ORCHARD TREES : SEEDLINGS, GRAFTING, BUDDING. 
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absence in these days of that intelligent industry in the selection of the best varieties of fruit for 
cultivation, which so distinguished the planters of the last century. There is much force in these 
observations, though they do but present a one sided view of the true cause of the decadence in 
the quality of Cider and Perry. The present state of our Orchards is most unsatisfactory in this 
respect, since they contain so large a proportion of varieties, without name, or character, or merit. 
Seedlings. —Every Orchard farm, properly cared for, has a nursery for young trees in some 
out of the way corner of the garden, or field. Here young Crab stocks are procured by placing the 
“must” or squeezed pulp from the Crab Apples, after verjuice has been made, in rows beneath the 
soil, when the pips, uncrushed by the mill, spring up, and in four or six years, after a few careful 
transplantings, become strong enough to graft with varieties of fruit, whose merits are established. 
The most approved method of raising young stocks is to separate the pips from the “ must ” 
by washing, so as to obtain clean seed. Mix this with moist sand, or light mould, and set aside until 
February or March. Then sow it in drills an inch deep, on a firm, well manured soil, made as for an 
onion bed. The seed should be sown thinly, so as to get the young plants an inch or two apart. A few 
will vegetate immediately, but it will generally remain a year in the ground before the full crop appears. 
The seedlings are apt to grow unequally, but by the end of the second year they will generally 
be ready to transplant into rows a foot apart, and three or four inches from each other. Here they 
must remain for two years, when they will be strong enough to plant out in the nursery in “ quarters,” 
as it is termed, that is on ground well trenched, two spades deep, and heavily manured. They 
should be planted in rows two feet six inches apart, and one foot from each other, when they 
will be ready for budding the following August. Seedlings should always be transplanted early in 
autumn as soon as the leaf falls, and never later than the beginning of November. 
It is however still more common to grow the young seedlings from the pips in the “must” 
from the cider mill. There can be no question, that these young Apple seedlings often escape 
grafting altogether. They have often been found to bear a good looking, “ eyeable,” fruit, and were 
then planted out to supply the vacancies that are so constantly occurring in the Orchard, and it is 
by this careless practice, that worthless varieties are now found to prevail so extensively. 
Budding and Grafting. —Budding is much more practised in these days than formerly. 
It presents greater economy in material, in labour, and, above all, in time. The young seedlings 
may be budded about the third or fourth year, and if in the following Spring the buds should fail they 
can then be grafted, and the chance of blanks on the bed be very greatly diminished. Whichever 
process may be adopted it should be done in the nursery where the growth of the scions may be 
well protected and regularly superintended. The young trees should not take their place in the 
Orchard until they have gained strength, and have got a good outline of head, and this will rarely 
be before the tenth or twelfth year of the age of the stock. 
A custom has arisen in the Orchards of late years which is often practised with good effect; it 
