Ik 
VOL XLVI NO. 1971 
NEW YORK NOVEMBER 5, 1.887 
PRICE FIVE CENTS. 
$2.00 PER YEAR. 
^nlercd^eccrOIng^o^ct oM^oiigrivifl^ln^the ypar, Rcbat. Nk^ouker, ■« the office of the Libra rian of Congress, at Washington. 
Do not prune at all while the tree is in good 
health; but rub off such shoots as should not 
be allowed to grow, as, like all other evils, 
they should be “nipped in the bud. 1 ’ But it 
will be necessary to prune when by accident, 
age or leaf-blight sorneof the limbs commence 
to decay. In such cases saw the affected I 
limbs rather close to the trunk, pare the whole | 
surface of the wounds smoothly, bevel the j 
edges and apply, with an old paint brush,some I 
hot pine tar into which one-half of its bulk of * 
fine sand has been stirred. This preparation | 
will keep out the rain, and less of decay will 
result than by any other method that I have 
tried. 
I do not believe'that trunk-blight occurs 
without good causes. Early in spring when 
the stronger-growing rays of the sun fall upon 
the exposed trunk of a tree that has 
no shell-bark to protect it, and the 
head of which is not large enough to 
shelter it, the bark with a tempera¬ 
ture of 40 Q to On** Fahrenheit, must 
expand. while the rest of the trunk 
remains frozen. A separation of bark 
and sap-wood is then inevitable, and 
trunk-bligbt has commenced. 
Again, a trunk exposed to the fierce 
A rays of our July and August suns 
while the tender sap for that: season’s 
t sap-wood is being deposited, and 
[) while a thermometer placed there 
would iudieate almost a scalding heat, 
would stand no chance of escaping 
blight. 
It will he easily apparent that the 
method of treatment given above 
would effectually prevent an evil so 
disastrous to orchards, aud prove of 
great value in making a healthy tree. 
The sap in the fore-part of the warm 
season will be delivered by way of the 
trunk to the branches in a coo! condi¬ 
tion, and a large, dark-green and 
vigorous foliage will keep it cool until 
the ends and aims of the grower are 
answered,and a perfect tree is formed; 
while the necessary moisture will be 
held nearer the surface of the ground 
by the mulch, which should be of such 
a nature that by itsyeariy decomposi¬ 
tion it will, furnish all the manure 
required. A board screen may be 
made by nailing two-inch boards to¬ 
gether at the edges, aud in the middle 
of the bottom of each board a piece 
about 2x2 inches and 15 inches long 
should be nailed on with clout nails, 
as shown, half being cut away from 
the top downward so as to leave a 
shoulder for the bottom of the boards 
to rest on. The screen, shown at Fig. 
451, (see next page) should be of a 
length to suit the trunk. The points 
at the bottom may be driven into the 
ground with very little damage to the 
roots, and the sei’eens can be easily re¬ 
moved and replaced as occasion re¬ 
quires. 
If Rural readers who live in locali¬ 
ties which have hitherto been consid¬ 
ered not adapted to apple culture, will 
follow this plau, success can be at¬ 
tained. A visit to the forest will show 
any one that the sun should not shine 
on the trunks of trees, nor on the 
/ ground under them. Forest trees are 
mulched and shaded. On the sunny 
edge of the woods a thick growth of 
saplings is hastening to screen the 
trunks of their older neighbors from 
the rays of the sun, and this offers us 
the idea of an artificial screen. If a 
tree be„planted alone, and no other 
growths be allowed near it, it will 
take on a spreading head for no other 
reason than to shade its trunk aud the 
k ground on which it grows. 
GEO SAFFORD. 
St. Lawrence Co., N. Y. 
THE MESQUIT BEAN. 
After returning towards the end of 
last August, from a journey of over 
700 miles in the dry region of Western 
Texas, w here for two years little or no 
rain bail fallen, and destitution stared 
many new settlers iu the face; where 
no green thing in the shape of forage 
remained, save the mesquit groves, 
which in some regions covered thou¬ 
sands of acres, and bore millions of 
bushels of nutritious beans, which pre¬ 
vent starvation even iu man. and fat¬ 
ten stock and prairie dogs, I thought 
readers of the Rural would like to 
learn something of this wonderful 
fuel and food plant. 
The tree (Prosopis glandulosa) be¬ 
longs to the leguminous, or bean fam¬ 
ily, nearly allied to the acacia. It 
makes a straggling growth about lO^to 
20 feet high, sometimes reaching a bight 
of 40 feet, a grove when seen at a dis¬ 
tance resembling an old, dilapidated 
peach-orchard, except in leaf and fruit. 
The trees l>enr heavy crops of beans, 
such as are shown at Fig. 448, where a 
shows the pod, b the bean as it lies in 
the pod, c the beau iu its envelop, d 
the same cut in two, and c the beau it¬ 
self. Some trees produce two to five 
bushels of the pods, which are greedily 
eaten by stock for the sweet nutriment 
which lies in the beans, not in the seeds, 
which are so bard and small that ani¬ 
mals cannot chew them. 
The wood is very hard, heavy and 
durable; the roots are enormous for 
the size of the tops. Both root and 
trunk make excellent fuel, even for 
forgiug in the smithy, when green. 
Such wood is procured at some ex¬ 
pense, us the digging is laborious. It 
is sold in the towns of those regions at 
about $5 per cord of one ton weight. 
Iu a fen' years t hose trees cover vacant 
lands with a growth averaging It) to 15 
feet iu bight, wherever seeds have been 
scattered by stock or otherwise. The 
millions of bushels of the pods annually 
borne iu Texas, play no small part in 
the economy of stock-growing. No 
land is so dry, poor, or rich that it will 
not produce the tree. It grows from 
the headwaters of the Red River into 
Mexico. Where the bark is broken, a 
fine gum resembling gum-arabic oozes 
out iu considerable quantities. 
Deuisou, Texas. T. v. munson. 
TRUNK-BLIGHT IN APPLE 
TREES.-CAUSE AND PRE¬ 
VENTION. 
Premising that a proper selection in 
regard to bardiuess aud local adapta¬ 
tion is made, l advise that, when plaut- 
ing out, the little trunks be entirely 
shaded from tho rays of the sun, and 
that the ground he well mulched for a 
good distance beyond the extent of the 
roots. Two quarts of good wood ashes 
and oue quart of slaked lime, scattered 
beneath the tree and beyond the spread 
of the roots at the end of the season’s 
growth, are absolutely needed to 
supply tbe want of the plant food in 
those substances, m old soils. 
FRUIT NOTES FROM QUEBEC 
PROVINCE, 
Everything was ripe a fortnight 
earlier than usual this season, aud 
apples are no exception; while grapes 
(Concords) were eatable September 
6th and.dropping from the bunch 
MESQUIT BEAN. From Nature. Fi°\ 448 
