THE CULTIVATOR. 
89 
1846 . 
ORCHARDS AND ORCHARD FRUIT. 
A request for information on this subject from Wm, 
H. Burritt, of Carrollton, Ill., was received last autumn, 
but being accidentally mislaid, has been deferred till 
the preseat time. He wishes to know, briefly, the best 
mode of converting an old orchard of natural fruit, into 
the trees of the best varieties; a selection of kinds for 
an orchard of four to six acres, to give a 'succession of 
fruit; and the best management in setting out a young 
orchard. 
1. To improve the orchard of natural fruit, it must 
first be pruned, by sawing or cutting off smoothly with 
an axe, near the upper part of the main trunk, during 
winter, most of the large branches. A portion of the 
smaller branches, which are left, may then be grafted 
with the desired varieties; or the young and vigorous 
shoots which will spring up the following season, may 
be budded. The wounds made by the removal of large 
limbs, should be covered with a warm mixture of tar 
and brick-dust. When the shoots from the grafts or 
buds have grown a year or two, the remaining needless 
branches may be taken off. 
To form handsome and convenient trees, the heading 
down should be done as near as possible to the upper 
extremity of the main trunk, and from this point the 
new shoots will mainly issue, and form a much 
neater tree, than if the old branches themselves are 
trimmed to bare poles, as is too frequently the case. 
Fig. 24, represents a tree 
pruned as it should be; fig, 
25 exhibits two instances of 
bad but very common prun¬ 
ing. Old trees are desti¬ 
tute of young* branches at 
the desired central point; 
and hence grafts are often 
set in far out on the 
side branches, which can 
never form good tops; to 
obviate which, prune them 
in, and wait one season, and 
there will be an abundance 
2l - of central shoots, which 
may be either budded or grafted. 
In setting out a young orchard, unless the soil is natu- 
Fig. 25. 
rally very fertile, it should be made so by manure in 
the cultivation of crops, either before the trees are 
transplanted, or immediately afterwards. Very large 
holes, several feet in diameter, should be dug, and filled, 
except in contact with the roots, with a third of old rot¬ 
ted manure mixed very thoroughly with two-thirds of 
soil, which, with good cultivation, will make the young 
trees grow most vigorously, bear young, produce fine 
large fruit, and soon repay twenty times the cost of. 
digging the holes. Then in setting out, spread out 
with the fingers carefully all the fine fibrous roots, and 
when the hole is nearly full, settle the earth through all 
the interstices among the roots, by pouring in a few 
quarts of water. The tree must be tied to a stake by a 
wisp of straw to prevent whipping about with the wind; 
many trees are lost by neglected staking. The soil 
must be kept well cultivated with some hoed crop for 
several years afterwards, as potatoes, beans, carrots or 
ruta-bagas. Corn shades the trees too much. 
In furnishing a list, almost every cultivator will dif¬ 
fer. The following are mostly well known; and if 
every cultivator who is acquainted with others equally 
good, will add one-half as many more to the list, the 
catalogue will not be a long one. Where several acres 
are to be planted, a greater number of each variety is to 
be taken. Winter apples and long-keepers, being of 
more value in market, and also continuing in use seve¬ 
ral times longer than summer and autumn varieties, a 
correspondingly greater number of each of these should 
be set out. 
Summer Apples. 
Early Harvest, 
Summer Rose, 
i0ine Qua Non, 
Summer Pearmain, 
Red Astrachan, 
Summer Queen, 
Early Sweet Bough, 
Golden Sweeting. 
Autumn Apples. 
Gravenstein, 
Porter, 
Late Strawberry, 
Summer Pippin, 
Fameuse, 
Rambo, 
Fall Pippin, 
Jersey Sweeting. 
Winter Fruit. 
Bellflower, (yellow,) 
American Golden Russet, 
Rhode Island Greening, 
Swaar, 
Esopus Spitzenburg, 
Jonathan, 
Peek’s Pleasant, 
Tallman’s Sweeting, 
Danvers’ Sweet, 
Ladies’ Sweet, 
Baldwin, 
Blue Pearmain, 
Hubbardston Nonsuch. 
Long Keepers. 
Roxbury Russet, 
Northern Spy, 
Newtown Pippin, 
Black Gilliflower. 
AMERICAN HEDG-ES. 
A few weeks since, we noticed some instances of 
good and successful management of hedges. It has been 
since suggested to us, that a very important operation 
was too briefly no¬ 
ticed to be intelli¬ 
gible to many read¬ 
ers. This was Lay¬ 
ing and Plashing. 
W e have noticed 
many hedges which 
were sadly ineffi¬ 
cient from thinness 
Fig. 26. and gaps near the 
bottom, which might thus have been made impenetra¬ 
bly strong. 
The mode of performing this work is represented in 
the annexed figure. It is usually done in winter. In 
England, well-managing farmers divide the whole 
length of their hedges into about twelve parts, and plash 
one of these parts each year, thus keeping up a system 
of successive renovation every twelve years; though 
hedges are sometimes known to continue in the best 
condition twice that length of time. The operation 
consists in first clearing away briars, small branches, 
&c., and cutting off the needless branches and stems, 
leaving straight upright stems in the middle of the row. 
The best and straightest of these, are selected for live 
stakes, and their tops cut off at a height of 3| or 4 feet,- 
They should be, if possible, at equal distances of about 
two feet; but as they cannot always be had so regularly 
distributed, occasional dead stakes driven into the 
ground become necessary. The roughest are then cut 
out, leaving a proper number for plashing among the 
upright stakes, to form a kind of rough wicker work. 
These are then laid hold of, and bent down in one direc¬ 
tion, and a hack is made into them near the surface of 
the ground with the knife or bill; the pressure with the 
right hand, and the stroke with the left, being at the 
same moment, the stem is bent partly down and cut 
partly through, and cannot regain its former position. 
They are then, as the work proceeds, woven backwards 
and forwards among the stakes, in a slanting direction. 
