224 
TRANSPLANTING AND GRAFTING TREES. 
TRANSPLANTING and grafting trees. 
In looking over agricultural journals and other 
publications during the last year, I have observed 
numerous articles upon the planting of fruit and 
ornamental trees. These almost without excep¬ 
tion differ so widely from my own experience, that 
though averse to obtruding my thoughts and opi¬ 
nions upon the public, I am induced in the present 
instance to address a few lines to you with the 
hope of offering some useful suggestions. The 
general strain of teaching on this subject is that 
almost all trees, whether for fruit or ornament, 
should be transplanted before the close of February 
at the latest, and, in fact, it seems to be an estab¬ 
lished axiom, that a tree is never to he removed after 
the sap has begun to circulate. As far as my own 
experience extends, this rule, which, if I am not mis¬ 
taken, is to be found in almost so many words in 
one of the numbers of the Agriculturist for 1845, is 
wholly wrong; and if we would save ourselves 
much trouble and expense in this most interesting 
and important department of our rural affairs, it 
should be exactly reversed in all cases, except 
where trees are to be transported so far as to occa¬ 
sion their being kept long out of the ground. In 
other words, never remove a tree, where you have 
the opportunity of replanting it immediately, till 
after the sap has not only started, but begun to cir¬ 
culate freely. If this appears to be a strange and 
unreasonable doctrine, it can only be said in reply, 
“ one fact is worth a thousand theories; and there 
are more things in this world than are dreamed of 
in our philosophy.” 
It is now eight or twelve years since I first began 
to improve a small place in the western part of 
North Carolina. I commenced setting out a very 
considerable number of trees of various kinds, 
among which, however, were a large proportion of 
the common locust. This was done during the 
months of January and February, according to 
rule ; but to my great disappointment, not a dozen 
of the whole collection took root. The year fol¬ 
lowing the effort was renewed with similar results, 
and so matters went on for several seasons in suc¬ 
cession. At tast, accidental circumstances prevent¬ 
ed my obtaining trees till it was so late that I had 
little or no expectation of their living. About 20 
locusts were procured just as the leaves were burst¬ 
ing into view, and of these only one failed to live 
and flourish. At the same time a number of young 
apple trees were transplanted, on which the leaves 
were fully out. They had been carried several 
miles in the hot sun, without protection to the 
roots; yet of these only two perished. 
Subsequent experience has fully sustained the 
idea thus suggested. Of nearly 200 trees trans¬ 
planted lately at my present residence, not one was 
removed till late in the spring—all after the sap had 
begun to flow, and many after the leaves, had at¬ 
tained a considerable size. Of these scarcely any 
are dead, and without exception were such as were 
taken up earliest in the season, and in the most 
backward state. The same has been found the 
case with evergreens. Pines, and other trees of the 
same family, when transplanted in winter, have 
rarely done well; whereas those set out late in the 
spring, have been found to contend successfully 
against negligent treatment, and the most withering 
drought. 
W hether there is anything in a southern climate, 
or in accidental circumstances, to account for these 
things, I do not pretend to say. Possibly attempts 
may be made to explain them in some such way. 
To me it appears anything but unreasonable to re¬ 
gard them as facts founded in nature. A tree re¬ 
moved when entirely destitute of sap, has nothing 
to sustain it against the blighting influences natu¬ 
rally consequent upon such a change of condition. 
Its whole system receives a shock at the outset by 
the breaking of its roots ; and it shrinks and 
withers from other causes before new roots can put 
forth to sustain it. But, on the contrary, if removed 
after the circulation has commenced, it has sufficient 
to live upon while the rootlets or fibres, which 
always protrude simultaneously with the leaves and 
hranchlets, are shooting out in search of new sup¬ 
plies of nourishment (a). 
The same view of the case will serve to explain 
another fact, viz., that grafts take much better if 
cut after the sap has begun to flow. At least such 
has been the result of my own observations the 
present season. Of a large number taken from the 
tree just as the buds were beginning to swell, only 
one of my own has failed; and a neighbor, who 
used largely from the same lot, has lost not one. In 
this case, however, the stocks were in leaf into 
which the grafts were inserted, and this, it would 
seem but reasonable should always be the case. 
Of my grafts which were cut this year in January 
and February, and inserted with equal care, not one 
half succeeded. T. S. W. Mott. 
Belvoir, N. C.,May 21 , 1846. 
(a) Much has been written respecting the proper 
season for transplanting trees—summer and autumn 
for evergreens, and spring or mild weather in win¬ 
ter for deciduous trees. The principle which justi¬ 
fies these practices is, that all plants whatever, 
with few exceptions, are most safely removed when 
they are in a comparatively dormant state, and when 
the weather is temperate, and the air moist and 
still, rather than dry and in motion. As it is 
known that the greatest degree of torpidity in any 
plant exists a short time before it begins to grow or 
push out shoots, late in winter or early in spring, 
is regarded as the best time for transplanting. The 
chief difference to be regarded between evergreens 
and deciduous trees, is that, from the circumstance 
of the former being at no time, whatever, in a com¬ 
pletely dormant state, they may be removed at any 
time in winter, spring, or autumn, when the wea¬ 
ther will least affect their fibrous roots and leaves 
by evaporation. This is in perfect accordance 
with the practice of the best gardeners; and it has 
been laid down as the most judicious mode founded 
on experience. As the apple tree and the common 
locust are both very tenacious of life, they may 
both be propagated when kept moist, wim great 
facility, at almost any season, by cuttings of the 
roots, or by suckers, which are often thrown up in 
great numbers around the trunks ; but if our cor¬ 
respondent were to attempt to cultivate the walnut, 
and many other trees, by his mode of transplanting, 
we think he would be sorely disappointed. ’Tis 
true, we believe, as he intimates, that the mildness 
