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branches to keep them far enough apart (three to four branches are 

 enough) and keep them as far apart as you possibly can, and at the 

 same time, pointing out into the space you expect to have filled with 

 tops and peaches, later on. During the next two years practice 

 cutting back each skeleton branch in early spring while the tree 

 is still dormant, to the extent of taking out a third or even a half 

 of the growth the tree made the season before. Some think this 

 practice retards bearing, but while there are some experiments, 

 I believe being conducted aiming at this point I am unable to say 

 what such pruning will do, other than to cause good stocky skele- 

 ton branches to develop with good diameter and strength enough 

 to hold up the future crops of fruit. I cannot help but believe, 

 when I see such methods followed, producing good strong branches, 

 and at the same time bearing as much fruit as a small tree three 

 years old can stand under, that it is not such a bad practice after 

 all. If that sounds too "fairy-like", I will add two more years and 

 say that under such methods of pruning (and by the way, with no 

 better location and soil than thousands of Pennsylvania farms have) 

 one grower cleared a little over, as he said, "$5,000.00 off of three 

 thousand trees, five years old." Not so bad when we consider that 

 at the age of three or four years, combined, the same trees had 

 paid for the thirty acres, and their own expenses, besides. 



As to culture, in brief, I'll say cultivate the peach orchard, not 

 just once, but cultivate it as a garden and use some form of cover 

 crop to protect the soil and tree roots in the winter. I am beginning 

 to believe that deep freezing of the soil is as injurious to the tree 

 and future crops as is late frost injury to the bud and currant 

 crop. The cover crop will also give us a chance to return to the 

 soil some organic and humus material. The cover crop may be a 

 non legume, such as barley, even rye or a good crop of weeds. It 

 might also be a legume if one believed that the trees were not re- 

 ceiving enough nitrogen. I do know of clover being used between 

 every other row in the orchard and allowed to stand two years 

 while the alternate rows were cultivated two years. 



This subject brings up the question of adding plant food to the 

 peach orchard. The addition of plant food to ordinary every-day 

 farm crops is very common, but some how or other, a large number 

 of people believed trees would do all right without plant food and 

 were not demanding food as other crops. I wish, here, to use the 

 idea of Professor Green of Wooster, Ohio, Experiment Station, 

 in one of his reports on the peach section of Ohio. 



"The grape industry having failed, for no other apparent 

 reason than the lack of plant food to keep the vines alive, grape 

 vines were taken out and immediately replaced by peach trees. 

 During all this time, continued cultivation was given the land 

 without the addition of any form of organic matter. Large crops 

 of peaches were harvested and the trees began to decline the same 

 as did the grapes. During all these years, no plant food had ever 

 been returned to the soil and by the help of the Experiment Sta- 



