18 
THE FLORIST AND POMOLOGIST. 
[ February, 
they will be allowed to extend lengthwise, 
where they will have the advantage of warm, 
comfortable soil, and be quite under control, so 
that the trees may be fed with water or 
liquid-manure, as circumstances may require. 
In preparing for planting, the border should 
be trenched 2 ft. deep and thoroughly drained, 
if it is on a strong clay subsoil; but if it be loose 
gravel at the bottom, so much the better, so 
long as there is a depth of 2^ ft. of soil above 
it. Make the holes to receive the young trees 
4 ft. wide and 1 ft. deep; tread the bottom of 
the hole, and place a layer of half-rotten cow- 
manure all over the bottom, and after this a 
sprinkling of soil, when the hole will be ready 
to receive the tree. Cover the roots with three 
or four inches of soil, and then pack round, 
near the edge of the hole, more cow-manure; 
tread it down and cover in with soil, and the 
work is complete. 
After the second year, if any of the trees are 
growing too vigorously, or inclined to make 
lateral shoots, a trench should be cut out 
around them, at about three feet from the 
stem, or just outside the bank of cow-manure 
that was placed in the hole at the time the 
tree was planted. Fill in this trench to within 
a foot of the surface, then tread into it a good 
layer of manure, and fill up with soil. This 
should be done about the end of October or 
beginning of November. In after years this 
operation should be repeated, if the trees 
become over-luxuriant. This may possibly 
appear to many persons to be strange advice? 
but from the manure being placed close 
at home , as before stated, it will produce the 
opposite effect to over-luxuriance , by in great 
measure preventing the roots from running 
downwards and across the whole border, the 
effect of which latter would be to gorge the 
tree with crude sap. On the other hand, by 
the treatment here recommended the roots 
will fix on the manure with thousands of little 
fibrous mouths, and in the end these will be 
found to surround the tree like a cocoa-nut 
mat. It is feeders of this kind that are re¬ 
quired to be developed in all fruit-trees, in 
order to produce fruitfulness and longevity. 
It will perhaps be more useful to the amateur 
and young gardener, if I endeavour to point 
out some of the causes of failure in the culti¬ 
vation of the Peach in the open air, rather than 
attempt to give a detailed account of its cul¬ 
ture, for which I should not now have space. 
To begin with young trained trees; when these 
■are had in from the nursery, they should not be 
cut back the first year, but the soft tops merely 
should be cut off, or perhaps a shoot shortened 
here and there, in order to balance the tree. 
It is not an uncommon thing for the shoots to 
canker and die off, and often for the trees to 
die altogether, when cut back to within a foot 
of the stem. The trees will make plenty of 
shoots to choose from, to form the future tree 
when not cut back. 
Then, again, another cause of failure is the 
severe way in which disbudding is carried on. 
Here I may remark that it is natural for all 
trees to shade their main branches ; therefore 
it is quite contrary to nature to strip the trees 
almost bare. It is reasonable, then, to suppose 
that trees growing on a south wall, where the 
temperature in May often runs up to 120°, should 
require all the foliage possible to shade the 
branches. To this severe disbudding, together 
with the neglect of keeping them free from 
green-fly, I attribute the wreck of many Peach 
trees; and when the branches are bare, the 
sun will do the mischief by burning them. 
From this it will at once be seen that it is 
absolutely necessary to encourage all the 
foliage during the early part of the season, 
and disbudding should not be carried on to any 
extent till about the first week in June, when 
the trees ought to be making free growth and 
healthy foliage. 
One of the main things to be ever in view is 
to keep the trees free from green-fly. These 
should be battled with on their first appearance. 
To destroy them, there is nothing better than a 
wash made of soft-soap, tobacco, and sulphur ; 
2 lb. of each will make about 30 gallons ; strain 
through canvas, and use with the syringe. This 
wash is cheap, effectual, and easily applied, 
and will not do the slightest injury either to 
the foliage or young fruit. 
I have already stated that disbudding or 
thinning the shoots should be only partially 
carried on before the middle of June, and even 
then a sufficient number of shoots to shade the 
branches must be retained, leaving the final 
thinning till the time arrives for nailing-in the 
young growth, which should not be proceeded 
with earlier than July. The shoots should be 
