184 
THE FLOEIST AND POMOLOGIST 
[Df.cembeh, 
PEUNING CONIFERS. 
HE severe winters of 1880—1881, and of 
1881—1882, did great injury to many 
fine Conifers in many places. Many of 
the leading and some of the side shoots 
have been killed back; the trees have suffered 
much on the side exposed to the winds. 
During the present and last season the trees 
have wonderfully improved, and with attention 
and careful pruning many of them may be 
brought into good form. As most kinds of 
Conifers will be improved b}' pruning, the trees 
should be gone carefully over. When the lead¬ 
ing shoot has been injured the most promising 
shoot should be looked out, and tied care¬ 
fully to a stake ; a little fern or straw should 
be tied over it to protect from frost; the side 
shoots should be carefully gone over, and tied 
in carefully where they require it. Where the 
trees have for some time not been attended to, 
it takes a little time to go over a quantity, but 
when they are looked over annually they do 
not take up so much time in regulating the 
shoots. Young trees should be looked over 
very carefully, and have the shoots thinned out 
and be staked as they may require it. By 
attention the foundation for handsome speci¬ 
mens are laid. The hot weather and long- 
continued drought during the present year, 
will have done much towards the thorough 
maturation of the wood and buds, and in conse¬ 
quence we may look forward for strong, healthy, 
vigorous growth.—M. Saul, York. 
FRUIT NOTES. 
W HEN reading the varied reports of fhe 
fruit crops this season I have felt 
sure, as I have often done before, 
that in many cases failures are attri¬ 
buted to something quite opposite to the real 
causes, such as a certain position of wind, 
frost, rain, hail, or such like. This is often 
too true, but after such a universal heavy crop 
of Apples and Pears as we had last year it was 
almost too much to expect anything like fair 
crops this season. W^e note in an old orchard 
here (some 6 acres) that the trees which were 
extra heavily laden last season are bearing very 
scanty crops this year. Every fruit-bud having 
been put to the test it would almost have been 
too much to have expected the same old trees 
to have been so productive this season. We 
cannot point, after careful observation, to any 
severity of weather in any stage of the fruiting 
process. The previous year the weather was 
ten to one less favourable during the flowering 
or setting period, when the crops set so heavily 
that at gathering time the work was a formid¬ 
able one, but such as delighted the school 
children of six different schools, who had 
liberal supplies. It gives much genuine happi¬ 
ness to proprietors when they can afford by 
this means to give pleasure to the young, who 
can so well reciprocate such. 
To secure a fair supply of fruit every season in 
almost any district where it will grow, it is neces¬ 
sary to find out what suits the district—there 
being kinds, if not always of the best quality, 
which may be found certain to bear crops every 
year. We know where selections of mostly 
every kind of hardy fruits are to be found 
which are never known to fail, let the season 
be what it may. As for Apples, one need not 
find it a difficult matter to select a few kinds 
which always appear more or less in the annual 
reports as bearing crops without fail. It has 
always been our practice to plant the following 
kinds, and we have advised others w^hen our 
advice has been solicited. The reports of such 
kinds, from districts many miles apart, are of 
the most satisfactory character, and uniform 
success with such extends over a period of 
more than twenty years :— Lord Suffield, Stir- 
Jmg Castle, Heiton House, Keswick Codlin, 
Humelow's Seedling, Northern Greening, and 
King of Pippins. The last answers for dessert 
as well as for kitchen purposes. These all are 
certain bearers from the south of England to 
well north in Scotland. Trees planted on a 
ffrm ibottom of loam and lime rubbish mixed, 
and well mulched, will come into bearing the 
first y-ear after planting and produce freely 
overy year. Some fruit farmers plant Lord 
Sutfield and Stirling Castle by the acre, now 
that thear characters are so well established. 
Heiton House, a kind we did not know before 
coming here two years ago, is a wonderful 
bearer; comes into use in October, and will 
keep in good condition to April or May. 
Some are making a deal of the pruning 
mania, but we know that the successful 
growers of large fruit and abundance of it 
every year, prune moderately ; and numbers, 
whom we know, reduce their work on the tops 
of the trees, by doing it piecemeal at the 
