THE ECONOMIC PLANTS OF JAPAN. 



II 



prefecture, where it is said that the best pears in Japan 

 are grown. So also in Shiwosa, a district in the penin- 

 sula east of Tokio, and other places. 



There are two features of interest in connection with 

 the culture of these pears. One is that for stocks they 

 use quite generally a kind of wild pear which strikes root 

 readily from cuttings, so that this is quite the ordinary 

 method of propagation. I suspect that it is the wild form 

 of the species ; but I am not certain of it, as I have been 

 able to see only very small trees. The gardeners and 



early in spring, they soon develop roots and top, and of- 

 ten make respectable trees at the end of the first year. 

 These are sometimes planted in the orchard without 

 grafting, and sometimes grafted with other sorts. 



The other feature which strikes a foreigner as pecul- 

 iar is their method of training. The Japanese pear 

 grower almost invariably trains his trees on a horizontal 

 trellis made of bamboo poles, and erected about five and 

 a half or six feet from the ground. The trees are plant- 

 ed at varying distances, but usually about twelve feet 



Fi.3. 5. J.\p.\xESE Pe.\r — MiNo OR Okago. Natur.-\l Size. (See page 10. 



nurserymen to whom I went for information invariably 

 told me that it was the " Yama-nashi," that is, wild pear 

 or mountain pear. The stocks I saw growing had thin- 

 ner, narrower and more deeply and irregularly serrate 

 leaves than the cultivated forms. But several of the 

 latter, if not all of them, also take root readily from cut- 

 tings, aqd are often used for stocks. For this purpose 

 they use branches three-fourths to one inch in diameter, 

 cut in lengths of about two feet. Stuck in the ground 



apart each way, and made to form a whorl of leading 

 branches at a height of four to five feet. As soon as 

 they reach above the trellis they are bent down and se- 

 cured to the poles, and thereafter pruned with a care 

 and system which rival the art of the masters in espalier 

 training of the West. 



The growers advance many reasons for their adher- 

 ence to this system. They claim that the trees yield 

 more and larger fruit than free-standing trees would — a 



