122 
THE FLORIST AND P0JV10L0GIST. 
in annually young shoots to bear fruit the following year. This being under¬ 
stood, the cultivator will have to determine, at the time of planting, which of 
the above methods he will follow. Trained Peach trees from a nursery have 
generally five shoots. Now, if either method be adopted, the trees should 
be pruned in the latter end of February or beginning of March, and trained 
with one shoot for a leader and the others horizontally, two on each side ; then 
every bud or nearly so will break, and the trees may then, by disbudding the 
useless or superfluous shoots, and training the remainder in, be furnished with 
well-placed leading branches and bearing shoots. The cultivator should study 
the figure the trees are to assume when the wall is covered with them, and lay-in 
branches accordingly to effect that purpose. 
In the second year, if all has gone on well, the trees will be again pruned 
at the same season, and the year’s shoots trained in fan-form ; and so the 
management in regard to pruning and training must be followed up till the 
trees cover the walls. 
If, however, the cultivator should choose to adopt my favourite mode of 
training, then he will proceed from the first to prune and train-in the shoots 
only which are produced upon the upper side of each branch. He w T ill find 
this the most symmetrical, and, at the same time, the most simple and the most 
easily understood of any mode of training. 
The summer pruning and training commences almost as soon as the buds 
break. The grand object is to obtain shoots for bearing the year following. 
In any mode of training, the young shoots should be retained that are placed 
near to the base of the shoot that is bearing fruit. All others should be rubbed 
off at once ; they only, if left on any time, rob the really useful ones of nutri¬ 
ment, and crowd them unnecessarily: therefore, I say, off with them at once. 
If the leading shoot of the bearing branch is too vigorous nip off the ends, 
leaving a sufficient number of leaves to draw up the sap. 
(To be continued .) A. 
ON THE CULTURE OF ERYTHRINAS. 
The different species of Erythrina are all splendid plants, with fine large 
leaves, and beautiful brilliant scarlet or red flowers. For late summer or 
autumn decoration they are very useful. During the winter months they 
should be kept perfectly dry. If the pots are laid on their sides the plants 
will do very well under the greenhouse-stages, or any place where they are 
safe from frost. 
Cuttings of the young wood, taken off in May or June and put into sandy 
soil and plunged in a nice bottom heat, root very freely ; but the best way of 
increasing the Erythrinas is from eyes of the last year’s wood, put in exactly 
as Vine eyes are, plunged in bottom heat, and treated in a very similar 
manner. 
The eyes should be put into pots or pans in February or the beginning of 
March. As soon as they have grown a little and made roots they should be potted 
off singly into small pots, and again plunged in a slight bottom heat. They 
should be kept close and be sprinkled slightly with water from a very fine rose. 
They will soon make roots into the fresh soil, and in a few weeks will be ready 
for a shift into larger-sized pots. The compost should now be one-half good 
turfy loam, one-fourth peat, and one-fourth good rotten dung, the whole well 
mixed up with a little sprinkling of river sand among it. If the plants are 
pretty well rooted they should have a liberal shift, and if they can have a little 
bottom heat for a few weeks longer they will grow all the more rapidly. 
