438 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ November 2T, 
assume that everybody knows everything, and that descending to 
simplicities is derogatory to one’s reputation, is the great error of 
the times. If everybody knows a thing, why pen a line ? and if 
we find one who looks with contempt on a thing plainly put, depend 
upon it that man is a hunter after information if he has need of it. 
But to proceed. That plan will produce a quantity of Grapes, 
especially if not followed out as stated, but if the first year’s growth 
had been boldly cut down to the base of the rafter, and a year’s 
grace given to get root-power, that seeming year’s loss is really an 
eventual and permanent gain. 
Those who want a large quantity of Grapes in a small space of 
time, and who have no reserve—nursing canes—will find this long- 
rod system give them ; moreover, it is more than possible they will 
be less troubled with shanking and other ailments than by the spur 
system. Mind, that is for amateurs who do not understand the 
whole rationale of Vine-culture sufficiently to work without aid, 
and who desire a quantity of Grapes as easily as possible, regardless 
of the way it is produced or the appearance of the Vines producing 
it. By that plan the bulk of the fruit will always be at the top of 
the house. To obviate this, take up two reserve rods by the side 
of the fruiting cane. Stop one nearly halfway up, and let the other 
go tire full length. That will fill a house with fruit from the 
bottom to the top of the rafters. The half-length rod may extend 
to the top in the year of fruiting, and it will make a fine bearer the 
following year. Another from the bottom, stopped halfway up, 
will make sure for the lower part of the house, and so the roof 
may be covered with fruit year by year, every bunch from wood of 
the year preceding, no spurs having had time to form. With a 
good root-power to begin with, this plan is capable of producing an 
immense quantity of Grapes. It is the simplest of all forms of 
Vine-pruning. Anyone can do it who can cut away a dead Rasp¬ 
berry cane after fruiting, and train one young shoot halfway up 
the stake for bottom fruit, and another the full length for top 
fruit for the next year's work. The bottom half of the rod reach¬ 
ing to the top should, however, be divested of eyes, and the eyes 
on the bearing portion be thinned out to about 15 (not less) inches 
apart. This can be done in the spring by disbudding, and is essen¬ 
tial in preventing an overcrowding of foliage, the most common of 
all mistakes in Vine culture by inexperienced persons. 
Leaving for the moment the long-rod or Raspberry system, let 
us look at the spur plan of treatment. The young rod of the first 
year should, if at all weakly, be cut boldly down to the bottom of 
the rafter, and not be allowed to bear a bunch. Strength will 
thus be concentrated to produce one fine young rod which, its other 
treatment being right, is sure to follow, and will lay the founda¬ 
tion for a good constitutioned Vine for permanent work. If, how¬ 
ever, the cane is stout, strong, and well ripened, containing not 
more than a speck of pith, but is hard, round, and bright, then it may 
be allowed 2 to 3 feet of rafter, and to carry two to four bunches. 
It will perfect these, and make a fine extension cane at the same 
time without any danger of overcropping ; indeed the fine cane is 
the proof—the safety-valve that all is right on that side, the bunches 
being, as it were, the steam-governors. If these press heavily, if 
the rod does not progress freely, relieve pressure by removing 
a bunch or bunches as required, making above all things sure 
that the sap has a full and abundant flow upwards to form 
a fine extension growth of vigorous cane. After this, yearly ex¬ 
tension may at each winter's pruning be shortened to about a one- 
fourth length of rafter—that is, if the rafter is 1G feet, leave 
4 feet. In very strong canes more is quite permissible, but as a 
rule that is a safe approximative guide. Now these side shoots 
which have borne the bunches must be shortened. Tbisshoiten- 
ing forms the spurs. Cut very smooth and clean almost close to 
the main stem—-that is, leaving only the lowest prominent eye that 
has had the assistance of a leaf. There can be no mistake there— 
the lowest eye that has had a leaf at its base to be left, the rest 
cut away. If the Vine is in a good state that eye is sure to 
push and show fruit. If this close shaving should frighten, two 
clear eyes may be left ; this will give two shoots, and both will 
or ought to show bunches. In this case always rub one off, and 
let it be, if possible, the one farthest from the main stem. Some 
people will prune a Vine for twenty years, and in that time not 
produce a spur of 3 inches, while others will add to the spur 
at the least an inch a year. Close pruning is the best for this 
reason, that the lateral flow of sap is less impeded. Why ? Look 
at an old standard Rose and its knotty swellings by yearly cutting. 
Note the narrow, restricted, twisted, curling sinuosities of the sap 
vessels. It bears small blooms, and well it may. Cut its head off, 
and see the immediate gross vigour of the after-growth. The 
impediment to free sap movement is removed ; the narrow tortuous 
channels are substituted by free, open, sap courses. So it is with 
the Vine or any other plant. The plant—the Rose, the Vine—may 
not be in a bad state of health ; the roots may be sound, and the 
foliage not indicative of any disease ; the soil may not be 
seriously at fault, but may be reasonably well supplied as the food 
store ; yet, if not breaking down by disease, the plant may come 
far short of the perfectness of constitution desired, and fail in the 
character of bloom or fruit. The fault there lies in the transit 
of sap of food. In the Indian famine, Rice was plentiful while 
the natives starved, but a free channel of communication being: 
provided the plague was stayed. I am not sure that I have seen 
this idea expressed before, but many an example of a stubborn 
scraggy tree tells me there is something in it. On that account 
close spur pruning is preferred to a longer mode, which in half a 
dozen years results in a curled knuckled accretion of wood and, 
tissue through which the sap can only circulate by a sluggish- 
crawl, inadequate to the real requirements of the fruit and foliage- 
of the Vine it is attempting to feed. But an example may be in- 
mind that Vines wflh long twisted spurs bear good and satisfactory' 
fruit. Very well. Go on with the mode that answers. Nothing 
succeeds like success, and never change a plan that is satisfactory 
by whomsoever the change may be proposed. 
Before closing these notes I should like to remark in the matter 
of a young Vine, that I do not think the common practice a wise- 
one of divesting a young cane of all its eyes from the ground up- 
to the rafter—that is, not sweeping them off at a stroke the first 
year. The upright sashes of houses may be from 4 to 6 feet. 
That portion of the cane is not often required to bear fruit; still r 
for a year or two it is preferable to pinch a few shoots, and have a- 
little foliage there rather than leaving the stem absolutely bare. 
The rod of a Vine so trimmed never thickens in the same proportion- 
as the upper portion of the stem. The sap channels are contracted,, 
and often a rod will form a protuberance of incipient roots at 
the base of the rafter where foliage commences to get the nourish¬ 
ment it needs, and which the contracted vertical portion of the? 
stem cannot supply. A little foliage down to the very ground will- 
change all this. The stem thickens freely, and affords a sufficient 
medium of conduct for the free unimpeded sap-flow. A young 
Vine so managed will be as thick at the base, even thicker, than at 
any other part of the rod ; but divest it of eyes the first year 
5 or 6 feet up from the bottom, and nothing can prevent it becom¬ 
ing thickest at the top, like a ladder reared wrong end upwards. In> 
that case all the best fruit will be at the top of the house ; in the- 
other it will be equally good to the very bottom. This is not- 
theory but practice.—J. 
DORYOPTERIS PALMATA. 
Small plants of this Fern, in neat little pots, are very ornamental- 
and useful for decorative purposes, owing to the distinct appearance of' 
the foliage. The examples shown by Messrs. J. Veitch & Sons, in their 
collection of table plants, were very notable, and it might well be intro¬ 
duced where variety of leaf character is admired. The fronds differ 
greatly in size ; in young plants they are only a few inches across, but in. 
older and stronger specimens they attain a height of 10 or 12 inches. 
They are of a bright glossy green colour, deeply divided in palmate? 
fashion. The Fern is an evergreen from tropical America, and requires- 
the temperature of a stove or a warm greenhouse, with a compost of 
peat and sphagnum and good drainage. 
PLUMS. 
[A paper read by Mr. T. Francis Rivers at the Horticultural Club, Tuesday, November - 
12th, 1889.] 
The Plum is, I think, destined to be one of the most important of 
our economic fruits, if we can establish the fact that fruit growing- 
will be a profitable source of income in these islands j there is, however^ 
little doubt that a fair profit is derived and will be derived from the 
employment of land for this purpose, although orchards can never take 
the place that seems to be claimed for them, by those who have never 
practically undergone the expenditure of capital necessary to succeed 
in this as in other occupations, which depend upon the millions rather 
than upon private consumers for the disposal of produce. Theoretically' 
an orchard containing some 500 trees planted, as I think they may 
be planted, 9 feet row from row, and 9 feet in the rows, will pro¬ 
duce, after a certain period of years, from one-half to one bushel per 
tree, worth 6s. to 10s. per bushel, according to the season in which it i* 
sent to market, the early and late Plums realising a higher price than 
the midseason fruit. Theoretically also one grain of Wheat will pro¬ 
duce three or four ears, each ear containing some thirty or forty grains. 
Altogether the gross produce, therefore, of a grain of Wheat seems to 
promise an enormous return, but the returns of the cultivators of land, 
do not, however, show the enormous profit which in theory the/ 
ought to receive, and I may say that the practical cultivation o L 
