136 
NAT. ORDER. POMACES. 
blossom-bud, and bears the third summer. Some useful observa- 
tions on the management of Pear-trees, in correspondence with the 
above, will be found in various parts of the Caledonian Horticultural 
Society's Memoirs. 
Summer pruning, While the spray is young and soft, but not 
until the wood-shoots can be distinguished from spurs, rub off the 
foreright, the disorderly, spongy and superfluous shoots of the year, 
rather than let them grow woody, so as to require the knife. Retain 
some of the most promising, well-placed, lateral and terminal shoots, 
always keeping a leader to each main branch, where the space will 
permit. Leave the greater number on young branches not fully sup- 
plied with branches. Train in these at their full length all summer, 
in order to have a choice of young wood in the winter pruning. 
Occasionally, on old trees, or others where any considerable vacancy 
occurs, some principal contiguous shoot may be shortened in June to 
a few eyes, for a supply of several new shoots the same season. 
Winter pruning. This may be performed any time from the 
beginning of November until the beginning of April. If on young 
trees or others a further increase of branches is necessary to fill up 
either the prescribed space or any casual vacuity, retain some prin- 
cipal shoots of last summer, to be trained for that purpose. As, how- 
ever, many young shoots will have arisen on the wood branches and 
bearers, of which a great part are abundant and disorderly, but 
which have received some regulation in the summer pruning, we 
must now cut these out close to the mother branches, while we are 
preserving the best in the more open parts. Examine the parent 
branches, and if any are very irregular or defective in growth, either 
cut them out close, or prune them to some eligible lateral to supply 
the place ; or if any branches be over extended, they may be pruned 
in to such a lateral, or to a good fruit-bud. Cut out the least regular 
of the two crowded, also any casually declined bearers, with decayed, 
cankery and dead wood. The retained supply .of laterals and ter- 
minals should be laid in as much at length as the limits allow, in 
