 

 their exertions to perfect their seed, than that 

 of the production of the flowers themselves. 

 Stopping or pinching off flower-bearing shoots 

 after they have shown their flower-buds, as is 

 often practised on the rose, retards their season 

 of blossoming; while stopping the shoots around 

 them, on which no flower-buds appear, has just 

 an opposite effect. 



The barbarous practice of using the hedge- 

 shears— justified only by those who are too lazy 

 to use the pruning-knife, or too ignorant to 

 know how to use it — cannot be too severely 

 condemned. Yet nothing is more common than 

 to see fine and rare shrubs, which, if left to 

 themselves, would become the ornaments of the 

 lawn, metamorphosed into so many shaven 

 and shorn dumpy haycock-looking monstrosi- 

 ties of various sizes and shapes, presenting not 

 one single feature of their natural character or 

 form. One great plea is used in defence of the 

 practice, namely, the keeping them within pre- 

 scribed limits — few indeed, in these days, ven- 

 turing to assert that they are improved in ap- 

 pearance. Eoot-pruning would be a far more 

 justifiable operation, and judicious hand-prun- 

 ing, taking care that, while extending branches 

 are foreshortened, and some removed where 

 they are too crowded, the natural habit of the 

 tree or shrub be not destroyed. The shears, 

 as a pruning instrument, can only be usefully 

 employed in cutting ornamental hedges and 

 box-edgings, or in the formation of verdant 

 architectural subjects in the tonsile style. 



Cree's system of pruning forest trees. — This 

 system deserves the serious attention of all who 

 wish to grow forest trees with straight stems 

 and sound timber. The operation of fore- 

 shortening the branches, which forms the cha- 

 racteristic of this mode of pruning, is begun 

 while the tree is young— indeed, before it is 

 removed from the nursery — and is continued 

 until the trunk of the tree has attained that 

 height which the cultivator deems the most 

 proper for the purpose for which the timber is 

 intended. The philosophy of this mode of 

 pruning is twofold — namely, the production of 

 timber clean and free from knots; and this 

 most desirable end is attained, because the side 

 branches are shortened annually, whenever 

 they extend beyond three or four feet from 

 the main stem, and, as a consequence, they 

 seldom attain a greater diameter close to the 

 stem than about an inch ; and as these side 

 branches are not removed until the tree has 

 attained the height of 16 to 20 feet, the wound 

 caused by their removal speedily heals up, with- 

 out leaving a trace of their existence on the 



bark, or the vestige of a knot in the timber 

 when cut up for use — quite the antipodes to 

 the effects of removing large branches, as illus- 

 trated as by figs. 160 and 161. If these branches 

 be removed close to the trunk, but without 

 disturbing the bark of the latter, the wound in 

 all cases will heal over within two years. The 

 first removal of branches close to the stem does 

 not take place until the tree has, as we have 

 said, attained the height of from 16 to 20 feet, 

 with a stem, close to the ground, of nearly as 

 many inches in circumference ; and the mode 

 of removal is by taking one tier of branches off 

 annually, commencing with the tier nearest the 

 ground, and performing the operation a little 

 before midsummer, while the sap is in motion, 

 so that in its downward flow so much of it will 

 be arrested around the sides of the wound, and 

 matter deposited sufficient for the formation of 

 new bark, to cover over the part where amputa- 

 tion took place. 



By this process of foreshortening the side 

 branches, the tree is made to assume a narrow 

 conical form; and as the trees to which we refer 

 are supposed to be growing in a close planta- 

 tion, no other form would present so great a 

 surface of foliage to the action of light and air 

 within the same space, and it is to the pre- 

 sence of these elements we must look for the 

 accumulation of bulk in timber. The same 

 practice may be extended to trees growing 

 in open exposed places ; but while such may 

 not produce the same cubic contents of timber 

 within the same space of time that a tree would 

 growing alongside, and allowed to take its na- 

 tural course of growth, the timber of the pruned 

 tree, on cutting up, will be the superior. 

 After the trunk is in this way cleared of 

 branches to the height the cultivator desires, 

 all pruning ceases, and the top is allowed to 

 take its own course, so long as it is allowed to 

 grow. Mr Cree's mode is exceedingly well 

 adapted to coniferous trees, not only for the 

 production of superior timber, but also when 

 planted for shelter to other trees, as the operation 

 of shortening the side branches throws strength 

 into the leader, inducing an upright growth, 

 while the shortening prevents their spreading- 

 out tendency, and allows a much freer circula- 

 tion of air to the trees around them : if properly 

 followed out, it would admit of those planted as 

 nurses to remain longer, and to attain a more 

 useful size, than is usually the case, before their 

 total removal. This process should be strictly 

 followed in all cases where height to trees is a 

 consideration. 



Pruning and training will be found further 

 detailed under the heading of the various sub- 

 jects to which they are to be applied. 



Implements employed in pruning. — Many fanci- 

 ful implements have been from time to time in- 

 vented and recommended for this purpose. In- 

 genious although some of these are, and amusing 

 as they may be to amateurs, they are regarded 

 for the most part with indifference by the prac- 

 tical operator. The following we consider the 

 most useful, and with them every operation of 

 pruning may be advantageously accomplished. 



Of pruning- knives the peach-pruner a, fig. 



