February S6. 18*5. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
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THE PHILOSOPHY OF PRUNING. 
HE art of pruning fruit trees has, perhaps, re¬ 
ceived more attention from writers on practical 
gardening than almost any other horticultural 
subject since the days of Abercrombie, Hitt, or 
Speechley, down to the present time. These 
old writers often gave very accurate and full 
directions for pruning the different kinds ; and 
although there is in their writing much to avoid, 
there is, notwithstanding, a great deal that is 
useful and may be studied with advantage by those who have 
time to peruse them. Harrison in 1825 not only gave 
excellent and minute instructions on this subject, but he also 
gave such valuable hints on making and preparing fruit tree 
borders as to put to the blush many authors of modern date. 
In the present generation there are three authors who 
stand out very conspicuously as eminent teachers of this very 
difficult art—viz., Lindley, Rivers, and M. Du Breuil. By 
each of these authors we have the various methods of pruning 
explained on such sound physiological and scientific principles 
as the older writers could not possibly lay claim to. Each of 
them, especially the former, assisted to raise the art of prun¬ 
ing from the partial obscurity in which it was previously 
enveloped and placed it in a clearer, more accurate, and more 
attractive light. Those operations which had been formerly 
taught and executed by finger-and-thumb rule, they reduced 
to sound theoretical principles, so that the hands should not 
merely be guided by the mind, but so that a clear and de¬ 
finite reason could be given for the necessity of every opera¬ 
tion. To them, therefore, we are largely indebted for the 
great improvements which have recently been made in the 
different methods of fruit cultivation. Lindley was, perhaps, 
the greater teacher in a theoretical sense, but to the other 
two, and especially to Du Breuil as regards our own country, 
belongs the credit of putting those theories into useful and 
successful practice. To the French author, as well as to 
Mr. William Wardle, the author of the English version of 
his work, we owe a special debt of gratitude for the elaborate 
and excellent lessons it contains, and also to Mr. Thomas 
Rivers for his plain and graphic descriptions of his successful 
practice, all of which have done so much to increase and ex¬ 
tend fruit culture in this country. 
Winter pruning, as suited to the different kinds of fruit 
trees, is now generally so well understood that there is little 
necessity to refer to it specially here, only, perhaps, to re¬ 
mark that much injury is often committed by the inex¬ 
perienced, especially in pruning young exuberant trees, by 
annually heading them hard back with the intention of 
causing them to produce a fuller, better furnished, and more 
even-shaped framework, or base upon which to build the 
future tree. The unnecessary and injurious practice is a 
remaining relic of old times, something similar to that per¬ 
nicious practice which existed a few years ago in the medical 
profession of using the lance for the cure of nearly every ill 
to which the human body is heir. This barbarous annual 
practice of severe amputation produces no good effect on any 
No. 244 .—Vol. X., Thiud Skriks. 
fruit tree, and to some kinds, especially so to stone fruit, it is 
particularly injurious, especially when the soil in which they 
grow is naturally rich, and where the young main branches 
have a tendency to grossness. In such instances this 
practice invariably produces gumming and canker, so 
changing and checking the natural current of the sap as to 
produce even in young trees such a plethoric condition as to 
engender disease even while the trees are in a young state. 
If in following this system the time in filling the trellises 
or walls alone be taken into consideration the loss is great, 
but if the different crops of fruit which would otherwise have 
been forthcoming be also estimated, the loss will be even 
greater still. Instead of this annual mutilation, all that is 
required is to secure from the maiden tree five, or at most 
seven, main or leading branches, and instead of pruning 
these off or heading them back, allow them to remain their 
entire ripened length, depending afterwards for a sufficient 
number of well-placed young shoots for filling up the frame¬ 
work of the fruit tree to timely and judicious summer prun¬ 
ing. In old and previously neglected fruit trees there is some¬ 
times great necessity for careful and judicious thinning of 
the branches, so as to admit light and air to every part of 
the trees, but even in such cases it is neither prudent nor 
beneficial to have recourse to that thoughtless and severe 
lopping which is sometimes practised even by experienced 
cultivators. 
I remember once having seen a large and valuable 
orchard half ruined by the reckless manner in which the 
proprietor set to work to improve, as he called it, the con¬ 
dition of his trees. They consisted of good varieties, but 
they had been so much neglected previously, and the 
branches had become so thick, that the fruit, although 
plentiful, was exceedingly small and inferior in quality. 
Instead of gradually trying to effect an improvement by 
thinning a few of the smallest branches and young shoots 
each year, so as to cause no perceptible check to the trees, 
large branches were mercilessly sawn off, and the younger 
shoots severely thinned, with the result that some of the 
larger trees never recovered from the shock, the branches 
became diseased and gradually died, while it took years to 
restore the rest to health and fertility. 
This was, no doubt, an exceptional case, but similar one3 
unfortunately are still too frequent, and if not of common 
occurrence in the larger orchards, I fear we cannot say the 
same of those geometrically trained trees which generally 
occupy the quarters and borders of the kitchen garden. 
In pruning these, in order to keep them within reason¬ 
able limits, we annually resort to severe and injurious 
methods that often result in canker and decay, and which, 
although they may tend to produce neat handsomely grown 
shapes, are not, as a rule, calculated to promote either health 
or fertility. By this I do not mean to argue that these 
prettily trained trees are always incompatible with good 
results, but such is frequently the case, unless this whole¬ 
sale winter pruning is either wholly or partially obviated by 
supplementing a more rational and less severe method of 
treatment, such as the authorities I have already quoted 
have advocated so forcibly. 
I have stated that severe winter pruning is often the 
cause of much injury instead of being productive of health 
and fertility, not that I feel inclined to endorse unreservedly 
the statement sometimes made that the pruning knife ought 
in future to be confined to its sheath. At the same time, 
I firmly believe if it were less frequently and less freely used, 
good rather than evil would be the result. Moderate and 
judicious thinning in winter is, no doubt, sometimes neces- 
saary, but if careful and timely attention be paid to summer 
pruning it will seldom be required to any extent in the 
winter season. It is true, in regard to summer pruning, 
that to be successful it is essential that it should be performed 
at the proper time, even to a day, and very frequently it must 
be performed at a time when work generally presses heavil ^ 
No, 1900.—Vol. I XXII., Old Seeies. 
