288 
T II E G A R D E N M A G A Z I N E 
July, 1915 
develops into a fruit spur, and it always 
carries a lot of leaves that are of great 
value to growing trees. 
Finally, I do as little pruning as possible, 
and do that little with a pair of small 
pruners or scissors, or my finger nails, 
nipping buds. A low, open head is con- 
sidered to be best for apples, pears, plums, 
cherries, and peaches. To get this, the 
usual method is to select three or four or 
five, preferably three, frame limbs when 
the tree makes its first year’s growth, and 
cut back to stubs the rest of the limbs 
that the tree has made. The second year 
allow two branches to grow on each one of 
these three main frame limbs. The third 
year allow each of these branches to grow 
two more branches. Keep this up until 
the head of the tree is thoroughly estab- 
lished. Don’t allow the limbs on one 
branch to start out opposite one another, 
and as far as possible cut back the tips, 
when you do that at all, to a bud growing 
in the direction you want the new branch 
at that place to grow. 
Some varieties naturally are very upright 
growers and do not take kindly to this 
system of training. For them a centre 
leader system is best. Let the centre shoot 
grow right on up, heading it back somewhat 
each year, and every ten inches let it send 
out a branch. If possible have these 
branches come out quartering from one 
another, in a rising spiral about the trunk. 
I prefer to head back the frame limbs as 
little as possible. An exception to this is 
all dwarf trees and all peaches which must 
be headed back half to two thirds of their 
season’s growth. Heading back should be 
done in the winter. Pruning is a big sub- 
ject, on which you profitably can spend a 
lot of study. Here there is room for sug- 
gestions only. 
Grapes must be pruned in the winter. 
The summer pruning of raspberries and 
blackberries consists of pinching or cutting 
off the tips of branches and of all shoots 
more than two feet high, to cause a stocky 
growth and to make them throw out more 
fruiting wood or fruit spurs. Then, as 
soon as the crop of fruit is harvested, cutout 
all the old canes that have borne. With 
strawberries, after the first set of runners 
have rooted and have made enough plants 
for your hedge-row or your matted row, 
as you select, cut of or prune off all the 
other runners that form. Also cut off all 
the blossoms that come the first season. 
This, of course, refers to the old style or 
June bearing strawberries. Fall-bearing, 
or Everbearing, strawberries, require to 
have all the blossoms picked off up to 
within three weeks of the time you want 
ripe berries. This means, usually, to pick 
them off up till about the first of August. 
FEEDING TREES 
In your garden you can afford to feed 
your trees and plants about all they can 
stand. Some of this food may be given in 
the form of manure. But unless the supply 
of manure is very near and cheap, you will 
find that commercial fertilizer plus cover 
crops, mulches and tillage will be a more 
satisfactory source of the necessary plant 
food in your garden. 
Your soil — every soil, in fact — is made up 
largely of potash and phosphorus. Most of 
this plant food, however, is in an unavailable 
or insoluble form at the present time. 
The mechanical operation of admitting 
air into the ground and of draining away 
surplus water produces quite as marked 
effects as a liberal dressing of fertilizer. 
The good part about it is that there never 
will be any end to this response if other soil 
treatment is right. Besides potash and 
phosphorus, the one other important plant 
food is nitrogen. These three plant foods 
have to be present in your soil, and present 
in an available or soluble condition, before 
plants can make good growth. 
As a chain is no stronger than its weakest 
link, so the plant food in the soil, as far as 
growth is concerned, is there in no greater 
abundance than the quantity of the least 
present element. If there is an excess of 
one, for illustration, nitrogen, and a lack 
of another, say of potash, the excess nitro- 
gen merely will go to waste while the plants 
and trees starve for the potash. About the 
only reliable way of determining how much 
of each kind of plant food is in your soil 
and what is lacking that should be supplied, 
is to observe the growth made by the trees 
and plants. Chemical analysis of soil is 
a poor guide. The elements usually short 
in young orchards and gardens are nitrogen 
and phosphorus — principally the former. 
In old orchards nitrogen and potash are the 
foods most often needed. 
Give your garden thorough cultivation 
and thereby release or make available 
quantities of potash and phosphorus in the 
soil itself, grow cover crops and get as much 
nitrogen as you can from the air, then 
observe the growth made and apply the 
remaining plant food needed, in the form of 
commercial fertilizers. 
USING COMMERCIAL FERTILIZERS 
The best commercial source of nitrogen 
is nitrate of soda. Apply this at the rate 
of eight to sixteen ounces a square rod. 
You may be prevailed upon by fertilizer 
dealers to use what they call a complete 
phosphate. In that case buy only high 
grade goods, rich in potash and phosphorus. 
Its analysis should be something like 4 
per cent, nitrogen, 12 per cent, potash, and 
12 per cent, phosphorus. Apply it at the 
rate of five pounds a square rod. 
The best commercial form in which you 
can buy potash is muriate of potash. 
Apply this usually at the rate of one to two 
pounds a square rod. If your garden is an 
old one, and you have reason to believe 
that it lacks potash markedly, apply six 
pounds to the square rod. Kainit is 
another form of potash that should be ap- 
plied in ordinary gardens at the rate of 
three pounds to the rod. Wood ashes that 
have been kept dry may be applied also at 
the rate of twelve quarts to the square rod. 
They are a good source of potash. 
Phosphorus or phosphoric acid will come 
to you in the form of South Carolina rock, 
ground bone and Thomas slag. The ground 
or dissolved rock should be applied at the 
rate of two to three pounds a rod, the bone 
at the rate of about four pounds a rod, and 
the Thomas slag at the rate of two to three 
pounds a rod. These amounts are average 
or light applications. You often can go a 
great deal heavier than the amounts stated, 
with profit, but you should study the 
matter well, and know just exactly what 
you are doing before you start. Knowing 
thoroughly the needs of your garden and 
knowing the fertilizers will prevent wasting 
money and possible damage to trees and 
plants by the use of too much fertilizer. 
Never apply nitrogen to trees when they 
are in bloom or just before. To do so may 
cause the young fruit to drop. Straw- 
berries may be fertilized with nitrate of 
soda, one pound to a hundred feet of row. 
Or a complete fertilizer may be used on 
them, such as the one mentioned, at the 
rate of twelve quarts to the hundred feet of 
row. Once a year is enough to apply any 
or all of these fertilizers mentioned, except 
in the case of strawberries, when two or 
three applications during a season may be 
made. Apply all fertilizers by spreading 
them on the surface of the ground or mulch 
during May or June. 
Your garden will need lime. Supply 
this at the rate of six quarts to the square 
rod, once a year for two or three years, then 
once every three or four years. 
COVER CROPS FOR HUMUS 
Also, to make any plant food available, so 
roots can take it up, the soil must contain 
organic matter. You can supply a certain 
amount of this from the mulch, and from 
manure, etc. ; but by far your best way of 
getting sufficient quantity of it into the soil 
will be by means of cover crops. These 
crops are exactly the same for your garden 
as are used in large commercial orchards. 
The best plant of all for a garden cover crop 
is crimson clover. This is an entire success 
south of the climatic line of Trenton, N. J., 
and should be used whenever the soil is 
fine enough to get it to catch. North of 
this line it succeeds only under favorable 
conditions, and other crops may be better 
because they are more reliable. Sow about 
one and three fifth ounces of seed to the 
square rod. 
Vetch is the next best legume. It is 
hardy anywhere, North or South. Sow two 
fifths of a pint of seed to the rod. Cow- 
peas, Canada peas and field beans also are 
legumes, and are excellent cover crop plants. 
Sow one pint of cow-peas to the rod, one 
half to one pint of Canada peas, and three 
fourths to one pint of field beans. If your 
soil seems to be full of nitrogen, and trees 
and plants make an excess growth, it may 
be well to sow a non-leguminous cover crop. 
Rve probably will be your best one. Sow 
a pint to the rod. Turnips is another such 
crop you might use. Sow one half ounce 
of seed to the square rod. 
Do your regular cultivating, or mulching, 
all summer, up till July or August. 
