April 6, 1882. ] 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
287 
appear in masses before they are many inches long. On trees in 
the open air some approve of allowing most of these to remain for 
a time with the view of improving the fruit, but plenty can be 
left to do this. As the young growths start many of them will 
be found extending towards the wall or at the back of the tree. 
These do no good, and if allowed to grow soon form a harbour for 
insects. Therefore in beginning to disbud all the back shoots may 
safely be taken first. When the shoots are only an inch in length 
they may easily be rubbed away, and they should be removed 
altogether. Others, again, will be found growing straight out ; 
these can never be trained in readily, and the best way is to 
remove them with the back shoots. 
This will complete the first stage of the operation ; but in a 
week or two the trees should be examined again, and this time 
many of the shoots growing along the sides of the branches must 
be removed. As a rule the young growths should not be left 
closer together than 1 foot, the best way being to allow a 
good one to remain near the base of last year’s wood and another 
at the top. This plan will always keep the trees well furnished 
with healthy young fruitful wood. Sometimes it will be seen 
that there may be more space above the old shoot than under it 
to train a young branch, and care should be taken that one is left 
for this. Crowding the young shoots will never result in any 
good. One healthy, well developed, and well ripened shoot is 
worth a dozen small spindly growths. Good wood can only be had 
by judicious disbudding, and care and labour spent in this direc¬ 
tion will always be amply repaid. 
Where the young growths are very crowded on Plum, Pear, 
and all other kinds of fruit trees it is always an advantage to thin 
them well. Stopping the growths after they have grown a foot 
will not do, as more growths may start on the same shoot when 
they are not wanted, but the best way is to remove them. The 
slightest pressure with the fingers will cause them to fall when they 
are small, young, and tender, and it is when they are in this state 
that they may be removed with the least injury and the greatest 
benefit to the tree. Under glass all kinds of trees may be dis¬ 
budded almost as soon as the leaves are formed, as the shoots 
extend so quickly that they would soon become crowded. It will 
be found that when the fruit is formed before disbudding is 
finished much of it is very closely connected with the young 
shoots, and in removing these care must be taken that the fruit is 
not broken away too. 
Vines, too, often need disbudding. On young canes the buds 
are often far too close together to be allowed to form permanent 
branches, and many should be removed before they have made 
much growth. Old spurs generally produce a number of shoots, 
but one is generally sufficient, and the weak and unfruitful growths 
should be removed as soon as possible. In all cases the object 
must be to improve the tree in leaving the best shoots in the vacant 
places, and above all avoid crowding.—A Kitchen Gardeneb. 
FRUIT-GROWING ON CHALK. 
As those who have had practical experience are fully aware, 
the successful cultivation of fruit on soils in which chalk greatly 
preponderates is far from being an easy task ; indeed, it may 
appropriately be described as uphill work from beginning to end. 
Should the attempt be made to grow fruit in the ordinary way— 
i.c., planting a tree and expecting it to flourish without anything 
further than the customary training, pruning, and autumnal mulch¬ 
ings of decayed manure, signal failure in the majority of cases is 
almost certain to ensue. This, of course, applies to soils of the 
very worst description, and to such fruit trees as Apples, Pears, 
Plums, Apricots, Peaches, and Nectarines. With small fruits, such, 
for instance, as Gooseberries, Currants, Strawberries, &c., the case 
is somewhat different, owing to their being mostly of a surface- 
rooting habit; still even with these more than ordinary pains are 
needed to ensure profitable and satisfactory results. 
The foregoing, it must be admitted, is simply the gloomy side 
of the question. It must not for a moment be supposed that 
success is impossible, or that such a thing belongs only to soils of 
a more genial character than those we are now dealing with. 
“ Where there’s a will there’s a way,” is an old adage, and one 
certainly which applies with a certain amount of force to fruit¬ 
growing on chalk. It is astonishing what a person may accom¬ 
plish if he only has the will, receives encouragement, and deter¬ 
mines not to be conquered in the struggle. That fruit trees may 
be made to flourish on extremely chalky soils will not admit of 
any doubt, but to accomplish this I must confess is a somewhat 
costly and laborious process. The last course to adopt where 
failure has hitherto been the only result is to make a fresh start 
and plant only young trees, say two or three years old, not more 
than four certainly. Previous to planting, trench the ground to a 
depth of 18 inches, and as the work proceeds work in a liberal 
dressing of well-decomposed manure and any decayed vegetable 
matter there may be from the refuse heap. Ashes from the burn¬ 
ing of prunings and other rubbish may also be advantageously 
employed in the same way. 
Young trees invariably thrive well the first two or three years 
after being planted ; but suffer them to remain longer without any 
further proceedings being taken, and the penalty incurred will 
make itself only too plainly visible. Yellow, sicklv-looking leaves, 
which are barely able to withstand the summer’s sun, and weak 
spindly growth are the inevitable results of such a system. To 
avoid this state of things and to produce a better, the person 
immediately responsible for the well-being of the trees should 
make up his mind to resort to that which, under the circum¬ 
stances, is the only safe remedy—namely, lifting and replanting 
the trees periodically, say once in three years. By adopting this 
practice the roots are prevented gaining a firm hold of the sub¬ 
soil, which is the cause of so much canker and decay, as it also 
is of many trees dying prematurely, and of fruit of an inferior 
quality. Wherever this periodical lifting system is adopted, the 
trees not growing on walls or as espaliers must of necessity be 
treated either as pyramids or bushes. Grown in this way they 
become, as regards lifting and replanting, manageable for a 
number of years, and certainly far more than trees which have 
been unattended. The above applies to Apples, Pears, Plums and 
Cherries, also Apricots on walls. 
With Peaches and Nectarines unquestionably the best plan is to 
make and prepare a special border for them, take out the soil 
2 feet deep, concrete and drain the bottom, and at a distance of 
4 feet from the wall on which the trees are to be grown and 
parallel to it build a 4£ inch wall of either concrete or brick¬ 
work. Now we have to prepare the material for the border. 
Procure the best turfy soil obtainable in the locality ; mix the 
same with the top soil taken from the border, in proportion of 
one load of the latter to two of the former ; give a fair sprinkling 
of brick and mortar rubbish, and if the turf is only of an ordinary 
quality add a little decomposed manure. With this to grow in, 
and the necessary attention as to training, pruning, watering, 
mulching, &c., there need be no apprehension as to what the 
ultimate result will be.— Et Castera. 
CUTTING DOWN CAMELLIAS. 
I FULLY endorse what Mr. Stephen Castle says at page 240 
respecting going to extremes in cutting down Camellias. Unless 
the plants are in a vigorous state of health the less they are cut 
the better, unless, indeed, they are so debilitated as to require 
beheading. I remember well, when foreman in the gardens at 
Lilleshall, Salop, that we used to cut Camellias with wood 1 to 
2 feet long for very large glasses, and the plants appeared to like 
it. Certainly for health and bloom they were not excelled, but 
they were liberally treated and grown specially for the purpose 
of securing plenty of wood with the blooms ; had we given them 
ordinary greenhouse treatment it would have been impossible to 
cut the number of blooms we did. 
When it is desired to restrict the extension of the leading 
shoots remove the terminal growth as soon as it starts, and thus 
divert the flow of sap into the lateral eyes, which will then break 
into growth ; but even that process is not always advisable, some 
varieties being more “shy” than others, although as a rule a 
greater degree of heat and atmospheric moisture will induce 
them to start. 
I have a large plant of Camellia alba plena in my care which 
last year produced nearly 3000 blooms—1500 more than I would 
have* allowed it to bear if there had not been a higher authority 
than mine. The result was that the majority of the terminal 
growth buds “ wilted ; ” the few that were strong commenced 
growing rapidly in April, and would have taken the entire re¬ 
maining strength of the tree, and thus have spoiled its contour for 
severaryears. Being anxious to retain the symmetry of the plant 
(which is a dwarf bush some 40 feet in circumference) and obtain 
at least the usual number of growths, I decided to remove the few 
growths that had started ; and the results more than justified my 
calculations, although some “ wiseacres ” belonging to the craft 
shook their heads when I told them what I intended doing in the 
matter.—J. U. S. 
Stephanotis FLORIBUNDA. —I send you a spray of Stephanotis 
from the same plant as last year. It has been growing all the winter, 
and now covers the roof and one end wall of a house 22 feet by 14. 
It is in a 12-inch pot, and has at the. present time upwards of a 
thousand trusses of flowers on it, averaging ten pips to a truss, some 
of the joints showing two trusses. It bloomed last year and the year 
