PRUNING. 



345 



ture -lands. When these are cut smoothly over with the scythe, they are 

 said to spring up again, at least after the first cutting ; but the stems being 

 bruised or torn off, are said to die down to the root, and not to reappear ; 

 probably from exposing a much greater surface of the sap-vessels to the 

 action of the air, and thus diminishing their contractile power. Bruising the 

 leaves of melons by beating them is a Dutch practice, said to increase the 

 fruitfulness of the plants, which it may probably do by checking their 

 luxuriance; but the effect of the old practice of beating the heads of 

 walnut-trees when the fruit is ripe is of much more doubtful efficacy. A 

 very full crop of pears was obtained by the llev. John Fisher, of Wavendon, 

 in Buckinghamshire, from trees which before had not borne at all, by 

 twisting and breaking down the young shoots (fig. 260) late in the 



Fig. 260. A pear-tree with the young shoots twisted, broken, and fastened down, to stagnate 

 the sap, and cause them to produce blossom-buds. 



autumn, when the wood had become tough, and after the sap had retreated. 

 Mr. Fisher found this practice succeed with branches on which ringing had 

 been tried without success, and he states that the pendent branches con- 

 tinued perfectly healthy. — (^Gard. Mag.., vol. iii. p. 175.) 



775. Clipping is a species of pruning that was formerly much more general 

 in gardening than it is at present, though as the ancient architectural style 

 of hedges and avenues is gradually coming into vogue, the practice will again 

 become frequent. At present clipping is chiefly confined to common hedges 

 and box-edgings, the modes of dressing which by the shears have been 

 already described (546, 547). 



776. Root-pruning. — As the nourishment of a plant. is absorbed from 

 the soil by the roots, it is evident that the supply will be diminished by 

 partially cutting off its source. The effect of cutting through the stronger 

 roots of trees is analogous in its first effects to that of ringing ; with this 

 difference, that the returning sap is stagnated throughout the whole tree, 

 instead of being stagnated only in the parts above the ring. The amputated 

 root, however, having the power of throwing out fibres, soon finds a vent 

 for the descending sap, and the analogy between root -pruning and ringing in 

 a short time ceases. The operation may be performed so as to effect a two- 

 fold result. Its immediate effect is to check the luxuriancy of wood shoots, 



