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PRACTICAL' TREATISE

•FRUIT TREES;

DESCRIPTIVE LISTS

OF THE MOST VALUABLE

FRUITS FOR GENERAL CULTIVATION

AD.'. PTED TO THF,

.

INTERIOR OF KEW E;
BY G-30SG3 JAQUES.

Every Clymat hath its ovvne fruit, far i^fieren1
Other countries. GEKARDK, in 1597.

>se fruits which succeed perfection one section of the
country, are sometimes ill ad: her.

DOWNING, in ISto.

WORCESTER:

ERASTUS N, TUCKER.

1 84 9.

REESE LIBRARY

. OF THK

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA.

Received— ..JU^L^^^^ic
Accessions No££4$.&~. Shelf No...

A

PRACTICAL TREATISE

ON Ttit MANAGEMENT OF

FRUIT TREES;

DESCRIPTIVE LISTS

OF TrfE MOSt VALUABLE

FRUITS FOR GENERAL CULTIVATION ;

ADAPTED tO THE

i»t*arit

INTERIOR OF NEW ENGLAND.

BY GEORGE JAQUES-

jgfW^

Every Clymat jiRK^jVowne fruit, far different firQpi that of other
countries. GE^ARDE, in 1597.

Those fruits which succeed perfectly in one section of the country,
are sometimes HI adapted to another. DOWNING, in 1845.

WORCESTER:

ERASTUS N. TUCKER.

1849.

J ^ 1 T AS I! T JAOIT3 Afll

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1849,

BY ERASTUS N. TUCKER,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts.

*£-**<>

WAT. 10 g

WORCESTER:
BENJ. J. UODGK, PRINTER, PALI ADICM OFFICE,

CONTENTS.

PREFACE,

INTRODUCTION, -( _• *""M '* • • 9

PART 1.

OF THE GENERAL CULTIVATION OF FRUIT TREES.

CHAPTER 1.— Production of a New Variety of Fruit, - Ib

Section I. Sowing Selected Seeds, - 18

" 2. Sowing Hybridized Seeds, - 21

CHAPTER II. — Multiplication of a Variety, 24

Section 1. Direct Mode of Multiplying, by

Dividing the Original Tree, 25

1. Suckers, - T-~.» - 25

2. Cuttings and Layers, - 26
***» • 2. Indirect Mode of Multiplying,

by Grafting from the Original
r ,;., into Other Trees, - - 30

1. Scion-Grafting, - - 35

2. Bud -Grafting, - - 45

3. Position of the Graft upon

the Stock, - - 51

CHAPTER III.— Stocks for Grafting, 54

PACE.

CHAPTER IV.— Transplanting - * - * 59

Section 1. Trees of Small Size, - 64

" 2. " " Medium Size, - 66

" 3. " « Large Si?e, 73

CHAPTER V.-*-Pruning, - * 76

1. To improve the Growth and

Form of a Tree, <• 77

2. To induce Fruitfulness, - 80

CHAPTER VI.— -Training, - 84

CHAPTER VII.-,Miscellane<wis, - - 90

Section 1. Purchasing, Packing, Forward-
ing, and Receiving Trees,

Grafts, &c. &c. - - 90

" 2. Soils, Manures, Location of Or-
chards, Position of Trees,
Trees in Grass^ground, Fruit •

ing, &c. &c. - - 97

<< 3. Insects, Diseases, Remedies, &c. 108

*•' 4. Implements, Materials etc. used

in the Nursery and Orchard, 113

" 5. The Nursery Business, - 118

ja'f 6. The Orchard Businesa, - , 124

.- ••••'. M'
PART II, /

OF THE CULTIVATION OF THE SEVERAL SPECIES OF FRUIT
TREES.

. .(J ~S*>.

PRELIMINARY REMARKS, « -, •, - 139

CHAPTER I.— -The Apple, - | -t - - 146

Section I. Standard Apple Trees, - 148

1. Cultivation, &c. - - 151

2. Descriptive Lists of Apples, 152
Sections. Dwarf Apple Trees. - - 158

" 3, Insects, Diseases, Remedies,

Bearing Year, &c. - - 160
« 4. Gathering and Ripening the Ap.

pie, . - 168

« 5. Uses of the Apple, , - 171

CHAPTER II.— -The Pear, - • '*t*'X* ' - 176

Section 1. Standard Pear Trees, - - 178

1. Cultivation, &c. - 180

2, Descriptive Lists of Pears,

for cultivation on Stand-
ard trees - - 182
« 2. Dwarf Pear Trees, - - 188

1. Root-Pruned Dwarfs, - 189

2. Quince-Bottomed Dwarfs, 191
" 3. Insects, Diseases and Remedies, 200
'' 4. Gathering and Ripening the Pear,

and Uses of the Fruit, - 203

CHAPTER III.— The Peach and the Nectarine '• • 207

Section 1. Cultivation,^. .<-. "." . ;» 207

" 2. Descriptive Lists of Peaches, - 215

CHAPTER IV.— The Cherry, - - 219

1. Cultivation, &c. • " - 220

2. Descriptive Lists of Cherries, 223

CHAPTER V.— The Quince, • >- - 225

CHAPTER VI.— The Plum, '.* r * «, • 227

CHAPTER VII.— The Grape, - - 232

CHAPTER VIII.— The Apricot, - ,#.$.4 ' 236

CHAPTER IX.— Nuts, - - 238

CHAPTER X.— Berry*Fruits, . 241

Section 1. The Strawberry, - . 241

1. Cultivation, &c. - 241

2, Varieties, Uses, <fcc. of the

Fruit, &c. - - 247

Section 2. The Currant, - .,',". - 251

" 3. The Gooseberry, - '. 254

" 4. The Raspberry, ^^ . 555

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PREFACE

i 16 «9o-j«e«i x*^

HAVING waited a long while, in the hope that some
one better qualified for the work, might be induced to
furnish the fruit-cultivators of Interior New England
with a treatise such as their local wants demand, I
have at length ventured upon the undertaking myself.

A book of this kind is so greatly needed, to guide the
operations of a large and increasing class of our citizens
that even comparative incompetency may not have labor-
ed upon it in vain.

If there are pears which ripen finely at Saltm, but
will not succeed in Boston ; if the climates of Western
New York and the shores of the Hudson differ so widely,
as to affect the quality of several varieties of different
species of fruits, one might easily infer — what it has cost
the writer something to learn — that whoever would suc-
ceed with fruit-trees, in the hill-country of the eastern
states, may rely with tolerable safety upon the uncertain
testimony cf his own neighborhood, while the profoundest
wisdom that has ever recorded the experience of other
countries, would only mislead and bewilder.

I have endeavored to make my book what its title in-
dicates. My Lists of Fruits have been carefully prepar-

8

ed, in honesty and in truth, and not with the mean sel-
fishness that would thus advertise the worthless trash of
a worn-out nursery. Should this little work in any in-
stance disappoint expectation, I shall deeply regret, that
the best intentions have failed here through inability,
while, elsewhere, those better qualified to instruct have
sometimes written with other prayers than for the success
of their disciples.
My sources of information have been, —

1. Nearly eight years experience in the cultivation of
nursery and orchard trees, chiefly by the labor of my
own hands.

2. A close observation of the management of nurseries
and orchards, in this vicinity and in other places, for the
last ten years.

3. A careful- inspection of the very instructive Exhibi-
tions of the Worcester Co. Horticultural Society, from its
formation to the present time.

4. Personal interviews and correspondence with several
of the* most distinguished horticulturists in this section
of the country.

5. An attentive perusal of almost all the agricultural
and horticultural publications that have been issued, par-
ticularly in the northern and eastern states, during the
last twelve years. G. J.

Worcester, March, 1849.

•aNt

01

INTRODUCTION.

_

!» r'.o • ' ; ~

" But forward in the name of God, graffe, set, plant and nomrish
up trees in every corner of your grounds, the labour is small,
the cost is nothing, the commoditie is great, yourselves shall have
plenty, the poore shall have somewhat in lime of want to relieve
their necessitie, and God shall reward your good mindes and dili-
gence."

So wrote the enthusiastic Gerarde, two hundred and fifty years
ago, and surely no better advice can be given to the land-owners
of New England at the present time*. For, when it is taken into
consideration, that the soil and climate of this section of the
country are most admirably adapted to orchard cultivation, that
the New England apples are among the finest flavored of any
grown in the world, that the home market for fruit never has
been, and that the foreign market probably never can be supplied,
one must admit that nothing is apparently more feasible, than to
make the lands of Worcester county and other sections of the
eastern states far more valuable than the most productive wheat-
fields of the west, or the richest cotton-grounds of the south, so
that the ruddy-cheeked Baldwin apple and the d'Aremberg pear
may take their easily attainable rank among our chief articles of
exportation.

While, therefore, so many mills compel each little rivulet to
b

10

earn and re-earn its passage to the ocean ; and while that ocean
continues to bear our surplus wealth to every distant clime, let no
planter of an orchard anticipate a want of purchasers for whatev-
ever fruits he may wish to spare from his trees. And even upon
a smaller scale, the farmer who consults economy or regards the
happiness of his family, will never regret the labor whicli can
so easily spread upon his table an abundance of the various
fruits of the successive seasons.

There is a pleasure too in these pursuits, from which unlike
all other earthly pleasures its votaries never turn aside with sa-
tiety or disgust. Our most endearing associations, our most re-
fined perceptions of the beautiful, are connected with fruit and
other gardens. Horticulture, says Sir Wm. Temple, has been
the inclination of kings, and the choice of philosophers. The
Prince de Ligne after sixty years' experience, affirms that the
love of gardens is the only passion which augments with age.

Something also may be urged in favor of the moral tendency
of the occupation, since as the latter writer finely observes. " it
seems impossible that a wicked man should possess a taste for it."*

There are those who will say — "all this reads pretty well ; yet
we ourselves are too old to reap the profits, to learn the pleasures,
or to experience the moral influences of which you speak." "Too
old ?" Why, with proper selection and careful cultivation, your
trees will render you valuable returns in even less than six
years from the time you put them out.

Says J. J. Thomas, " A Bartlett pear-tree, six feet high, and
two years from transplanting, bore a peck of superb fruit. An
apple tree, removed to the orchard when not larger than a car-

* II me semble qu'll est impossible q'un tnechant puisse 1' avoir.

11

.•>

riage-whip, produced a bushel the fifth year." We have our-
self a Hubbardston Nonesuch apple-tree which, in the third
year from the nursery and the tenth from the seed, bore us
a half bushel of splendid fruit ; and the next year it produced
nearly a bushel. Peaches, plums, and cherries begin to show
fruit the second year from the nursery, and frequently the for-
mer two produce large crops in less than fire years.

" Too old I " Rather say too lucky, that your father did not
make the same plea, when planting the trees of which you first
eat in childhood.

" Too old ! " Admit it, — must we also understand then that you
are a\so too mean to pay to posterity what you owe to those who
have gone before you ? Selfish man! Plant trees, plant trees.
No matter whether or not you may eat thereof yourself. The
fruit will afford another just as much pleasure as it would you.
Plant trees — " forward in the name of God." plant trees, and it
»hall cheer the useless hours of old age to remember, that in
your day and generation you did something, even so little, to
leave the world better, or at least no worse, than you found it.

The subject-matter upon which this little work is designed to
treat, seems to us worthy the attention of all land-owners who
look to pecuniary profit, healthful recreation, and favorable mor-
al influences, or who feel disposed to leave to posterity some-
thing of as goodly a heritage as former generations may have be-
queathed to them.

But the limits of a work, practical as this purports to be, do
not admit of further reflections of this kind. Let us proceed at
once to those enquiries which may serve to direct the hand of
future labor.

" Aliens mes amis, il faut cuHiver nos fruitier^''

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UI7EESITY

OP THE GENERAL CULTIVATION OF
FRUIT TREES.

CHARTER I.

PRODUCTION OF A NEW VARIETY OF FRUIT.

OF the vegetable no less than of the animal
kingdom, it is a law to which there are few
exceptions, that, in their native wilds uncon-
trolled by man, the different species exactly
reproduce themselves.

The process of change commences with the
generations raised in a domesticated state.

Some plants, indeed, and animals also seem
not to be susceptible of the ameliorating influ-
ences of human care. But almost all the
really useful species are easily brought into a
state of domestication. When once the artifi-
cial treatment of culture is applied, the artifi-
cial product of varieties is the result. The
seeds, for example, of the common field-
strawberry, sown in the garden, will produce
fruit differing from that of the parent-plant
and also from each other. The product from
sowing the seeds of these will be still more

16

varied, and so on with each successive cul-
tivated generation.

And not only does cultivation originate but
it sustains our fine varieties of fruit; for ex-
perience has rendered it highly probable
that, but for the fostering hand of man, these
would, in the course of a few generations, rap-
idly degenerate into a comparatively limited
number of wild fruits.

And here we will digress a moment to state
a truth which lies among the foundations of
horticultural science — that it is as absurd for
o man to talk of the natural treatment of a
garden fruit-tree, as of the natural treatment
of his artificial Durham cow or of his own
yet more artificial self; for a fine fruit-tree is
the combined product of nature and art, and
nature and art must both take care of it, or it
dies.

We shall not attempt to explain v)hy the
effect of cultivation should be to produce va-
rieties. Perhaps the tendency to accidental
hybridization is thereby greatly increased.
Perhaps the influences of grafting, being almost
always combined with those of cultivation,
may be to break up the natural course of re-

17

production. Certain it is, and sufficient for
our purpose, that the fact exists.

All varieties of plants and fruits, good or
bad, originate from the seed.

There are two distinct modes of producing
them in use among cultivators — 1st, by sow-
ing selected seeds; 2d, by sowing hybridized
seeds.

SECTION I.

SOWING SELECTED SEEDS.

THE laws regulating this mode of reproduc-
tion are not well understood. Of a thousand
apple-trees raised from seeds of some fine va-
riety— say the Baldwin — and grown to a fruit-
bearing age, probably not one would show a
fruit equal to the original ; and while the num-
ber of varieties thus produced might equal the
w.hole number of the trees, perhaps not three
out of the whole would be found worthy of
cultivation. Some of the trees would bear
small fruit, others large ; some fair, some
knurly; some sweet, others subacid, sour or
bitter; some would ripen their fruit early,
others would retain theirs until the frosts and
winds of Autumn should scatter them upon
the ground. Little therefore can be hoped
from this chance sowing of selected seeds.
Other circumstances must govern the choica
of seeds, beside the mere qualities of the fruit
from which they may be taken.

19

Professor Van Mons, after devoting nearly
his whole life to these pursuits, came to results
which may be briefly stated as follows :

THEORY OF VAN MONS.

The design of nature is to produce a heal-
thy plant capable of furnishing seeds for con-
tinuing the species.

The object of cultivation (or rather domes-
tication.) is to turn the energies of nature from
this end to the enlargement of the size and im-
provement of the flavor of the fruit containing
the seeds. — that is, so far as the vigor and ro-
bust health of the tree is affected, it is an enfee-
bling process.

To carry forward this enfeebling work, sel-
ect your seeds from a young tree of a garden,
not a wild variety, gathering the fruit before
it is fully ripe, and suffering the seeds to re-
main in it until it is decayed. The words
just italicised indicate four sources of ener-
vating the breed, (if this latter term is allow-
able.)

The trees from these seeds should be root-
pruned and branch- pruned, on purpose to
enfeeble and stunt their growth ; and, in order

20

that there should be no contamination from
other breeds, they should be allowed to bear
their fruit upon their own roots.

From these trees select seeds as before,
plant, prune and re-select seeds, and so on,
until in about the fifth generation for pears,
the fourth for apples, and the third or second
for stone fruits and other shorter lived species ;
the seedlings will nearly all become of great
excellence. The point of perfectioh once at-
tained, a further continuance of the process
will result in a retrograde movement toward
the original wild state of the plant.

This theory seems to be founded in reason,
although facts stubborn and numerous exist
in opposition to it. Indeed, the principles
which govern the reproduction of plants from
the seed, are still very imperfectly understood.

It will easily occur to the reader, that acci-
dental causes have placed within reach of the
American cultivator abundant materials in all
stages of progress for the mode of reproduc-
tion which originated with Van Mons.

We come now to the far more certain, direct
and scientific mode of originating fruits.

SECTION II.

SOWING HYBRIDIZED SEEDS.

HYBRIDIZED seeds are those contained in
fruits which have been originated, by fertiliz-
ing the stigma of the flower of one tree with
the pollen of another of different though near-
ly allied characters; for, like grafting, the
process cannot be extended beyond certain
comparatively narrow limits. A fruit pro-
duced by this cross fecundation, usually pos-
sesses properties intermediate between those of
its parents ; and the seedlings from such a
fruit, although they may slightly differ among
themselves, will all bear fruits partaking of the
mixed characters of the fruits of the two
parent trees.

Strictly speaking, a hybrid or mule plant or
fruit is the product of two different though
nearly allied species; a cross-bred plant or
fruit is a sub-variety originating from two va-
rieties of the same species.

We have said that the field of hybridizing,

22

like that of grafting, is hemmed in by narrow
limits.

Indeed the laws of hybridizing in the vege-
table and in the animal world are similar,
though less stringent in the former than in the
latter. We must therefore expect to find the
seeds of cross-bred plants sometimes sterile,
and those of mules or hybrid plants almost
always so, or becoming so in the second or
third generations. And therefore our two dis-
tinct modes of producing seedlings cannot be
combined to any great extent, even were it
desirable.

This art of hybridizing has scarcely been
known above half a century, and its utility
is as yet probably not at all appreciated as it
will be hereafter.

Some of the results which have been and
may be produced, are — among Flowers, great-
er hardihood, change of time of flowering, im-
proved odors, increased size, more beautiful
colors, &c. — among Fruits, and Vegetables,
almost every desirable improvement of size,
flavor, time of ripening, productiveness, &c. —
among Timber -trees, more rapid and larger
growth, superior toughness and strength,
compactness, &c.

23

In conclusion, we may say that the busi-
ness of producing new varieties of fruits, as
well as of improved breeds of animals, should
be required at the hands of men of wealth and
leisure, and ought hardly to be attempted by
persons of humble means and limited re-
sources. But better still, were a part of the
revenue of a state or a nation judiciously and
wisely expended in this way, the result*
would richly repay the outlay.

CHAPTER II.

'

MULTIPLICATION OF A VARIETY.

ONCE in possession of a fine variety of fruit,
a benevolent man would be anxious to know-
how its existence might be perpetuated, and
the number of trees of it indefinitely multi-
plied. Indeed, without any very urgent
promptings of benevolence, the fortunate re-
cipient, in Pomona's lottery, of such a prize
as the Esopus Spitzenburg apple, the Para-
dise tfAutomne pear, or the like, might natu-
rally enough be solicitous to increase the
number of trees of it, as rapidly as possible.
Since these objects cannot be obtained by
sowing the seeds of the fruit, as we have
already stated, we must resort to the only two
other methods left us, — 1st, That of dividing
the original tree ; 2d, That of grafting buds
or scions from the original into other trees.

•fc

v

SECTION I.

DIRECT MODE OF MULTIPLYING, BY DIVIDING THE
ORIGINAL TREE.

THERE are two specifically different modes
of accomplishing this. The first mode is by
Suckers : the second, by Cuttings and Layers.

I. SUCKERS.

A sucker is a portion of a tree growing up
from the root or from a portion of the trunk
which is below tho surface of the soil. By
digging down carefully and cutting it off with
a portion of the root attached, and setting it
out at the proper season of transplanting, it
will become a tree of itself. It will not, how-
ever, possess so thrifty and'vigorous a habit
as that of its parent, — although suckers some-
times do make very handsome trees. Another
objection to suckers . is, that they have a
strong disposition to waste their energies in
generating other suckers. Still a third objec-

26

tion lies in the fact that they are very apt to
retain whatever diseases or infirmities infect
the tree from which they may be taken.
Whether therefore for fruit-bearing purposes
or as stocks for grafting, they are in general
by no means especial favorites with the care-
ful and judicious cultivator. Exceptions must,
however, be made in favor of the Vine, the
Quince, and a very few other fruit-bearing
plants, which will be noticed in their proper
place.

H. CUTTINGS AND LAYERS.

A cutting is a bud. or a twig (containing
two or more buds) of the previous season's
growth, cut from a tree. This being planted,
if a twig, partly, and, if a bud, wholly under
ground, will, under favorable circumstances,
take root and itself become a tree.

It is possible with proper care to multiply
all fruit trees and shrubs in this way. But,
practically, this mode is chiefly confined to the
Vine, the Quince, the Currant, the Gooseberry
and a very few others.

Twig-cuttings should be cut and set early
in the Spring. They should be separated
from the tree at the point between the last and

27

the previous season's growth; the tip end
should be cut off so as to leave them from
eight to fourteen inches long. When planted,
from two-thirds to three-fourths of their length
should be under ground, and the soil should
be pressed hard about the lower end. Mulch-
ing, or covering the ground with straw so as
nearly to hide them from sight, is an excellent
mode of assisting nature in this work. Plant-
ing also in a shady place answers a similar
purpose.

When it is desirable that the cutting should
make a tree-like growth without throwing
up suckers, all the eyes in the part put below
the surface of the ground should be cut out.

Bud-cuttings, or those containing but a sin-
gle eye or bud, should be planted abaut an
inch deep in the ground at the same time with
twig-cuttings. The Chinese Multicaulis and
some varieties of foreign Grapes are raised in
this way. In propagating by cuttings, the
chances of success are greatly increased by
the application of underground heat. This
mode is much practiced with plant cuttings
in green-houses.

It should be understood, however, that a
strict compliance with these rules is not

always necessary ; for cuttings often succeed
when cut and planted in the most careless
manner. For instance, with herbaceous cut-
tings, an unskilful hand at the hoe in a cloudy
day, will in this way propagate some kinds of
weeds to a most undesirable extent, doubling
and trebling their number where his only in-
tention was to destroy them.

A layer is a cutting which has been prepar-
ed one or more seasons previously to being
used. A twig growing out of a tree at a point
not far from the ground, is bent down and the
middle portion of it is buried just under the
surface of the soil and fastened there by
means of a hooked peg or by a stone or turf
placed above it. Success is rendered more
certain by checking the downward flow of the
sap. This may be accomplished by cutting a
slice off the under side of the part of the twig
that is placed under ground, or, more imper-
fectly, by twisting, bruising, or partially
debarking the twig at that point; some re-
commend to enter the knife on the under side
at this point and split the twig upward about
one or two inches, fastening the split open
with a little wedge or pebble.

Trees or shrubs purposely headed down

K t

29

for raising layers, are called stools. A single
quince-bush, thus made into a stool, and its
twigs layered, is capable of producing many
finely rooted plants in a single season. Of
some kinds of layers, nearly every bud will
form roots of its own. A tree or shrub origi-
nated from a layer, has a tendency to a dwarf-
ish habit, and to inherit the diseases by which
its parent-plant may be affected.

SECTION II.

INDIRECT MODE OF MULTIPLYING, BY GRAFTING
FROM THE ORIGINAL INTO OTHER TREES.

A graft is either a scion (which is the same
thing as a twig-cutting,) or a bud (which is
the same thing as a bud-cutting.)

Grafting consists in causing a scion or a bud
to grow upon a limb or the trunk of a tree, in-
stead of taking root directly in the ground.
The artificial tree thus produced, is said to be
a worked, or more properly a grafted tree. A
defect in the language compels us to use the
term graft and its derivatives, in a specific as
well as a generic sense. Thus to graft means,
commonly and specifically, to scion ; generic-
ally it means either to scion or to bud.* Were
it our province to show how words instead of
trees may be multiplied, we should be tempted
to enrich the ' phraseology of horticulture, by
endeavoring to introduce into good usage the

* The French employ the word greffe (graft) in this same gen •
eric sense, as a term including both grafting and budding.

31

word to scion and its derivatives, scioning and
scioned, just as we have to bud, budding, and
budded.

The tree upon which a graft is set, is called
a stock. The stock and the graft (scion or
bud) form a partnership, the former discharg-
ing the duties of mouth and stomach, by means
of its roots, the latter performing the functions
of lungs and perspiratory system, by means of
its leaves.

It hardly needs to be explained that no
grafting can succeed, unless the sap vessels of
the graft (scion or bud) and those of the stock,
are so adapted to each other that the flow of
sap shall pass uninterruptedly from one to the
other. These sap-vessels are chiefly situated
in the inner bark (or liber) of trees.

Neither can any grafting, however nicely
performed, be successful, unless between dif-
ferent varieties of the same species, as the
Apple upon a seedling apple-tree stock; or
between nearly allied species of the same ge-
nus, as between the x^pple and the Pear, which
unions are comparatively imperfect and short-
lived ; or, thirdly, between nearly allied gen-
era, as between the Cherry and the Plum,
which maintain a feeble existence for a limi-

. 32

ted period, and then die. All unions, there-
fore, between widely different genera and
species, are utterly impossible, as the graft
cannot live upon the sap supplied by the
stock, any more than a lion can be fed upon
grass. Virgil, and other writers of antiquity,
being ignorant of this principle, were led into
great errors — a warning to those of modern
times, who publish dreams of imagination in-
stead of real facts.

The practical limits within which grafting
is ordinarily confined, are, first, between vari-
eties of the same species, for standards; and
secondly, between varieties of different species
or genera, for dwarfs. The Apple upon an
Apple-seedling, is an example of the first, the
Apple upon the Pear, and the Pear upon the
Quince, are examples of the second. Other
things equal, grafting is successful in propor-
tion to the health and vigor of the stock upon
which it is performed. Recently transplanted
trees, therefore, are not in a favorable situation
to be grafted, although they often are grafted
successfully.

The primary object of grafting has already
been stated. Among the secondary uses of
this curious and very ancient art are, —

33

1st. To alter the head of a tree bearing one
kind of fruitj so that it shall bear another fruit
possessing more desirable qualities.

2d. To improve the form of a tree, by insert-
ing scions or buds into the sides of the trunk
or limbs.

3d. To invigorate a feebly growing variety,
by grafting it upon a vigorous stock.

4th. To accumulate a number of varieties
upon a single tree.

5th. To accelerate the fruiting of a young
seedling tree, by setting grafts, or, more es-
pecially, fruit-spurs or fruit-buds from it, upon
a grown tree.

6th. To propagate a tree in soils unfavora-
ble to its own roots ; as, for example, the
Peach upon the Plum, in cold clayey soils.

7th. To save a variety from being lost, as
when accident has destroyed the original tree.

8th. To transmit a variety through chan-
nels in which it would be impossible to send
a whole tree, as to forward a scion or a bud
enclosed in a letter.

9th. To produce dwarf-trees. For this, the
Apple is grafted upon Paradise (or Doucin)
stocks, the Pear upon the Quince, Thorn or
Mountain Ash ; the Peach upon the Plum,

the Plum upon Mirabelle Plum seedlings, the
Cherry upon the Cerasus Mahaleb, and, in
general, any tree upon any other kindred tree
of slower or smaller growth. There is also,
we may remark here, another mode of produ-
cing dwarf-trees, by root-pruning, which we
shall describe under the head of Pruning.

The stock and the graft (scion or bud,) exert
influences upon each other, mutually. Some
of the influences of the stock have just been
mentioned, see 3d, 5th, 6th, and 9th uses of
grafting above described. The stock often
affects the size and flavor of the fruit borne
by the graft. Thus the Saint Michael pear is
larger, fairer, and better flavored, in our climate,
when grown upon the Quince stock. Of a
graft or a stock, either may communicate its
own diseases and infirmities to the other. It
is pretty well established, also> that stocks bear-
ing early fruits, have an influence in acceler-
ating the ripening of the- fruits which may be
made to grow upon them by grafting. The
graft is also said, in some cases, to affect the
appearance of the bark of the stock, and also
the form of growth in its roots.

It may be remarked here, that many of the

ftevi ' '••••• i

35

theories respecting these influenc
a rather sandy foundation of facts.

There are two general methods of Grafting,
1st, with Scions, 2d, with Buds.

I. SCION-GRAFTING, (07' SClOning.)

As we have said above, a graft, consisting
of a twig containing two or more buds, is
called a scion. The art of uniting such a
graft to a stock, may be called scion-grafting,
or, if the term were in use, we should prefer
to call it scioning.

It is a general rule that scions succeed much
better, when they have been cut some time
previously to their being set. The best time
to cut them, is from the middle of January to
the last of February, although they may be
taken from the trees, at any time from late
autumn until spring. In order to keep scions
until they may be used, nothing more is neces-
sary than to thrust their lower ends into the
ground, in a shady place, say close on the
north side of the trunk of the tree from which
they were cut ; or a better way is to set them
half their length deep, in a box of fine soil in
a cellar. Scions of stone-fruits require to be
kept with more care than those of the apple

36

and pear. Scions are often set immediately
on being cat, in the months of March and
April.

In cutting scions, we take, from the extrem-
ity of the limb of a tree, that part of it which
grew the preceding season, and we keep the
shoot or twig entire, till wanted for use. Any
thing of this description will answer for scions,
but the best scions are cut from the upright
topmost limbs of the central parts of a healthy
tree. Young nursery trees often furnish ex-
cellent scions. Grafts of unhealthy trees
ought always to be avoided.

In all the modes of grafting, it is necessary
to protect the joint of the stock and graft from
the weather, till the two have grown together.
For this purpose, in scion-grafting, two com-
positions are used, one is called grafting-clay,
the other, grafting-wax.

Good grafting-clay is made, by mixing two
parts of clay with one part of fresh horse
dung, adding a little hair as in mortar. It
should be prepared some days before using,
and the more it is worked over the better.
Grafting-wax is composed of bees- wax, ros-
in and tallow. Downing recommends three
parts of bees-wax, three parts of rosin, and two

37

of tallow. Melt them well together, and pour
ihs mixture off into a vessel of cold water.
Before it hardens, work it over with the hands,
as you would molasses candy; and, as with
the clay, the more it is worked over the better.
Among the Dutch, a compound of equal parts
of cow-dung and loam, well worked together,
is used in preference to any other.

T. G. Yeomans, of Walworth, N. Y., re-
commends the following, as a grafting-wax
which "will give entire satisfaction to who-
ever shall use it." He says he considers it
better, as well as cheaper, than any other
grafting composition known. Mr. Yeomans
prepares what he calls his " superior grafting
wax" by mixing together 1 pint Linseed Oil,
1 pound Bees-wax, and 6 pounds Rosin. He
does not inform us how the mixing process is
conducted, but we presume the rosin and
bees-wax are simmered together, over a fire,
and the oil added afterward. Any of these
compositions will answer a very good pur-
pose. Even a turf of grass has served to
protect a cleft-grafted scion, sufficiently to
ensure its success. But it is never advisable
to attempt grafting, unless one has good tools,
time, and patience to do the work faithfully

38

and well. When it is desirable to bestow
the greatest, possible care upon a scion, the
wax composition and also the tip end of
the scion may be covered,, in addition, with
the gum-shellac composition, which we shall
describe under the head of Pruning.

Scion-grafting may be performed at almost
any season of the year, with scions properly
kept. A stick of buds (see Bud-Grafting,)
may be inserted on the north side of a tree, at
budding time, after the mode of side-grafting
explained below; and from that time to the
first of June, scions may be successfully set.
But by far the best time to graft with scions, is
from the middle of February, in mild weather,
all along until the middle of May, — stone-
fruits first, and other fruits chiefly in April
and May.

Scions are united to their stocks in several
ways. Whatever may be the mode of oper-
ating, the principle is always the same as
above stated, — namely, the sap-vessels of the
graft and the stock must be so adapted to
each other, that the sap can flow uninterrupt-
edly from the one to the other.

Cleft- grafting, so called, is the mode of sci-
on-grafting in most common use. Stocks, from

v; -,,- f •<• <-

39

half an inch to two inches in diameter, are
usually worked over in this way. The whole
top of a large tree may thus he headed back
and grafted, so as to become even more valu-
able than one that was grafted in the nursery.
The operation is easily described. Saw
off the stock crosswise; then pare the end
smoothly with a knife. Next, split it down
about two inches, with a thin sharp knife,
driven with a hammer. A narrow wedge is
now driven into, the middle of the cleft, so as
to keep the top of it open about a quarter of an
inch. Cut the scion, (which should not contain
more than three or four buds,) at the lower end,
in the form of a wedge, about one and a half
inches long, contriving to have a bud* or eye
at the top of the part so formed, to ensure
greater success. The scion is next to be insert-
ed on one side of the stock, and fitted nicely
into the cleft, so that the inner bark of the
outer side of the scion shall exactly meet that
of the stock. On large stocks, two scions are
thus inserted, one on each side ; and, when a
stock is extremely large, two clefts may be
made, and four scions inserted. These will be

* After the scion is set, this bud should be on the outer side of
it, and about a quarter of aa inch below the top of the stock.

40

managed, in future years, according to the
discretion of the primer. When the stock is
very small, it is necessary to bind the joint, by
tying it with bass-matting. Every part of
the joint should now be protected from the
weather, by covering it with grafting clay or
wax. When the scion is set just at the sur-
face of the ground, a little mound of earth
may be heaped over the joint, as a substitute
for the clay or wax.

When the stock and scion are of about the
same size, the operation may be reversed, the
cleft being made in the scion, and the stock
wedge-shaped and fitted into it. This mode
is called saddle- grafting. A little wood
should be pared out, on each inner side of the
cleft of the scion, so as to fit it better to the
stock.

Splice- grafting. This is done very neatly
and perfectly, upon stocks which are of the
exact size of the scion. Cut off the stock, with
an upward slant of an inch or more in length,
and the scion with a similar downward slant ;
tie the two firmly together with bass-matting,
always fitting their inner barks, or sap-vessels,
to each other; next, cover the joint with wax
or clay, and you have performed one of the

41

neatest and surest modes of grafting yet
known.

When the stock is larger than the scion, the
latter must be fitted to one side of the former.

It is often more convenient in practice, to
tongue the stock and scion together, that is, to
cut a corresponding notch or slit in each, and
then fit the two carefully together, tying and
claying or waxing the joint, as before.

Small stocks, taken up in the fall and kept
in a cellar, are often grafted in winter, by the
fire-side, in either of the above-described
modes, and then kept in the cellar until
spring.

Side-grafting is often practised to improve
the form of a tree, or as a substitute for the
other modes of grafting. Cut the scion as for
splice-grafting. In the bark of the trunk or
limb, where you wish to insert the scion, cut
a slit, of the form of an inverted L (thus q,)
paring away a small triangular piece of the
bark, on the upper side of the horizontal part
of the slit, so that the scion may fit closely to
the stock. The vertical part of the slit should
be two or three inches long. Raise the corner
of the bark, and enter the scion under it,
always remembering the fundamental princi-

42

pie essential to the success of all grafting.
By shaving off the bark of the scion entirely
around its lower end, more of its sap-vessels
are brought in contact with those of the
stock, and its growth is therefore rendered
more certain. The joint must now be bound
with strong matting, or tarred rope (old ship-
rigging.) In applying the bandage, it should
be wound, so as to bind the scion against the
undisturbed bark of the vertical portion of the
slit. Cover with the composition as before.
Fruit-bearing spurs of the Pear or Apple, in-
serted in this way, sometimes bear the same
season in which they are grafted.

This mode of grafting cannot be performed,
until the sap of the tree flows freely, say
about the tenth of May, or later for most
kinds of trees.

In-arch grafting. This mode is used when
others will scarcely succeed. The two trees
must stand close to each other. A twig of
each, without being cut from its tree, must be
pared with a long corresponding slanting cut,
and the two raw edges must be fitted nicely,
and bound firmly together, and the joint cover-
ed with the composition. When the union has
taken place, the trees are so separated, as to

43

leave the scion on the tree where it is wanted.

There is also a mode of grafting, by which
a stock may be worked into a tree which has
a feeble root. Take, for instance, a pear-tree
upon a quince root, which has become weak
and unhealthy, at or below the point of
grafting. Set out, close to it, one or more
small vigorous Pear stocks, and- graft them
into the trunk of the Pear, as near the surface
of the ground as possible, or even below it,
by the mode of side- grafting inverted. We
have seen a dwarf thus entirely taken off its
quince bottom, and converted into a standard
tree. This should be done as early in the
spring as the bark will slip.

In rich soils and favorable locations, the
Pear may be taken off its Quince bottom,
simply by setting the latter three or four inch-
es under ground, or by raising the ground
around it, using, in the latter case, a rich, gen-
erous soil, suited to the wants of Pear roots.

The sap- vessels of the Grape, and of some
other vines, are of such structure and location,
that the mode of grafting may be varied
essentially from what has been described
above.

Mr. Goodnow, of Indiana says, "I have

44

never succeeded with any other mode of
grafting the Grape than this : — Cut off the
root, some two inches below the ground, with
a transverse cut. Then choose a gimblet just
the size of the scions to be inserted, and bore
from one to three or four holes, in the end of
the stock, according to the size of the root, and
insert the .scions, first removing their loose
bark. The holes should be two or three inches
in depth, and perpendicular with the grain of
the wood, and the scions should fit accurately
into them. I have never known them fail to
grow. If the operation is performed so late
in the spring that the root shows a disposition
to bleed, grafting cement must be used." We
infer, therefore, that this work would be done
more advantageously, very early in the spring.
Herbaceous grafting, (or rather scioning.)
The French gardeners have succeeded perfect-
ly with this curious operation; grafting melon
vines upon those of the cucumber, the tomato
upon the potato, and effecting other similar
unions between vegetables of the same species.

•

ii. BUD-GRAFTING, (budding or inoculating.)

Bud-grafting, which is commonly called
budding or inoculating, is a modification of
side grafting, in which the graft consists of
but a single bud, or eye.

This is always an easy and convenient
method of working small stocks. It is
usually performed, in the latter part of sum-
mer, although it may be done late in the
spring; but it is not advisable to resort to
budding in the spring, except where we have
a very valuable scion, which we wish, by
subdividing, to increase the chances of sav-
ing. In this case, we may cut off the buds of
the scion, and insert them separately, in the
manner which we are about to describe, wait-
ing of course till the sap of the stock is in full
motion. We, in this latitude, commence Mid-
ding Plums, Cherries, Apricots and Pears, the
latter part of July. From the middle of Au-
gust to the middle of September, is the season
for Apples. From the first to the middle of
September, is better than earlier, for Peaches
3

46

and Nectarines.* It is essential to success, —
1 st. That the bark of the stock should part free-
ly from the wood ; for whenever, either from
the season of the year or the feeble condition
of the stock, the bark adheres to the wood, the
operation will certainly prove a failure.
2d. The bud which is to be inserted, should be
well ripened; otherwise it will not have vital
energy sufficient to establish, itself, in its new
location.

To prepare a stick of buds for budding in
summer or autumn, take a scion of the pre&-
ent season's growth, and cut off the portions-
of each end of it containing buds that are im-
perfectly developed. Next, cut off the leaves,
at a point about in the middle of their stems
or footstalks. The buds which are- to be used,
lie in the angle on the upper side of these
stems. Upon the Peach and some other trees,
three classes of buds will be noticed, — single,
double, and triple. Double buds being gener-

* It will give a better idea of the proper time for autumn bud-
ding, to mention, that a bud has two stages of growth, — 1st, to
unite itself with its stock j 2d,to form wood of its own. The
best time to set a bud, in summer or autumn, is just early enough
to allow it time to complete its first stage of growth, without en-
tering upon its second, this latter growth being delayed until the
ensuing spring.

47

ally fruit-buds^, ought to be avoided, unless
when the particular object of the operation,
(which seldom succeeds,) is to secure a speci-
men of fruit the ensuing year, and nothing
further. Single ivood-buds are preferable
to the triple ones, except in working the
Peach, where the latter, in our climate, seem
to succeed quite as well as the former. It
may assist the inexperienced budder. to in-
form him that the blossom-buds are' quite
round, whereas the wood-buds -are always
long and pointed. Yery feeble wood-buds
sometimes have not vigor sufficient to grow
into a twig; they, therefore, emit two or three
leaves only, the first season, and then die.

The size of the stock (trunk or limb,) upon
which this operation is to be performed, ought
to be from one-eighth of an inch to not more
than an inch in diameter. There are many
modes of budding; we shall give only that
which we consider the best.

With a sharp budding knife, (a pen-knife
will answer,) upon a smooth place, on the side
of the stock, cut a longitudinal slit, an inch or
more long. Across the top of this, cut a trans-
verse slit, from a quarter to half an inch long,
so that both slits, taken together, shall resem-

48

ble a letter T. Next, cut from your stick
of buds, a thin slice of bark, with a little
wood in the central portion of it, entering the
knife about half or three-fourths of an inch
below, and bringing it out about as far above
a bud. This slice of bark and wood, taken
together, is called a bud, — the part of the bud
which grows into a twig being technically
called its eye.

With the ivory haft of your budding-knife,
or, if you have not such a knife, with any
little wedge of wood or ivory, raise up the
Corners of the slit in the stock. Taking hold of
the bud by its foot-stalk, enter it, and gently
push it down to the bottom of the incision.
The eye of the bud will now be about from
one-fourth to three-fourths of an inch from the
transverse part of the slit. The part of the
bud, if any, projecting above this transverse
slit, should be cut off, by passing the knife
through it, into the transverse slit again, so
that the upper end of the bud and this trans-
verse part of the slit shall make a good joint
together. Bind the bud firmly with shreds
of bass-matting, so as to cover every part of
it except the eye. Woollen yarn or corn
husks will answer, when no matting is at
hand.

49

If the stock grows so much, the remainder
of the season, as to occasion the bandage to
girdle it, take the bandage off; otherwise, let it
remain on until spring.

In the month of April, when the buds begin
to swell, remove the bandage, if it has not
been previously removed, and cut off the
stock three or four inches above the bud,
which will soon begin to grow vigorously.
The stock is left thus long above the bud, as
this will often be convenient for tying up the
young shoot of the bud, during the first sea-
son of its growth ; after which the stock may
be cut offclose above the point where the bud
was inserted.

When the buds are set in the spring, the
stocks are cut off above them, as soon as they
show any signs of growing. As soon as a
bud or a scion begins to grow, ail sprouts or
suckers (called robber-shoots,) starting out
below it, should be carefully cut off. This,
however, should be done gradually, if the
stock is quite large, otherwise the bud or scion
might not afford a sufficient supply of leaves
to keep the sap of the stock in healthy action.

A modification of the process of budding is
deserving of notice. The French call it Bud-

50

ding without Buds (Grejfe satis yeux.} The
object of this operation is merely to cover a
wound or blemish in one tree with the live
bark of another, thus :

" Take from a tree of the same species as
the wounded tree, a piece of bark rather larger
than the wound, and form it into a regular
shape. Cut the bark round the wound into
the exact form and dimensions of the piece to
be inserted, so that the latter may be fitted
into the former, with the greatest exactness.
Bind the joint tightly with a ligature, and
cover the whole with grafting clay or wax/''

The same cure may also be effected by
means of scions. Cut good thrifty scions
from the same species of tree as the wounded
one. After paring the edges of the wound
smoothly, insert the lower ends of the scions
under the bark at the lower side of the wound,
by the above-described mode of side-grafting;
then insert the upper ends of the scions under
the bark of the upper side of the wound, by the
mode of side- grafting inverted. Bind the
joint, particularly at its two ends, with tarred
rope or some other suitable ligature. Next
cover all the parts heavily with grafting clay ;
and then bind an old cloth or piece of matting
around, so as to secure the whole.

51

In both the above-described processes oJ
•cure, the bandages need not be removed till
the next year. Injuries done to trees by mice
in the winter, may often be successfully re-
paired by either of the modes just described.

HI. POSITION OF THE GRAFT UPON THE STOCK.

There are five principal points at which a
graft may be inserted into a stock, —

1st. At or below the surface of the ground.
Splice, cleft, and saddle grafting, are applica-
ble at this point, according to the size of the
stock, or the fancy of the operator. Trees
worked in this way, have a neat appearance,
as the joint of the stock and the scion is not
visible.

2d. Between the surface of the ground
and the point of branching out. All the
modes of grafting may be practised at this
point. But if the stock and graft do not
grow alike, the tree will suffer in appearance,
and perhaps even in its health and vigor.
This is the point where nurserymen graft
nine-tenths of their trees, because the work
can be done more expeditiously here, and the
tree becomes marketable quite as soon as

52

when worked at any other point. But it does
not follow, therefore, that this is the best
point, by any means.

3d. At the point of branching. All the
modes of grafting may also be performed here ;
but the objection just stated weighs also,
though in a less degree, against this place of
inserting the graft. Trees grafted at this
point, are, however, quite as valuable to the
purchaser as those worked by either of the
above described modes.

4th. Beyond the point of branching, in the
limbs. A tree properly grafted in this way, so
that it shall form a handsome top, is unques-
tionably more valuable than one which has
been worked at any lower point ; and if such
trees are not recommended by nursery-men
generally, it may be because such high work-
ed trees cannot be got into the market so
young, or sold at so good a profit, as others.
We do not at all mean to condemn trees graft-
ed in either of the above-mentioned modes,
but only to give our preference to those of this
latter class.

5th. Still farther from the trunk, in the
branches of the limbs. This is the place to
put a new head upon an old tree. An excel-

53

lent plan for performing this improvement is
recommended by Mr. Olmsted, of East Hart-
ford, Ct. He says, "I begin on the top, and
graft one-third each year, taking three years
to complete the entire heads of the trees.
Grafting the top first, gives the grafts there
the best possible chance, while the necessary
reduction of the top throws the sap into the
remaining side branches, fitting them well for
grafting the following year." The lower
branches are, in the same way, made ready
for the succeeding year.

This is quite a profitable labor to be em-
ployed upon a healthy old tree, of which
the present fruit is not good. Twenty-eight
bushels of apples were gathered by Mr. O.,
from a single tree, only six years from the
time the first scion was set in it in this way.

In general, except where dwarfing is the
object, the nearer the point of union, between
graft and stock, is to the fruit-bearing parts of
the tree, the better; because seedling wood
has naturally more hardihood and vigor, than
the wood of a bud or scion usually possesses ;
— this, at any rate, is the teaeliing of expe-
rience, if not of theory.

CHAPTER III.

STOCKS FOR GRAFTING.

IT is generally best to raise stocks of all
kinds of fruit trees, from seeds. In the culti-
vation of the apple, the pear, and also of the
plum and the cherry, swc&er-stocks should be
carefully avoided, unless no others can be
procured.

The general rule, for raising seedlings of all
our hardy out-door fruit trees, is to plant their
seeds about an inch deep in the ground, in the
latter part of summer or in autumn, as soon
as the fruits ripen. The seeds of the later
varieties of each species, for the most part,
succeed the best. But to be more particular :

Apple seedling-stocks may be very easily
raised, thus : Take pomace, in autumn, from
the cider-press, before fermentation has com-
menced; sow the pomace in drills of about
four or - six inches in width, and about four
feet apart, covering it from half an inch to an
inch deep. A neater, but altogether unneces-

55

sary process, is to wash the seeds out of the
pomace, before sowing them.

During the next summer, keep the young
trees clean 'of weeds, working between the
drills with a horse-plough or cultivator. If
the plants spring up very thick, it is good
economy to pull up and throw away a portion
of them. By the second or -third spring, ac-
cording to the soil and cultivation, about
three-fourths of the seedlings will be large
enough to be set out in nursery rows; the
other one-fourth, or thereabouts, being of a
dwarfish or stunted growth, should be thrown
away, as worse than worthless.

Those which are to be planted out in the
nursery, will be from one-eighth to three-
fourths of an inch in diameter, at the surface
of the -ground. They should be taken up,
their tap-roots shortened, and three or four
inches of their tops cut off; then they should
be set in straight rows, one foot apart in the
row, the rows being three or four feet apart.

The best soil, in which to sow the seeds or
set the young trees of the apple, is a strong
deep loam, rather moist than dry — say a soil
that would produce a large crop of Indian
corn.

56

Pear stocks may be raised from seed, pre-
cisely in the mode we have described for Ap-
ple seedlings, only let the soil be deeper and
richer. But the climate of New England is-
not well adapted to their growth, and it is
not, therefore, advisable to attempt to raise
them, so long as the foreign stocks can be so
cheaply purchased of importing houses, in
Boston or New York.

Cherry stocks are generally raised from
seeds of the common Black Mazzard cherry.
Gather the fruit, when it is fully ripe, arid-
sow it immediately in drills, covering, &c.3
precisely as directed for the1 apple-seedlings.
The soil should be a deep, rich sandy loam.

Some wash the seeds from the pulp, before
sowing, but, as with the apple, we have found
this to be unnecessary. The stones, may be
kept in sand until spring, but we do not ad-
vise to do it. When the plants are one year
old, under good cultivation, they will be fit to
set out in nursery rows. Assort them accord-
ing to their size, throwing away the quite
small ones ; cut off their tap-roots and tops,
and set them out in the way described for
apple-stocks.

Plum-stocks may be had of the importers.

57

or they may be raised from the seeds of any
free growing kinds, in the same way as cher-
ry-stocks, (avoiding the seeds of the damsons,
as they are not easily budded.) A rich,
heavy, moist soil suits the plum best.

The above-named stocks may be splice-
grafted, when first set out in nursery rows ;
but it is a preferable practice, to bud them,
the ensuing summer. In ten days from set-
ting a bud, it will generally be ascertainable
whether it will live. If this appears doubtful,
another bud may be set in the stock, either
above or below the first. If unsuccessful the
first year, bud again the next, and even a
third year. If still unsuccessful, scwm-graft
the stocks, at the proper season, or throw
them away. This throwing away worthless
stocks, by the by, is sometimes a very profit-
able operation.

Peach stones should be gathered, in the
season of the fruit, and kept in sand in a cel-
lar, or buried in the ground, until early plant-
ing time in the spring. They should then be
cracked with a hammer, and planted in rows
three or four feet apart, and six inches to a
foot apart in the rows. They should be bud-
ded the ensuing September. The next spring,

those stocks in which the bud is not aliver
should be cut down close to the ground, and
only a single shoot suffered to grow, to be
budded the following autumn. If there is
again a failure in the bud, dig up the stock
and throw it away> as worthless. The high-
est ground in your nursery is the place for
peaches and cherries, and they will be truly
grateful far a deep, rich, loamy soil.

Quince bushes may be raised from cuttings,
which of course do not need grafting. When
seedling quinces are desired, sow the seeds in
autumn,, just as you would those of the apple,
and give them the same after treatment. The
quince is much more easily raised from cut-
tings in Europe than in this country. Good,
well rooted plants can be had of the importers
quite as cheap as they can be raised here.
When it is desirable to graft quince cuttings
or seedlings, follow the directions given above
for the apple, pear, &c.

Stocks for dwarf-trees — as the Paradise ap-
ple, Mirabelle plum, Cerasus Mahaleb cherry,
— or the dwarf-trees themselves, are obtained
from the importers, at very reasonable prices.

CHAPTER IV.

TRANSPLANTING.

No branch of tree-cultivation is more im-
perfectly understood than this. Thousands
of fine trees die, the first season after being
set, in consequence of the ignorance and inex-
perience of those who plant them. And many
which survive their first summer of suffering,
stand for years, hesitating between life and
death, which, had they received an extra fif-
teen minutes' attention, and a shilling's worth
of rich soil at setting, would have repaid for
both, an hundred fold, in beauty of growth
and productiveness.

To do this work perfectly, it would be
necessary to take up a tree, with every fibre
of its roots entire, and to set it again, so that
every root, rootlet, and fibrous root should oc-
cupy the same relative position in the ground,
that it originally had, — being at the same
depth from the surface ; and the earth lying
as compactly around it as before.

60

But, as trees are rarely moved without suf-
fering more or less loss or maiming of their
roots, it becomes important to understand
iiow to repair this injury.

A tree is a thing of life. It lives and has
its being. Its roots constitute its mouths and
stomach ; its foliage performs the functions of
lungs and perspiratory system. If, on re-
moving a tree, you cut away one-half of its
mouths, at the same time, of course, destroying
an equal portion of its stomach, its powers of
perspiration and respiration must also be pro-
portionably checked, or its health, or life even,
may be destroyed. Hence, when a period of
rainy weather immediately succeeds the set-
ting of a tree, it is almost sure to live; for the
dampness of the atmosphere checks the perspi-
ration and respiration of the tree, till its roots
in a measure recover what they have suffered
from their mutilation and removal. The same
thing is also imperfectly accomplished, by
watering the top of a tree with a water-pot
for several successive nights after being set, or
by binding the trunk with moss and straw.
A small plant or cutting is put under a bell-
glass for this purpose, the confined air check-
ing the perspiration equally as well as a hu-
mid or cloudy atmosphere.

61

The fundamental principle to be generally
observed, in transplanting, is to head back the
top of the tree, in proportion to the loss of
ro.ot that it has sustained by being removed.
Trees which are impatient of the knife, as the
cherry and some others, should be taken up
with great care, so as to save as much of the
root as possible. Instead of heading in the top
of the newly-planted tree, it has been recom-
mended very strongly, to remove every alter-
nate bud from each little limb or scion of the
tree, sparing the terminal buds. This mode,
it is urged, saves a year's growth of the wood.
This disbudding process may be worthy of
trial, but, as at present advised, we should
still give our decided preference to the short-
ening method.

Some fruit trees may be moved much more
easily than others. Downing arranges them,
with reference to this point, in the follow-
ing order: — Plums, Quinces, Apples, Pears,
Peaches, Nectarines, Apricots, and, last and
most difficult, Cherries. It is an invariable
rule, that the larger the tree the 'less the
chances of success. Small trees should always
be set, in the spring, in our climate. If neces-
sarily taken up in the fall, heel them in for the
4

62

winter ; i. e.. dig a trench, lay them in slant-
ing, and bury their roots quite deep in the
ground, mixing the soil well among them. In
the spring, take them up and set them where
you wish. Medium-sized trees, say five to
ten feet high, may be set equally well, either
in the autumn or spring. Trees of large size
should be moved, late in autumn, in the win-
ter, or quite early in the spring. Trees of
medium and moderately large size, may in-
deed be set, at any time, from the fall of the
leaf in the -autumn until the buds begin to ex-
pand in the spring, provided the weather is
not freezing, and the ground is not too wet.
In setting trees of medium and large size, if
the trunk of the tree is crooked, place the tree
so that it shall crook toward the prevailing
wind to which it is to be exposed. In almost
all places in interior New England, this will
be found to be the north-west wind. If the
tree is straight and handsome, set it with its
longest limbs toward the north. By observing
these rules, you will have the satisfaction of
seeing your trees growing more and more
symmetrical and beautiful every year.

The ancient precept, teaching to set the
sides of the tree to the same points of compass

63

at which they previously stood, is of not the
slightest consequence. From a disregard of
the rules just given, three-fourths of the old
orchard trees, now standing in Massachusetts,
are leaning awkwardly over toward the
south-east, where they have been turned by
our prevailing north-west winds.

Ornamental trees are generally set, at the
same season with fruit trees. The evergreen
tribe are, however, best planted out, just as
their buds begin to swell in the spring. They
are also successfully set, in autumn, and also
during the last of May and first of June,^ If
their roots are exposed to dry, out of the
ground, they are about certain to die. If the
root of an evergreen is much diminished by
removal, it will be found advantageous to
shorten-in symmetrically its side limbs, but
never head off the lea ding shoots of evergreen
trees.

* This last is said to be the best season for removing evergreen
trees from a forest into an open exposure.

|5V?V!

SECTION I.

TRANSPLANTING TREES OF SMALL SIZE.

SMALL trees, of less than three-fourths of an
inch in diameter, are very easily re-set. If
you wish to put them in nursery-rows, i. e.,
to trench-plant them, dig a little trench, suffi-
ciently wide to receive their roots without
cramping them. Make this trench by a tight
line, so that it shall be straight. Cut off the
tap-roots of the trees, if they have any, and
shape their side-roots as handsomely and
evenly as may be convenient; then cut off the
top, (or, what may answer, pick off the alter-
nate buds,) of the tree, so as to restore its bal-
ance of power between root and top. Set the
roots at the same depth in the ground that they
stood before being removed ; carefully spread
them out horizontally and straight, and work
the soil well among them with the fingers.
After they are covered, the ground should be
pressed around them with the foot. - Nursery-
rows should always be set by a tight rope, so

65

that they may be straight ; for a nursery-man
who has his trees in crooked rows, deserves to
be called a , or some worse name.

Deep tillage is essential to the success of
cultivating trees. Nursery land ought to be
ploughed and subsoiled, to the depth of from
a foot to twenty inches, and there is little dan-
ger of too highly enriching it. All stones
larger than a hen's egg should be picked off.
The best nursery land for fruit trees generally,
is tha«t which would produce a hundred bush-
els of Indian Corn to the acre. Subsoil
ploughing, although little practised, should be
regarded as almost indispensable.

The highest and driest land of a nursery
should be occupied with peaches and cherries ;
then pears; still lower down, apples and
plums; and lastly, the quince and grape,
which will bear, though they do not need, a
molster soil than some of the others.

ft*

i c '.•:.!'*

SECTION II. %

•

TRANSPLANTING TREES OF MEDIUM SIZE.

TREES of medium size, say from five to ten
feet high, such as are commonly taken from
the nursery to the fruit-garden or orchard, are
not generally set with sufficient care. There
is no more false economy than that which
does this work hastily and imperfectly. It
were much better not to attempt this labor at
all, until one has time and means wherewith
to do it well.

1st. Preparation of a place for setting-
the tree. Dig a hole, avoiding the sites of old
trees, five to seven feet in diameter, and fif-
teen to twenty inches deep, placing the sods,
if in sward-land, in one heap, the soil in an-
other, and the subsoil in a third. The diam-
eter of the hole ought to be, at least, three
times that of the clump of the tree's roots.
Holes of this size, and, in deep, rich land, even
smaller ones will answer. But, if the planter
has patience to dig still wider, and to any

67

depth less than three feet, he will find himself
amply repaid, in the better growth and health
of his trees. If holes are dug over twenty
inches deep, they may be filled up to that
depth with cobble stones, old bones, or even
gravel. The rest of the hole should be filled
with a mixture of the soil, subsoil, and rich,
black loam, or well rotted compost manure, to
the height where it is proper to place the tree.
With the hand or spade shape the soil for the
roots, into the form of a little cone, on which
to set the hollow in the centre of the clump
of roots. If this is done some weeks, or even
months, before setting the tree, it will be all
the better.

2d. Preparing and placing the tree. If the
ground is dry, or if the roots have been much
exposed to the air since the tree was taken up,
soak the roots and the lower part of the trunk
in water, twelve or twenty- four hours. Cut
off all bruises and broken ends of roots smooth-
ly with a knife, and shorten-in the longest, so
that the clump of roots may have a somewhat
circular form. In cutting a root, always en-
ter the knife upon the under side, and bring it
out. with a slope, to the upper side, so that
the fibres which may shoot out from the edges

68

of the cut, shall strike downward into the
ground, instead of upward, as they would
were the cut made as it commonly is. If the
tree is quite large, and a considerable quantity
of its roots has been lost in removing it, its
branches must be shortened back, or the alter-
nate buds thinned sufficiently to restore the
balance of power between the parts below and
those above the ground, for reasons already
explained. This being done, set the tree and
gently press it down upon the place designed
for it. As there will be a tendency for the
tree to settle down in its new location, the
planter should aim to -have it stand higher,
rather than lower than it stood previously to
being moved, — remembering that nothing is
more fatal to the growth and health of a tree,
than to bury its roots unnaturally deep in the
ground. Trees of medium and large size, set
upon a very gentle elevation like a turtle's
back, succeed admirably; and so, if a tree
should by accident be set rather too high, the
ground can be raised a little around it; or, if
this be omitted, the roots will easily strike
downward, whereas, the roots of a tree too
deeply set, cannot shoot upward, except in
the very offensive form of suckers.

,Q

3d. Filling- up around the tree. With good,
rich soil, fill up under, among, around and
above the roots, straightening them out with
the fingers, and placing them in a fan-like
and natural position, — being very cautious
not to leave any; even small, hollow places
among them. If the root is one-sided, make
the most you can of the weaker part. At this
stage of the work, if you have patience, it is
an excellent plan to make a circular dam
around the edge of the hole, and keep it full
of water, for a half hour or more. In setting
evergreens, this, by some, is deemed almost
indispensable, unless the ground is quite
moist. Next, put in a little more earth, pres-
sing it around the tree with the foot. After
this, throw on an inch or so of loose earth,
and the work is done.

Another mode of filling up around the trees,
called mudding-in, has proved very success-
ful. Make the circular dam around the tree
first, or, as soon as it is needed, then let one
person slowly sift the soil into the hole upon
the roots, while another constantly pours in
water, thus keeping the earth in a thin, mud-
dy state. This operation will require consid-

70

crable time, but its success is perhaps more
certain than that of any other mode.

The best compost-manure for trees', where
the soil is poor, is a mixture of two parts of
muck or peat-earth with one part of barn-yard
manure, adding, if convenient, a small quan-
tity of wood-ashes or pulverised charceal. If
these have been mixed some months, or even
a year or two previously to being used, the
composition will be all the better. Never put
raw manure in contact with the roots.

4th. ' After-treatment. When the tree is
transplanted in the fall or winter, it is ex-
tremely advantageous to place a conical
mound, consisting of from five to ten bushels
of soil or compost-manure, close around the
tree to save it from being disturbed by the ac-
tion of the frost. This mound should be re-
moved in the spring. It is generally best to
put a stake down, to which the tree may be
tied, for the first season after being set. This
ought to be done before filling up the hole, in
order not to bruise the roots. Large cobble
stones laid close to a tree, answer quite as
good a purpose. [See Chapter VII]

71

If the tree languishes, when it commences
growing, cover the ground in a circle of three
or four feet in diameter around it, with coarse
straw or litter from the barn-yard, laying on
sods or stones to keep this from being blown
away. This process is called Mulching. It
keeps the soil moist, and in that state of equa-
ble temperature most favorable to the growth
of young roots. Watering on the surface,
without mulching, is almost always injurious.
Feeble trees may also be benefitted, by shading
them with pine boughs, &c. If, with all this
care, the tree continues still feeble, head back
its top yet more severely, and water the leaves
and twigs, every evening, with a water-pot.

If, having followed all the above directions,
the planter still finds his tree standing season
after season, neither growing nor fruiting, but
only existing, let him consult his true interest,
by transferring it to the wood-pile. Why
cumbereth it the ground?

Nursery trees, five to eight or ten feet high,
are greatly improved by being taken up and
re-set in rows again. Take them up, shape
the roots, and head in and form the tops. If
this work be properly done, the value of the
trees will double in two years.

72

Small and medium-sized trees may be trans-
planted, with certain success, and without
suffering scarcely a perceptible check, by the
mode of Balling described in the next section.

SECTION III.

TRANSPLANTING LARGE TREES.

OWING to the humid atmosphere of England,
large trees of the forest and the orchard, are
frequently transplanted there without scarcely
airy risk of losing them. Here, the chances of
succeeding are greatly lessened, by the hot
penetrating rays of the sun, and the conse-
quent transpiration of the trees. With suita-
ble apparatus, however, and at no great
expense, our large fruit trees may 'be re-set, in
a manner similar to that just described for
medium-sized trees. But the cheaper and
safer mode is that called Balling. This mode
is as follows : —

1st. Hole for receiving the tree. This
should be dug, in the fall, before the ground
is frozen. It should be made, say not less
than from twenty to thirty inches deep, and
at least two or three feet in diameter larger
than the circular mass, hereafter described,
containing the roots of the tree.

74

2d. Removing the tree. At a distance from
tho trunk of the tree, of from two to five feet,
according as its diameter is from five to twelve
or fourteen inches, dig a circular ditch around
it, eighteen to thirty inches deep; smoothly
cutting off all the lateral roots, close to the
central mass of earth. This ditch, dug late
in autumn, must be kept free from snow, un-
til the enclosed ball containing the roots of the
tree, is thoroughly frozen. With iron-bars
and levers, force up this circular mass .of
earth, and place two or more strong skids un-
der it. By means of a strong set of pulleys,
with oxen attached, if necessary, the mass of
earth, and the tree altogether, must be drawn
over the skids up out of the hole, upon a stone-
boat or sled, the tree standing vertically, just
as it grew. Thus loaded and secured, it may
easily be drawn to the spot selected for it.

3d. Placing the tree. Measure the depth
of the ball containing the roots of the tree, and
fill up the prepared hole to such a height, that
the tree, when' placed in it, may stand quite
as high above the surrounding ground, as it
did before it was taken up. Next, lay strong
skids from the sled or stone-boat, into the
hole, and slide the tree carefully into it, using,

75

if necessary, two sets of pulleys, for this is
heavy work. Raise np with a lever, and
block the mass of earth, until the tree stands
properly erect, and then carefully fill in, all
around and under it, with good soil enriched
with compost manure. The earth for this
purpose should be kept protected from frost,
either under boards and straw, by the side of
the hole, or in barrels, in some barn or cellar.
The top of the tree ought, of course, to be
headed-in, if much of the root is taken off. If
deemed necessary, the tree, for the first and
second seasons after its removal, may be kept
supported by three long heavy stakes or poles,
set triangularly, slanting, and bound against
the trunk of it. Give it a good mulching the
first summer, and it will be almost certain to
live; and, when you gather its fruit or sit be-
neath its shade, and listen to the songs of birds
among its boughs, you will feel repaid an
hundred fold for the trouble and expense,
attending its removal.

CHAPTER V.

PRUNING.

TREES which have been properly formed in
the nursery, will afterward need but little
farther pruning, except to remove suckers,
broken limbs, and dead wood. This and
other light pruning, may be done late in the
winter, early in the spring, or in the latter
part of June, just as it will best suit one's
convenience.

What is called very heavy pruning, should
always be avoided, if possible; but, when
really necessary, it should be done in the win-
ter or early in the spring.

To form the head of a large tree, which has
been neglected for years, requires much judg-
ment, caution and skill, it is labor that ought
never to be entrusted to inexperienced hands.

In countries where trees are trained upon
the sides of walls, fences or trellises, pruning
is reduced to a science ; but here little is at-
tempted, in this way, except to promote the

77

growth, to improve the form, or to increase the
fruitfulness of trees. Pruning ought to be
performed with sharp tools. When the saw
is used, the ends of the limbs should after-
wards be carefully pared with a knife. They
should then be covered with some composi-
tion to protect them from the weather.
Downing's Gum-Shellac is admirably adapt-
ed to this purpose. This preparation is made
by dissolving a quantity of the gum in alco-
hol, so that the composition shall be of the
consistency of thin molasses. The liquid
should be kept in a wide-mouthed bottle, the
cork of which should have a wire (running
through it into the bottle,) with a sponge at-
tached to the end of it.

Thus prepared, the composition may be
very conveniently applied, wherever it may
be needed. We cannot too highly recommend
this preparation for the purposes for which it
is designed.

I. PRUNING TO IMPROVE THE GROWTH AND FORM
OF A TREE.

THE growth and health of a tree may be
greatly improved, and its form rendered far
5

78

more comely and beautiful, by a proper and
seasonable pruning.

1st. Heading-in. Trees are headed back,
in order to restore a balance of power between
the root and the top. We have already ex-
plained this in the Chapter on Transplanting.
Feeble trees of all sizes are benefitted by this
treatment. When a large tree is to be grafted
over, it may be headed back, if you choose, a
year or two previously, and the scions or buds
may be inserted into the young, thrifty shoots
that will be emitted from the ends of the limbs
where they were sawed off. By judicious
grafting and pruning of these, a new, hand-
some, and very valuable top may be put upon
an old and apparently worthless tree: but you
must not forget to dig and enrich the soil
around its roots, at the same time. Young
trees, two or three years from the seed, or one
year from the graft, are not unfrequently head-
ed down to two or three buds, on purpose to
strengthen their growth. A single bud is then
trained vertically, and the rest pruned away
in the course of the summer. In such cases,
the growth of the top being attended with a
corresponding increase of fibrous roots, the
tree at once becomes vigorous and healthy.

79

Peach trees, in our climate, are highly ben-
efitted, by thus shortening-in annually, in the
spring, one-half, or thereabouts, of their entire
growth of the previous summer, all over the
heads of the trees.

Dwarf-pears on quince, also require a simi-
lar heading-in, annually each spring, so long
as they continue to make a growth of scions.

2d. Pruning to improve a tree's form.
This is quite a matter of taste. Shortening-
in may be made subservient to this end, by
cutting so as to leave a wood-bud just below
the cut, on that side of a twig or limb which
is farthest from the central parts of the tree,
or which faces the direction in which it is de-
sirable that the limb should extend its growth.

A tree may branch out too low or too high ;
its top may be too open or too crowded. The
iimbs also may cross each other in such a
way as to give a disagreeable, tangled appear-
ance to the head of the tree. It is always
best to inspect a tree carefully, before com-
mencing operations, and then to proceed de-
liberately ; for one hasty cut may impair the
beauty of a tree forever.

The lower side limbs of young trees, in the
nursery, ought to be cut in, at first, to an inch

80

or two from the trunk; the next year, they
may be cut in closely. Trimming up a small
tree to a tall, smooth trunk, too suddenly, has
a tendency to weaken its constitution, and to
permanently injure it.

When the fruit cultivator does not do this
with his own hands, he should take especial
care to whom he entrusts it. Some cultivators
consider the whole family of pruning tools as
a nuisance, arguing that, by attending to the
trees in season, the whole business of pruning
can be accomplished, by the thumb and finger
only, — pinching off, in the bud, what in fu-
ture years might make work for the saw or

knife.

kaii'i*

II. PRUNING TO INDUCE FRUITFULNESS.

Scientific primers have the power to extort
from their trees large crops of fruit. But they
well understand, that it is not always their
true interest to exercise their skill for this pur-
pose. Nor is this without reason: for erro-
neous opinions prevail in regard to the
productiveness of trees. The sap that pro-
duces fruit, is so much withdrawn from that
general circulation which causes the growth

81

of wood and leaves. Consequently, whatever
treatment a tree receives, calculated to ob-
struct the flow of the sap. or to accumulate it
at any point, causes the formation of blossom-
buds, and the subsequent production of fruit.
There are a variety of modes to accomplish
this, which will be described in the proper
place. This end is- attained by pruning, —

1st. By pruning the top. Hence the excel-
lent practice, above described, of shortening-in
the Peach, Nectarine, and Apricot, has this
farther desirable result of causing the sap to
collect in the remainder of the branches.
While we thus diminish the bearing wood,
and of course the number of specimens of the
fruit, we greatly enhance the valuable of the
crop. For one large peach — and it is gener-
ally true of other fruits — is worth twice its
weight of smaller ones of the same variety.
A similar shortening-in of trained fruit trees,
practised in England, at mid-summer, causes
fruitfuiness, upon the same principle. Thin-
ning out the crowded head of a large tree,
also has the same effect, the superabundance
of sap, supplied by the roots and trunk, indu-
cing the growth both of wood and fruit5 in
the remaining parts.

82

2d. By pruning the root. This mode of
stunting the growth of a tree, and thereby
causing that accumulation of sap in the
branches, necessary to the formation of fruit-
buds, is one of the very best ways of inducing
fruitfulness that we are acquainted with.
This work may be done in autumn, in winter,
or early in the spring.

At a few feet from the trunk of the tree,
varying the distance according to its size, dig
a circular ditch around it, eighteen or twenty
inches deep, cutting off all the lateral roots
smoothly, close to the circular mass of earth
in which the tree stands, removing the outer
pieces of roots, from the surrounding ground,
as much as can be done conveniently. Fill
up the trench, with good, rich soil, and the
tree will, in this country, generally be brought
into a permanent fruit-bearing state. Repeat-
ing the operation annually, apples, pears, and
other fruit trees may be rendered productive
dwarfs,— even so as to be planted only six or
eight feet apart. And, if at the same time, we
apply the shortening-in process above describ-
ed, they may be kept in a beautiful pyramidal
form, and rendered very profitable.

J ' ,.» : %r '

83

There are some important advantages aris-
ing from this practice.

1. Root-pruned dwarfs will do well in the
poorest land, provided they have a few bush-
els of good earth under and around them.

2. They may be transplanted as safely and
almost as easily as a geranium may be re-
potted.

Trees dwarfed by grafting, [see Chap. II. ,
Sec. 2d,] may be rendered still more diminu-
tive, by this practice ; but caution is necessary,
for it is easy to overdo this work, and thus
to enfeeble and finally destroy what we in-
tended to improve.

Any fruit tree, in a languishing condition,
by a combined application of root-pruning
with a somewhat severe heading-in of the top,
may be wonderfully renewed in health and
vigor.

Dl "§' \

CHAPTER VI.

TRAINING.
*

This constitutes more than one half the
labor of an English fruit gardener. In the
United States, out of the vicinity of Boston,
it is but very little practiced, and, except in
the extreme northern parts of the country, it
is not to be recommended to the economical
cultivator.

1. Training upon a, trellis or wall. The
British gardeners train their trees perfectly
flat. Taste and ingenuity may weary them-
selves, in varying this mode of forming trees.
But taste will always have a regard for a
symmetrical regularity, in the arrangement of
the branches of the tree, and ingenuity ought
in all cases to conform to the requisitions of
taste.

The branches may be trained regularly
downward, horizontally, or upward in a
fanlike manner. It ought to be borne in
mind, in pruning to shape a tree, that

85

whenever a twig is cut off, the buds on it
below the cut, have a tendency to turn into
limbs. The same operation may again be
performed upon these limbs, and so on. A
knowledge of this fact, a skillful hand, and
good taste to guide it, will ensure success in
all the modes of training which an American
will wish to practice.

Out-door grapes may be easily trained in a
fan-shaped form, having but one smooth trunk
coming out of the ground, and branching at
from one to three feet high; or two branches
only may be suffered to grow horizontally,
like two arms, and, from those parallel
perpendicular shoots may be trained upward,
at equal intervals from each other. Another
pair of arms may be made three or five feet
higher up, and perpendiculars also trained
from these as before. Late in the autumn, or
in the winter of each year, cut down these
perpendiculars, to within two or three buds
(or eyes as they are called,) of the horizontal
arms, and in the following summer train up
other new shoots, precisely as before, suffer-
ing only one shoot to grow in a place.
When these perpendiculars have fairly set

their fruit, pinch off their tip ends, for the
purpose of forcing the sap into the fruit.

This may seem severe pruning, but, if you
desire fruit, instead of wood and leaves, you
will find your account in it. The health and
longevity of the vine does not seem to suffer
at all, by this treatment. The grape, cultivat-
ed under glass, is even more subjected to the
knife,, than it is in this mode of open culture.
[See Allen's Treatise on the Grape Vine.]

Late autumn, or winter, is the best season
to do this work, so far as the knife is employed
in it. The vine, and all other trees that are
inclined to bleed, should receive their heavy
pruning at this season, and their very light
trimmings in mid-summer.

The vine, and other trained trees, are fas-
tened to their trellises, or to the sides of walls
or buildings, by means of shreds of bass-
matting, twine, or leather loops put round
them and nailed. The walls or trellises should
face the south or south-west, in preference to
other points of compass.

It is haidly within the province of this little
work, to enter into a more particular descrip-
tion of the training of trees upon walls and
trellises. Those who desire to investigate the

subject further, will find details of the modes
of operating, in English horticultural publi-
cations. A mode new of training fruit trees,
practiced in the north of Russia, is well
deserving of trial in the colder parts of New
England, especially for cultivating the peach.
A tree, one year from the graft, is headed
down to two healthy, strong wood-buds.
These are trained horizontally, about ten or
twelve inches from the ground, to a south
wall; — perhaps the north side of a wall
might do quite as well, in our more changea-
climate. These arms are suffered to throw
up vertical shoots, which become covered witji
fruit-spurs. These vertical shoots are kept
shortened-in, to a length of not more than
about one or two feet ; and these with the two
horizontal arms from which they spring, and
the short trunk of about ten to fourteen inches,
in length, constitute all there is of the tree
above ground. The whole tree may be
covered, through the winter, with two feet or
more of soil heaped over it, with a deep bank
of snow, or with straw, evergreen boughs, or
the like.

We have had a similar experiment repeatedly
try itself, in our garden, where a low limb of

88

a peach happened to pass the winter under a
snow-drift. This branch would show a beau.-
tiful festoon of fruit, the following summer,
while all the rest of the tree, having dropped
its frozen blossom-buds, would remain through
the season, like the fig-tree of the parable,
having " nothing thereon but leaves only."

Instead of only two arms, the Russians,
with equal success, sometimes plant the tree
in open ground away from a wall, and train
similar arms out in every direction, like the
spokes of a horizontal wheel, tying them down
thus to trellises made for the purpose. The
apple, the plum, the cherry have been, and
perhaps all fruits might be cultivated in this
way. A reflecting mind will easily <take
hints from these practices, and vary the mode
of operating to suit the circumstances of any
tree that it may be desirable to subject to such
or a similar regimen. This mode of training
has other advantages. The fruit is less
exposed to the wind, the trees also come
earlier into bearing, and it has been noticed
that they are less persecuted by insects.

2. Training of Standard Trees. In
Chapter Vth, (on Pruning^) we have given

89

some general directions for forming standard
trees, and regulating their growth.

Except for the dwarf pear, this work does
not need to be done in this country. We
have thought it best to describe the mode of
pruning dwarf pears, in the part of the book
treating of those trees. [See Part II. Section
on Dwarf Pears.]

CHAPTER VII.

MISCELLANEOUS.

SECTION I.

PURCHASING, PACKING, FORWARDING, AND RECEIVING
TREES, GRAFTS, &C. &C.

Purchasing Trees. What has thus far
been written, will, we hope, prove serviceable
to those who purchase trees at the nurseries.
For the benefit of persons who have little
experience, we will now recapitulate, and add
some further general directions for buying
fruit trees.

1. Do not buy of pedlars or irresponsible
persons. Such dealers may offer you trees
which have received exposure sufficient to
cause their death, before they are put into
your hands ; or the trees may be labelled as
one thing, even when the vender knows them
to be something else comparatively valueless.

91

2. Select, although at a higher price, trees
which have been re-set twice or (better yet)
three times since they came frorn the seed.
You will find that such plants possess much
finer roots than others, and that they will
suffer far less check from another transplant-
ing.

3. In general, avoid trees which made but
little growth, the summer proceeding your
purchase.

4. Observe where the tree is grafted.
Generally, the nearer this point is to the fruit-
bearing parts the better. We should, however,
rather prefer trees grafted at or below the
surface of the ground to those where the
operation was performed between that point
and the point of branching-out. But a fine
healthy tree worked at any point, is not
simply on that account to be rejected.

5. The trunk of the tree should be straight,
smooth, and stocky. It should branch out, at
the proper height, and the branches should
extend upward and outward, forming a hand-
some open top. If the limbs are crooked,
entangled, crowded and crosswise of each
other, it may be difficult for you ever to get
them into the form you wish, and therefore

92

it is not advisable to purchase a tree of that
description.

6. Avoid trees of which the grafted part, is
growing larger than the stock. This is an
e\ril that will increase, and, unless the point
of junction is at or below the surface of the
ground, the tree will disappoint any very
favorable expectations that its cultivator may
cherish in regard to it.

7. Do not be tempted by a cheap price to
buy a diseased tree. Unless you are a very
skilful cultivator, you will find much more
profit a'nd pleasure, in taking care of healthy
trees, than in endeavoring to nurse those
which are sickly. A nurseryman of the first
rank in his business, will hardly offer such
trees for sale, at any price.

Packing Trees, Grafts, &c. The trees
having been taken up carefully, lay them up-
on the ground, placing their roots even with
each other, and interlocking the branches so
as to get them as compactly together as possi-
ble. With old ship-rope, or any soft cord,
bind the package firmly together, tying one
cord around close to the roots, and one or two
more around the branches ; then immerse the
roots in very muddy clay water, so as to give
them a coating of earth.

93

Next, let one person hold the bundle on end,
the roots resting upon a bass-mat. Sprinkle
among and around the roots, a mixture of
moss and wet straw ; then tie, or sew the
matting over them, so as to completely pro-
tect them from exposure. The remainder of
the bundle may be covered with rye straw
laid longitudinally and bound around it with
twine or old ship-yarn ; or the entire package
may be sewed up, like the roots, in bass-mats.
When trees are to be sent a very great dis-
tance, and of course are to be out of the
ground a long while, their roots, after being
immersed in the clay water, are suffered to
get dry, and then the trees are packed imme-
diately in boxes, and the interstices among the
branches and roots are filled with dry moss.
Trees are very successfully brought across
the Atlantic in this way. It ought to be borne
in mind, that it is death to the roots of a tree
to suffer them to freeze, out of the ground, and
that it is injurious to allow them to get quite
dry, in the air. Either exposure is entirely
fatal to the class of evergreens.

Where trees are sent only two or three days'
journey, their roots may be packed in wet
moss. Scions may be packed in boxes of
6

94

sand or dry moss ; buds should be put into
moss only. Fruit is best put up, for long
transportion, in layers of cotton-batting, and
closely packed thus by hand, in clean tight
boxes.

Receiving Trees, fyc. On receiving trees
from a distance, examine the roots. If these
are moist and fresh, they are in a proper con-
dition for setting. But, if they appear dry
or shrivelled, soak them in water, (if frozen, in
very cold water,) from six to twenty-four
hours. If the trees have suffered so much
that their tops also are shrivelled, it will be
well to put the whole package under water
for a few hours. After this take them out,
head-in the tops, using as much severity as
the previous exposure of the package would
seem to require. The trees should then be
set, (see Transplanting,) and the ground
ought to be mulched, for the first season.
Should the ground not be ready for planting
out the trees, lay them in by the heels, as it is
called ; that is, dig a trench and put the roots
of the trees into it, letting the tops stand up-
right, or lean down quite slanting, as you may
find it the most convenient ; then bury the
roots in the ground, and the trees may remain

95

for weeks, and, if they are received in the fall,
even through winter, withoiit injury. Trees
heeled-in in the fall, should be put down quite
deep, and the tenderer sorts, especially if they
have come from southern nurseries, should
lie in a very sloping manner, having their
tops protected by coarse litter or straw. It is
still better to open a deep trench, in a perfect-
ly dry spot of which the texture admits of
easy filtration. Let the depth of the trench
he some three or four feet, and the width suf-
ficient to contain what trees you may have.
Place the trees, root and branch, horizontally
in the trench, filling in, among them, with
light sand or vegetable mould. After this,
cover the whole, to the depth of two feet, with
earth. In extremely cold latitudes, the trees
ought to be buried still deeper.

Southern trees may also be kept through a
northern winter, by heeling them in in a cel-
lar. They may also be brought from the
south, early in the spring, and heeled-in in
a cellar, till the weather shall admit of putting
them in, out of doors; or, if well packed, they
may remain in packages in a cool dark cellar,
for two or three weeks, quite safely. South-
ern trees, excepting perhaps the pear, properly

taken up, properly forwarded, and properly
treated when received, are not much inferior
to trees which are grown here. Those which
are generally brought here, have been raised
under high cultivation; and the purchaser
not keeping up the same forcing culture, the
trees have languished and died. Thousands
of fine southern trees have also been lost, by
other kinds of erroneous treatment which they
have received, before and after coming into
the purchaser's possession.

We may add, here, in this connection^
that a root of a tree may be weakened by ex-
posure, as well as by diminishing its size ;
and, therefore, a regard should be had to both
these conditions, when we head-in its top,
to restore a balance of power between the root
and branch.

SECTION II.

SOILS, MANURES, LOCATION OF ORCHARDS, &C. &C.

Soils. Downing says a strong loam, that
is, a loam having just sufficient inter-mixture
of sand to make it easily worked, is by far
the best soil for a fruit-garden or orchard. A
farmer will be less likely to misunderstand, if
we should recommend, as the best general
soil for an orchard, that which will produce
seventy to one hundred bushels of Indian corn
to the acre.

This kind of soil, and also that which is
called a clayey loam, derives great benefit
from the subsoil plough, or, what is far more
expensive as it is also much better, trenching
and mixing the sub and upper soils together,
say for a depth of from eighteen inches to
two feet. Whoever is willing to be at the
expense of this work, in a small fruit-garden,
will find himself repaid by the beneficial
effects which the labor will have upon the
growth and health of his trees.

98

Where the sub-soil is sand or gravel, top-
dressing with a little clay and a generous
quantity of well-rotted manure, is the best
treatment.

When the whole garden or field cannot be
worked over, in this way, a large proportion
of the benefit may be derived, from preparing
a place six to twelve feet in diameter, around
and under each tree according to its size.

Low, flat land, spongey or peaty soils, par-
ticularly in our cold climate, are very unfavor-
able to the growth of fruit. Something,
however, may be accomplished, even in such
locations, by setting the trees quite high, and
placing under them in the holes a drainage of
small stones and gravel ; and by mixing with
the soil a quantity of sand, so as to diminish
the amount of moisture, and to increase the
warmth which the roots may need to enjoy.

General Manure for Fruit Trees. The
best manure for fruit trees in general, is
composed of about equal parts of meadow
mud, muck, or peaty earth, and common
stable manure. A small quantity of wood
ashes, say four bushels to a cart-load of
manure, and charcoal dust in about the same
ratio, may be intermixed with this composi-

99

tion, to great advantage. This manure will
be greatly improved by having been prepared
and well worked over, some months previous-
ly to using it.

Half a peck of bone-dust and a little lime,
well mixed with the soil when setting a tree,
or from a peck to a bushel of old broken
bones, put into the bottom of the hole, before
setting, will produce the most satisfactory
results for years to come. Almost any well
composted manure suitable for corn, will also
answer for fruit trees. $ |#

Where meadow-hay, straw, or sea-weed
(or sedge) is cheap, an annual mulching with
these will be found extremely beneficial.

Specific Manures. Much attention has
been bestowed upon this subject, within a few
years. When the soil and exposure are
adapted to the wants of any tree, the very
best specific manure or fertilizer for it, is
unquestionably the debris (or perfectly decay-
ed particles) of a tree of the same species.

There are, however, far more available
fertilizers than these. We are indebted to
Downing's Horticulturist chiefly, for what
we shall say further upon this subject.

100

The Apple. A peck of air- slaked lime to
a tree, scattered and slightly hoed in under
it in autumn, in a circle of six or twelve feet
in diameter, according to the size of the tree,
will generally answer. This application, and
an equal quantity of wood ashes, applied
each alternate autumn, with a top-dressing of
the general compost manure above-described
will keep an apple tree in fine condition, so
far as it is influenced by the soil.

The Pear. A small quantity of rusty iron
among the roots of the pear, gives a fine
healthy appearance to the tree. Another —
dissolve a pound of potash -in water, and
thoroughly water two bushels of swamp
earth or muck with it. Let it lie, two or three
days, and then put a top-dressing of about a
bushel of this compost to a tree.

The Peach. Apply half a peck of old
rusty iron, lightly hoed in close around the
tree. A half pint of common salt applied
annually, is also beneficial to the peach, and
nectarine.

The Plum. A quart of common salt and
three quarts of lime applied, in the autumn
of each year, as a top-dressing, will keep a

101

middling sized tree in fine condition. Of the
two, the salt is more essential than the lime.
The branches and trunk may be watered
with weak brine, occasionally to much advan-
tage.

The Chewy. The general compost manure,
with the addition of sand where the subsoil is
clayey.

The Qtiince. The same as for the apple,
with the addition of a small quantity of salt,
applied as to the plum.

We know of no better fertilizers for other
fruit trees and orchards, than the compost or
general manure, above described. Indeed,
those which we have just described may not
be the best. The whole theory and applica-
tion of specific fertilizers, is as yet very
imperfectly understood.

Location of Orchards. The tops of very
high hills, and low sandy plains, are not
favorable locations for an orchard. The hill-
sides are the preferable land for fruit, as they
are for almost every other crop. Downing
prefers those slopes which look toward the
south-west; others consider other aspects
equally favorable. But, while we would
concur in Downing's preference, we should by

102

no means hesitate to plant a fruit-orchard
even upon a northern slope, if convenience
should require it ; for fine, flourishing fruit
trees of every species, may be found growing
in every possible exposure, both as regards
the sun and the wind.

Orchard Position of Trees. There are
various modes of planting out trees in the
orchard.

1. The equidistant plan of straight parallel
rows, the trees standing as in the corners of
the squares of a chess-board. This is the
common mode in use with our farmers, gener-
ally.

2. The thick or hedge-row plan is a modi-
fication of the above, by which the trees are
placed quite closely together in the rows, the
rows being left more widely apart to make
amends for this lateral crowding. It is an
excellent practice to set, alternately in each
row, apples and pears, and a peach or dwarf-
pear between each of these. The peach or
dwarf will be worn out with age, before it
encroaches upon the apple and pear, and the
apple even will be infirm with years, before
the longer-lived pear shall have attained its
maturity of growth.

103

The hedge-row mode of setting peach-
orchards, works admirably. It is also recom-
mended where it is an object, to make the
most of what is called the under crop —
potatoes, onions or the like, — in contra-distinc-
tion to the fruit which is called the upper crop.
The rows ought to extend north and south,
thirty to forty feet apart, and the trees should
stand about eight or twelve feet from each
other, in the rows.

3. The ancient quincunx plan — where the
trees are set in the centres of equal circles in
contact with each other — is recommended

2

when one wishes his fruit plantation to be
as compact as possible. This is the same as
the above-described equidistant plan, except-
ing that the trees, in each alternate row, break
joints with each other, as the phrase is, a
tree in one row being opposite to a space in
the next, etc. When trees of different longevity
are in this way properly intermixed, the
closest order of planting has been attained.

Some recommend to have the rows, in each
of the above plans, occupy the centres of
broad flat parallel ridges like a turtle's back,
the ridges running lengthwise with the

104

rows. This secures more warmth and better
drainage.

4. The irregular plan of planting, after the
manner of an open natural forest, often
produces a fine effect. We have seen this
successfully accomplished even upon a small
scale ; but it is better adapted to large planta-
tions, where winding ways, hills, rocks and
valleys aid in diversifying the landscape.

Trees in Grass Ground. Trees in mow-
ing-land should have a circle of six to ten feet
in diameter around each, kept in a cultivated
state. A skillful ploughman, with a manage-
able team and a careful driver, can do this
work, two or three times in a season, very ex-
peditiously, by going down one side of a row
and up the other, putting in shallowly and
turning out the plough neatly at the proper
places. Twice a year will answer for this
work. But have a care how you entrust such,
labor to unskillful or careless hands. Such
may do the work with a bog-hoe or spade,
taking special care not to bruise the roots
in the least.

Some laborers are so rough, that they ought
not to be allowed even to look over the fence

105

which encloses an orchard, or a nursery. And
we may further remark, that the whole busi-
ness of cultivating fruit trees, from the sowing
of the seed to the gathering of the fruit, ought
to be entrusted to none but very careful men
— men of good sense, taste, skill and FIDELITY.

Fruiting, fyc. Some of the causes of fruit-
fulness have been explained already. [See
Chap. F., Sec. 2d, and observe the general
principle there stated.} The natural and cor-
rect inference from that principle is, that neg-
lected cultivation, bending, distorting, and
even girdling the limbs, a hard lime-stone
soil or top-dressing with lime, dwarf -grafting,
and, in a word, whatever tends to stunt the
growth, or induce premature old age, operates
as a cause of fruitfulness. But a word more.
As the little boy cannot have his cake and eat
it, so the overgrown boy — we came very
near saying booby, — -who is so importunate
as to require an immediate income from his
young orchard trees, ought not to complain of
their feeble health and early decay.

First Fruiting. Beware of hastily form-
ing an opinion from the first, fruits of a youug
tree. We have known a peach, through fee-
bleness, produce little, green, worthless fruit,

106

the first bearing season, and, the very next
year, the tree being abundantly supplied with
sap, the peaches would grow and swell out
into large, beautiful, delicious red rareripes.
We have also frequently seen an almost equal
improvement in the pear, sometimes even ex-
tending to the third or fourth season of fruit-
ing; and, further, it ought to be understood
that the fruit of some varieties, particularly of
the pear, may be excellent one season, and
only ordinary or indifferent the next, for
causes not yet well understood.

Thinning-out Fruit. The fruits of the
pear and the peach, and, indeed, of all fruit-
bearing trees and shrubs, may be greatly in-
creased in size, by thinning out the young
fruit when it is fairly set. And, as the largest
specimens are always the most valuable by
the quantity, this will often be found, by the
careful cultivator, to be a profitable operation.

A single peck of large, luscious rareripes,
is worth a bushel of those little, tough, fibrous
abominations, such as it is the height of im-
politeness to offer to a well-fed pig.

Peach trees, annually shortened-in, will, in
general, scarcely need to have their fruits
thinned.

107

Specimen Trees. Amateur cultivators and
nursery-men, will often find it convenient to
have one or more specimen trees of apples,
pears, &c. Twenty to forty or fifty or more
varieties, may easily be worked upon a single
tree; and one, in this way, may multiply spe-
cimens to almost any extent, even upon a
small piece of ground. Dwarf pear trees are
very pretty for this purpose.

SECTION III.

INSECTS, DISEASES, REMEDIES, &C.

To purchase the best trees, and to set them
in the best location, and in the most careful
manner, is so far well. But much more than
this is necessary. The soil must be tilled and
occasionally fertilized, diseases require their
appropriate remedies, insects must be destroy-
ed, suckers and dead wood must be pruned
away. Indeed, there is scarcely a month in
the year, when the hand of the careful culti-
vator may not find profitable employment
among his trees.

We shall, in this place, speak in very gen-
eral terms of insects and diseases. In the de-
struction of the one, as in the curing of the
other, the orchardist ought, always to make a
prompt and seasonable movement ; for insects
increase with astonishing rapidity, and dis-
eases, long neglected, can hardly be eradicated
without destroying the life of the patient.

Insects are kept away from plants and trees,

109

chiefly by strong offensive odors. Some of
those that have proved effectual, are the odor
ofchamomile, that of coal-tar from the gas
works, the vapor from oil of turpentine, &c.

Insects may be killed, by liquid applications.
The best liquids yet known for this purpose
are tobacco water, and diluted whale oil soap.

Tobacco water is made by boiling any
refuse tobacco in water. It must not be
excessively strong.

The whale oil soap is prepared, by mixing
one pound of it with seven or eight gallons of
water. These liquids may be applied to
plants, with a water-pot, or a syringe having
a water-pot rose upon the end of it so as to
scatter the water more effectually.

Half a pound of quassia, boiled a few
minutes in six quarts of water, is a liquid
said to be quite as efficacious as the tobacco-
water.

All plant lice and almost all small insects,
can be killed, by the application of either of
the'se liquids. A mixture of them might
possibly be even more effectual than either
used by itself. Strong suds made of common
soap answers tolerably well, in many cases.

Much has been accomplished, by kindling
7

110

bonfires in a fruit-garden, at night. Thousands
of winged insects, from a sort of instinctive
fondness for the light, fly into these fires and
perish at once.

Wide-mouthed bottles, filled with molasses
and water, and suspended among the trees,
will speedily become full of insects.

The animal tenants of our grounds — the
toad, and the bat, — will also lend us their valu-
able assistance, if we are kind to them. The
sparrow, also, the robin , and some other birds,
render such important services in the exter-
mination of various kinds of vermin, that the
fruit-gardener ought always to cultivate
their friendship, notwithstanding their dispo-
sition to test the quality of his finest cherries
and other smaller fruits in their season,
laughingly warbling their criticisms in his
face, at the same time.

Nearly all diseases in fruitrtrees are occa-
sioned, or greatly aggravated by insects. We
shall treat of these more particularly in the
following pages, under the head of each class
of fruits.

Fruit Stealing. Other "varmints," larger
although more despisable than insects, some-
times sneak into your fruit-grounds, to

Ill

steal and destroy. Every man who enters
your enclosure without your consent, and
takes away, from off or from under a tree, an
article of fruit, is a thief. Deal with him as
such. Keep him out with a picket fence, or
a watch-dog. Apply the scourge and the
disgrace of legal prosecution. Perhaps the
experiment of thorn hedges may be found to
answer a good purpose. But if these dissua-
sives fail, like the turf of the old man in the
fable, you must " try what virtue there is in
9 tones;" for while so many of our American
citizens continue to steal our fruits, and thus
evince a wicked meanness which would
disgrace a savage in uncivilized countries,
certainly a man can hardly be censured for
defending his fruits, cultivated or wild, from
the poacher, in the same manner that Uncle
Sam himself is wont to repel an invading
enemy from his own large and growing plan-
tation. As the penalty for the theft ought to
be in proportion to the difficulty of identifying
the thief, he who pilfers from an orchard
deserves to be far more severely punished,
than the easily-caught purloiner from a fruit-
stand in the market. And further, whenever
the law of the land fails to protect a spirited

112

man, he will not be backward in making and
executing a more effectual law of his own.

More might be said, but less would suffice,
if the men of the school-house and the pulpit
would all fearlessly discharge the duties
incumbent upon their stations. In some
heathen countries, where we send our mission-
aries, the necessity for fences, locks, and
other protect! ves against the sin of theft, is
entirely unfelt and can scarcely even be
conceived of. .

SECTION IV.

' SERY AND ORCHARD.

Labels. There are various modes of label-
ling trees. Labels of pine or cedar, brushed
over with white paint, and written upon with a
lead pencil before the paint is dry, answer a
good purpose for six or eight years. They
should be fastened to the tree, with copper
wire, in such a manner that they will not be
blown about and broken off by the wind, and
they should be watched occasionally, lest the
tree grow so as to be girdled by the wire.

Lead labels, stamped with type or dies, are
far more durable. They may be made of
long narrow strips of the metal, and wound
round a limb or twig of the tree, or they may
be attached by means of copper wire.

A convenient, cheap, and very durable
label, may be made of zinc.

1st. The Form. Cut strips of zinc of an
elongated triangular form, ten to twelve inches

114

long, half an inch wide at one end and
running to a point at the other.

2d. The mode of Fastening. About four
inches from the wide end of one of these strips,
cut a slit, or punch a hole. Bend the pointed
end of the label over a twig of tjie tree, and
put it, say one-fourth of an inch through the
slit or hole, and clinch it with the fingers or
with a small pair of pincers. It may then
easily be bent and shaped, so as not to be
moved by the wind.

3d. The Writing. Write with a quill pen,
on that part of the label between the hole and
the wide end. The ink to be used is made of
— Verdigris, (powdered) two parts ; sal ammo-
nia, two parts ; lampblack, one part ; water,
twenty parts. Mix these ingredients in a mor-
tar, using at first only so much of the water
as suffices for mixing them, and adding the
remainder afterward. Put the ink into a well
corked bottle, and shake it from time to time.
In a few days it will be fit for use. When
laid away, let the bottle stand cork-end down-
ward, to prevent the escape of the ammonia.
The ink may, in this manner, be kept ready
for use, for years.

Labels of this description cost but a trifle

115

more than wooden ones, and they will remain,
upon the trees, and be legible, during a man's
life-time. Instead of this ink, the writing,
made with a common lead pencil, becomes,
after two or three days' exposure without wet-
ting, almost indelible, and will last for a long
time.

The initials of a name, or the number of a
fruit, may be cut in the bark of a tree without
injury. Such marks remain legible for many
years.

Supports. Trees newly set, often require
support against the force of the wind. When.
a stake is used, it ought to be three or four
inches in diameter. There will be an advan-
tage in setting the stake in the hole, before
planting out the tree. The bottom of the
stake may stand, one or two feet from the bot-
tom of the tree, and the top may slant up so
as to touch the tree. Pare the side of the
stake next the tree smoothly, in a crescent
form, so as to fit the form of the tree, and bind
the two together with a soft rope, previously
winding an old cloth round the tree to prevent
its being chafed by the stake. Short stakes,
two feet above the surface of the ground, are
often sufficient for the support of a tree.

:$ >&

116

Large cobble stones, of the size of a bushel
basket, laid close around a newly set tree, are
quite as good as stakes.

Tools , Materials, fyc. Many and various
tools and materials are employed in horticul-
tural labor. The Tree-scraper is used for
taking off moss and rough bark, from un-
healthy or large trees. The Pruning-knife
is a large hooked jack-knife, for cutting off
the smaller limbs, in pruning. There are
several kinds of -Pruning-saws ; some are
narrow, so that they may be used to make a
curved cut ; some are contrived to be fitted
upon a pole, so as to cut limbs not otherwise
easily accessible. A common small handsaw
will answer nearly every purpose. The
Budding-knife is used for budding; the
Grafting-chisel, for grafting. The Nursery-
shears are used for pruning limbs of the size
of the finger and smaller. A modification of
these, called an averruncator by the English,
may be attached to a pole and worked by
means of a cord. These are sometimes used
in cutting scions, clearing off caterpillars' eggs,
or, with a little basket attached, in gathering
a fine specimen of fruit, not easily to be come
at by other means ; when made quite strong,

117

they are serviceable to the pruner. Portable
Steps, or Self-supporting Ladders, are of
great use, in gathering fruit, killing insects, &c.

Russia matting- is used for packing trees,
and shreds of this material are extensively
employed in budding, tying, &c. American
matting, made of bass-wood, has recently
come into use as a substitute for the Russian.

Common meadow moss, is one of the best
things in which to pack the roots of trees, or
buds or scions which are to be sent some dis-
tance. Buds and scions may be wrapped
singly, in oiled silk, when one wishes to send
them to a distance.

Stakes for heading nursery rows, to be dura-
ble, ought to be made of chestnut. They
should be two or three feet long, having their
upper ends planed smoothly for a space of
eight or ten inches. This smooth part should
be brushed over with white paint, and imme-
diately written upon with red chalk.

SECTION V.

THE NURSERY BUSINESS.

MANY American nursery-men have failed;
others have abandoned the business for more
lucrative employments ; a very few have found
it a tolerably profitable occupation for a series
of years.

A great deal depends upon the location, in
itself, and also with reference to a market.
The same capital and labor employed upon
one piece of land, might bring in a handsome
return, on another, the loss would be ruinous
to the proprietor.*

* The location in itself. — A somewhat elevated, gentle slope,
looking toward the south or southwest, is perhaps the best aspect.
A deeply tilled, highly enriched sandy loam is the best soil for
the generality of nursery trees. Cultivate cherries and peaches
upon the highest and driest parts ; upon the next lower ground,
apples and plums ; still lower down, quinces and grapes.

The location in reference to a market. — Experience has proved
that a location in the suburbs of a large town or city, although
costing $500 to $ 1000 per acre, is better than a retired locality
upon much cheaper land ; for a nursery -man must sell as well as
cultivate his trees.

119

The whole annual cost of conducting a nur-
sery, in New England, for a series of years,
will not fall short of $200 per acre.^ A few
lines will exhibit some of the items of this
expense :

Rent, or Interest on suitable land, near a good

tree-market, / $30,00

Labor, of men, &c. — planting out, cultivating,

grafting, pruning, taking up, selling, &c., 90,00

Stock, — including a due proportion of the first

outlay, the anaual cost of seeds, stocks for
^ , -grafting, tools, &c., &c., — taking the annual

average for a series of years, . . . 35,00

Manure, <?JFjr> ,90ffllivi» fife STOJffe1 .fctfVr5.f»f 15,00
Advertising, iv"»<v'"f ?!,«-*>•»••'.* - rtv\ #*i<v^ **fi®
Incidental expenses, . f • * ^ ' •' ' ^fi®

Interest, annually accruing on these outgoes before

the trees are sold, . . . . \ • >* * 20,00

Total Annual Expense of a one-acre nursery, . $200,00

^The above items would vary greatly of
course, in different localities, and also, from
year to year, in the same nursery. Such an
average estimate cannot be very accurately
made ; but whoever thinks it may be too large,
will mid no difficulty in swelling it to the
present amount, by adding the losses arising

* This cost is very clearly shown, in detail, in the Albany Cul-
tivator— Sept. No. of 1848 — page 279. Two very important er-
rors, in the article, will be found corrected on the 310th page of
the Oct. No. of the same year. Ambitious young nursery-men
will do well to read attentively the article alluded to.

120

from the numerous accidents that destroy so
many young trees, and from the depreciated
value of fine trees that have become unpopu-
lar varieties since they were grafted ; the
bad debts also, which are never paid, the cost
of collecting good debts, discount on retail
prices, &c., &c.

Five thousand saleable trees are the very
utmost that an acre will, in general, produce.
The average age of the trees sold, is certainly
not less than five years. Therefore, but one
thousand trees, upon an average, can annually
be sold from a one-acre nursery : in favorable
years, more, in others, less.

Thus it appears that five years' old nursery-
trees must be sold at an average price of about
twenty cents apiece to defray expenses. But
the nursery-man must support himself, not
from outgoes, but from PROFITS ! Put the
price at twenty-five cents a tree, and fifty dol-
lars profit will be left annually in the hands
of the proprietor of a one-acre nursery. If it
be objected to this calculation that many trees
are sold at much higher rates, let it also be
understood that such trees are often eight or
ten years old. In a word — from a little expe-
rience, and from considerable observation of,

121

and enquiry into the experience of others, we
very confidently affirm it as our belief that
the nurseries of New England have not, for
the last ten years, yielded a net profit equal
to fifty dollars per acre for the grounds which
they have occupied.

Again, young trees are liable to many inju-
ries. Thousands are winter-killed. Others
die from the uncongenial nature of the soil.
The inserted buds are frozen ; the grafts are
dried up ; the trunks are gnawed by mice ; the
roots are thrown out by the heaving of the
soil ; the foliage and the young growth, in a
dry season, are often destroyed by lice and
other vermin.

Thousands upon thousands of fine trees are
lost every year, in some or all of these several
ways. Many perish under the hands of un-
skillful or careless laborers. Many also, with
the best care, never become saleable, from
crookedness, deformity, &c., &c.

Nor is this quite all. A fruit, this year
extremely popular, will tempt the nursery-man
to graft it very extensively. Three or four
years hence, when these trees are ready for
market, lo and behold ! further trial has fair-
ly and satisfactorily proved the variety to be

122

worthless. Thus, all these grafted trees be-
come at once unsaleable, and their value sinks
even lower than that of good thrifty stocks of
the same age; for many of them will hardly
out-grow the severe discipline of another
grafting.

Whoever contemplates engaging in this bu-
siness, must also bear in mind, that the faith-
fulness and ingenuity without which a very
considerable part of the work were better not
done, cannot be commanded at the ordinary
prices for which an Irishman will shovel
gravel. So true is it that the more of intellect
or of other qualifications is required of labor,
the more exacting does it become. You must
pay for a two-footed simpleton more than
for a horse, for an American more than for
an Irishman, for mechanical labor more
than for field work, for professional services
still more, and so on.

It will be seen at once then, that, under
these circumstances, a nursery -man, who is
his own foreman and labors constantly in the
field with his men, might support his family
by the business, while another, of more gen-
teel ideas, would find it difficult to live by it.

And there is another strong reason for this

123

difference of result. As a Roman writer ob-
served, two thousand years ago, " Wherever
the eyes of the master most frequently ap-
proach, there is the greatest increase." Every
one knows this to be true in general, but unre-
flecting inexperience does not know that the
expression has a very peculiar force of mean-
ing, with reference to the management of a
nursery.

Another thing, — the nursery-trade is not to
be learned in a single week. Ten years' ex-
perience might grow rich in the business,
where five years could hardly get a living,
and a yearling novice would certainly starve.

The nursery business requires very much
more skill than ordinary farming, arid its pro-
fits are far more uncertain. Upon the whole,
it is a much better avocation? to amuse a rich
man's leisure, than to replenish a poor man's
purse. The reader may rest assured, that
there is no more satisfactory way of arriving
at a realizing sense of the truth of this asser-
tion, than to give the business a thorough trial.
For ourselves, we confess that we have fairly
and clearly " seen the elephant" that eats up
the profits of raising or buying fruit trees, for
sale.

SECTION VI.

THE ORCHARD BUSINESS.

As we have remarked elsewhere, there is
no better orcharding country in the world,
than the hill-sides of New England. A little
detail will show what might be done in this
business. Forty apple trees of the largest
size can stand upon an acre ; and, producing
annually but two barrels apiece, the crop is
worth not less than a hundred and twenty
dollars — iwhich is the interest of two thousand
dollars per acre. Deducting the cost of the
labor of managing it, and making every al-
lowance for other drawbacks, and this busi-
ness would still appear to be more profitable
than any other kind of agriculture. But since
what has been may 'be more satisfactory than
what might be, we appeal to facts. From the
windows where we are writing, we look out
upon apple trees, which we know have pro-
duced, during the last ten years, an annual
net profit, fully equal to the interest of one

thousand dollars per acre, for the land which
they have shaded. And let no one anticipate
a glutted market, so long as our manufac-
turing villages, yearly increasing in number,
are still but imperfectly supplied, and partic-
ularly so long as the fruiterers of London
palm off the products of British orchards, un-
der the attractive recommendation of " Amer-
ican apples."

Much of the rocky hill-side land of New
England, now considered unavailable for oth-
er uses than that of pasturage, could, with a
moderate outlay, be converted into excellent
orcharding. It seems very strange, that our
farmers should think so lightly of this very
feasible operation, now that the demand for
cider no longer requires to be supplied. A
bushel of Baldwins, never worth less than
forty cents, may be grown with but little mofe
expense than it formerly cost to raise a bush*
el of nondescript apples, which, in the palmiest
days of the cider-press, never were worth
more than ten cents. Most marvelous mis-
takes have been made, in cutting down old
cider-orchards, instead of saving and grafting
over frhe most healthy of the trees. Many such
trees, thus* altered into good fruit, scraped,
8

126

dug around, and manured, would have gladly
given the farmer five dollars worth of fruit,
for every clay that he might have thus kindly
devoted to them. The case of old neglected
pear trees is still more deplorable.

A hundred standard pear trees need not oc-
cupy over an adre of land. Their annual
crop, if of proper varieties, Would certainly
not fall short of the value of five dollars for
each tree. Excellent judges assure us that
this estimate is quite too low. But even at
this moderate computation, the income from a
single acre of pears would amount to the an-
nual sum of five hundred dollars. And the
labor attending the good management of the
trees and their crop^ would be less than what
is usually bestowed upon many other products
of the farmef's fields.

Four hundred dwarf pear trees would have
plenty of room upon an acre. Under the care
of a skillful cultivator, they might be made to
yield a much more valuable crop than the
same piece of land, in pear-rooted standards.
Some writers say more than double the crop
would be produced by the dwarfs. Thus the
income from a single acre of fruit trees prop-
erly cultivated and managed, might easily be

127

made to exceed that of some entire farms.
We have spoken only of apples and pears.
But much might also be accomplished, even
in our comparatively rigorous climate, with
peaches, cherries, &c. And there is little to
be apprehended from competition, even in the
less difficult branches of fruit culture. We
would hardly make an exception to this re-
mark, in favor of the peach-^a tree of the
very easiest cultivation, in all places where it
does not suffer from the severity of the weath-
er in winter.

Yet, — and this is important — let no one hope
for success in this business, unless he have
taste for it, a skillful hand, and a willingness
to devote himself personally, and with assid-
uousness to the work* It will not do to turn
into your orchard the first straggling laborer
who applies for employment. Neither can
you with impunity neglect your trees, when
they require the fostering hand of the cultiva-
tor.

Constant attention, patience, perseverance,
and unremitting care, are just as essential to
the success of an orchard, as is the soil in which
it grows, or the air in which its leaves tran-
spire.

123

For lack of these, perhaps nearly one half
of the trees annually taken from our nurse-
ries, are consigned to the wood-pile, within
five years after they are set out ; and the dis-
appointed purchaser curses the nursery-man,
his soil, the climate, and even the stars of
heaven, when, in truth, only himself is at
fault. What Horace said of things in gene-
ral, applies with the strongest force to the
orcharding business: "Life gives nothing to
man, but at the price of great labor."*

Yet, if a New England farmer's son shall
have been trained to habits of industry, and
to a taste for these pursuits, and there shall
descend to him an inheritance of a few pater-
nal acres of thriving fruit trees, let him thank
God that he was not bom heir-apparent to a
European Throne.

* * * * Nil sine magno

Vita labore dedit mortalibus * * *

Lib, I: Sal. 9,

CHAPTER VIII.

MONTHLY ROUTINE OF LABOR AMONG FRUIT TREES.

A chapter upon this subject may serve to
remind the reader of work which he might
otherwise forget, thus furnishing idle hours
with profitable employment which might oth-
erwise be crowded into more busy seasons of
the year.

JANUARY.

You can work this month, during pleasant
weather, pruning and scraping your orchard
trees that need this care. You can cut scions,
and also splice-graft little stocks previously
heeled-in in your cellar, for that purpose.
Trim your hardy grape-vines, if you had not
time to do it last month.

Tread the snow around your standard and
nursery trees, so as to keep the mice away
from them.

Examine and attend to all your trees that

130

need labelling. Prepare a good supply of la-
bels for another season. Pick or cut off cat-
erpillar's eggs from your apple trees.

FEBRUARY.

Finish the uncompleted work of last month.
Large trees, previously prepared, may be
moved in this or in either of the two preceding
months, by what is called the frozen ball mode.
[See Transplanting, Sec. 3d.]

MARCH.

•

Prune gooseberries and currants. Graft
cherries and plums, in mild days. Prune and
tie up raspberries. In the latter part of this
month, you may head down trees that were
budded last autumn. Shorten-in peach-trees,
dwarf-pears, &c.

•
APRIL.

Complete the unfinished work of last month.
Uncover tender grapes, &c. Weed strawberry
beds, and set out new beds of this fruit. Plant
out also cuttings of gooseberries, currants,
quinces and grapes, — the latter two in shady
and favorable situations, or they will not suc-
ceed* Crack and plant plum and peach stones.

131

As soon as the ground and weainer win per-
mit, transplant first evergreen, then fruit and
ornamental trees generally. Plant out the
trees which you root-grafted in January and
February. Dig around orchard-trees standing
in grass-ground, in this, or in any other month
in the year when you have leisure. Complete
grafting cherries and plums, and commence
grafting apples and pears.

MAY.

This is a very busy month. Get up early
in the morning. Finish the work of last
month as soon as you can. Endeavor to keep
down all weeds while they are young, and
thus save one-half of the labor attending
this work. Cut what are called robber-shoots*
off of all budded and scion-grafted stocks,
unless the bud or scion is very weak, or does
npt appear likely to live. Stake and tie crook-
ed and newly set trees that need tying.
Examine the peach, apple and quince, for the
borer-worms that infest them. Put down
layers of the quince and grape. Put your

* Robber-shoots are those which giow out of the stock below
the bud or scion. Sometimes these ought to be destroyed grad-
ually, if the bud or scion is weak.

•*'.liil'" ! • ;J • "ff^p

132

horse and cultivator in motion seasonbly
among your nursery rows. Brush off and
destroy caterpillars, early in the morning and
in wet days. Attend also to your ornamental
trees, plants, and flower-beds.
.
JUNE.

Cultivate around your trees in grass-ground.
Finish the uncompleted work of last month.
Thin out overbearing fruit-trees. Train
grape-vines. Make war upon weeds every
where. Cut off the blight from pear-trees,
and the black-knot from plum-trees. Exam-
ine for borers in apple trees, &c., &c. Keep
down robber-shoots on your grafted stocks.
We may add, though the remark does not
properly belong here, that evergreen orna^
mental trees may be successfully transplanted
during the last week of last month, and the
first ten days of this. If they suifer much
loss of root in the operation, mulch them, and
trim their tops, by shortening-in uniformly all
the limbs except the top or leader. This lat-
ter, once cut off or broken, can with difficuU
ty be restored again, even on a small tree.

JULY.
Continue your warfare upon weeds, training

133

the grape, cutting off blight and excresences
from trees, destroying borers, foe.

Bud cherries and plums in the latter part of
this month, as soon as the buds become ripe
enough for use. Attend to shortening-in dwarf
pear-trees, if you prefer to do this by the
pinching-off process, described under the
head of Quince-bottomed dwarf jiears.

AUGUST.

Put down grape and other layers, if you
have not done it in the spring. Continue
budding plums and cherries. Simultaneously
with, and after cherries, bud pears, either on
quince or pear stocks ; then apples till into
September. Strawberry plants may be set
during this and the early part of next month ;
but, in our cold climate, it is quite as well to
defer this work until spring. Apricots on
plum stocks may be budded this month, on
peach stocks, say about the first of Septem-
ber.

SEPTEMBER.

During the first week of this month bud
quinces, if you wish ; finish budding other
trees, and then bud peaches, from the first to

134

tha middle of the month. Remove, loosen,
or re-tie the bandages of budded trees which
are beginning to be girdled by them. It is an
excellent practice to untie such bandages, and
immediately tie them on again, more loosely.
Dig holes arid prepare soil for transplanting
medium or large sized trees.

OCTOBER.

This is a good month for setting an or-
chard. Follow the directions for Autumn trans-
planting, and you may successfully plant out
any fruit-trees of orchard size, from the latter
part of this month, until they begin to leaf
out in the spring, — provided, the ground is
not too wet, and the weather is not down to
the freezing point.

NOVEMBER.

Manure your trees. Top-dress strawberry
beds. Lay down and cover tender grape-
vines, &c,, &c. Small trees, layers, &c.,
designed for setting next spring, may be heel-
ed-in deep, out of doors. Small stocks for
root-grafting in winter, should be heeled-in, in
a cellar, in a box of loam if you prefer, where
they will not' freeze. Scions may (if neces-

135

sary) be cut, Put them in a cellar, with
their lower ends in the ground. Prepare large
trees for moving, by the frozen ball method.

DECEMBER,

Complete the unfinished work of last month,
If the weather is right, move and set the large
trees prepared in that month.

Do work as in the month of January also.
The leisure hours of this and the two ensuing
months, may be very profitably employed, in
reading the various horticultural publications
of the day, — works which Poverty herself
cannot keep out of any hands that desire to
possess them,

PART II.

OF THE CULTIVATION OP THE SEV-
ERAL SPECIES OF FRUIT TREES.

PRELIMINARY REMARKS.
.•j£»M[ $r!t ,?&$$&. ?Jfe^j^t&^M^

THE preceding chapters contain information
Upon the cultivation and rhana'gemerit of fruit
trees generally.

We now propose to eriter intd a particular
examination of the character ahd habits of
the several sp&ties of fruit trees adapted to
Wpen culturd in our climate, arid the proper
care necessary to be Bestowed upon each. In
order that we may Understand What are the
claims of New England, as a fruit-growing
country, we borrow a few words from Gene-
ral Dearborn, the first Pfesident of the Mass.
Horticultural Society.

"Among all the fruits Which are produced
upon the earth, the highest position has been
given to the Mangostan, Which is indigenous
to Java and other island in the Indian Arche-
pelago ; the second has been assigned to the
Pine Apple, the third to the Orange, the fourth
to the Peach, the fifth to the Grape, and the
sixth to the Pear." But this is not the order

140

of precedence with these fruits, even in so far
as they admit of out-doof cultivation in the
rigorous climates of the north.

The fruits of our eastern states, in the or*
der of their comparative value, should, we
think, be arranged thus.-^-the Apple, the Pear,
t(he Peach, the Cherry, the Quince, the Plum,
the Grape, the Apricot, the Nectarine, the
Strawberry, the Currant, the Gooseberry, the
Raspberry, and (we hardly know where to
insert it,) the Cranberry. In this arrangment,
we commence with tree-fruits and end with
berry-fruits; otherwise, we should have placed
the Strawberry, and, 'perhaps, the Currant
also, between the Quince, and the Plum,
where, we think, they have reputation suffi-
cient to sustain themselves easily.

We are entering upon by far the. most diffi-
cult part of our work. The writings of
Thomas and Downing, and even of our near-
er neighbors, Kenrick, Hovey, Manning, Ives,
and others, are adapted to soils and climates
differing from those of the elevated rocky re-
gions of the interior of New England. Nor
is this all. The testimony of cultivators in
our most immediate vicinity, is by no means
unanimous. Occupants of adjoining farms,

141

growing fruits for the same purposes, speak
in terms of praise and condemnation of the
same varieties of fruits. We have even known
an intelligent orchardist to cut his scions from
the same limb that another of equal intelli-
gence, had sawed off as unworthy of cultiva-
tion. These remarks apply with more or less
force to our fruits and fruit trees generally.

Something, nevertheless, may be done, and,
so far as it in us lies, we shall endeavor hon-
estly and faithfully to do this something, to
the best of our humble ability.

It is important to say that many fine fruits
are purposely left out of all our Descriptive
Lists. Of some of these the reputation has
not been sufficiently established ; others have
not proved uniformly productive and hardy ;
others have been too variable in their quality ;
and of others the omission has been justified
by other seemingly sufficient causes.

It will be obvious to whoever reflects upon
the matter, that such small lists as we have
chosen to confine ourselves to, are not easily
compiled. One man's family consumption,
nearness to a good market, taste, fancy or pe-
culiar whim, may be such that he will prefer
to cultivate almost exclusively-r-say of ap-
9

142

pies — the summer or early autumn varieties.
Another man differently situated, cultivating
for dissimilar purposes, and aiming to gratify
entirely different taste, fancy or whims, may
desire to cultivate none but winter fruits.
Still a third class of men may desire altogeth-
er other fruits, and so forth.

Occupants of city-gardens, having only two
or three trees, would probably wish to cul-
tivate such fruits as can be enjoyed in perfec-
tion, only when eaten directly from the tree.

Those possessing but a single tree would
be able to attain this object, by having two or
three such early varieties worked upon it to-
gether, trusting to the market for a supply of
those fruits which have better keeping prop-
erties.

It would be desirable to extend these gene-
ral remarks ; but ours is a little book, and we
must hasten along to other subjects.

In preparing our Lists, we have followed
the Catalogue of the London Horticultural
Society, as giving a greater amount of in-
formation, in a small space, than any other
plan with which we are acquainted. In our
particular descriptions of the quality of fruits,
we have followed the mode adopted by the

143

American Congress of Fruit-growers. Their
three grades of quality and the types or pat-
terns of each, may be conveniently exhibited
in the following little

TABLE OF QUALITY.

FRUITS.

GOOD .

VERY C3OOD. | BEST.

APPLES.

Maiden's
Blush.

Gravenstein.

Esoput* Spit-
zenburg.

PEARS.

Napoleon.

Bartlett.

Seckel.

PEACHES.

Crawford's
Late.

Old Mixon Free-
stone.

George IV.

CHERRIES.

Black Heart.

Elton. | Black Eagle".

PLUMS. | Lombard.

Washington. | Green Gage.

Many fruits are so much affected by the
season, cultivation, soil, health of the tree,
&c. &c. that they, in some years, seem to
belong with the good, and in other years,
with the very good, or even the best. Thus
of many it is difficult to decide, whether
some should be generally classed as good or
very good, and whether others generally be-
long with the very good or the best class.

A very explicit notion of quality, therefore,
must not be expected from the following tables
of fruits. We intend to give a general idea
only of this characteristic, and the same also
of the size, and, in a less degree, of all other
properties and characteristics of fruits. Per-

144

feet accuracy, in these matters, is altogether
an impracticable thing.

TABLE OF SIZE.

FRUITS,

LARGE.

.MEDIUM.

SMALL.

APPLES.

II. I. Green-
ing.

Roxbury Russet.

Qolden Rus-
set.

FEARS.

Bartlett.

Buffum.

Seckel.

PEACHES.

Early Craw-
ford.

E arly Sweet Water

Early Anne.

c««». i B""rkeara-

Black Heart. | BlackzardMaz'

PLUMS. | Washington.

Imperial Gage.

Green Gage.

We have made the above Table of Size on
our own responsibility, and we wish it to be
interpreted in the same manner as that of
Quality above. Thus, apples about as large
as the R. I. Greening, and all larger apples,
will be marked with the figure 1, indicating
large; apples about the size of the Roxbury
Russet, will be marked with a figure 2, indi^
eating medium^sized ; apples about as small
as the Golden Russet, and all smaller apples,
will be marked with the figure 3, indicating
small; and the same also in regard to the
other fruits.

We repeat, that perfect accuracy ought not
to be required, in regard to these things.

We will not deny that possibly we might

145

have selected better types of size than those
included in the above table; but we thought
it preferable to Use such as were the most
generally known.

In regard to the Vses of fruits, many of
those marked as dessert or table fruits, are
also valuable for culinary purposes ; and some
of the finer kitchen fruits are also esteemed
for the dessert.

NOMENCLATURE,

In designating fruits, We have adopted the
general usage tif our own neighborhood, as
being the best suited to our purpose, without
any regard to what may or may not be stand-
ard authority elsewhere.

Unfortunately the nomenclature of fruits is
Still in a very unsettled condition. Whether
in a country where every one feels so sensi-
tively his own political importance and per-
sonal rights, an entire uniformity in this re-
spect is attainable^ is with us rather more a
matter of hope than of confident belief.

CHAPTER I.

f"

THE APPLE.

One of the good old fathers of English
Pomology, some two hundred and fifty years
ago, wrote, —

" I have seen in pastures about the grounds
of a worshipfull gentleman, dwelling two
miles from Hereford, so many Apple trees of
all sorts, that the servants drink for the most
part no other drink but that which is made of
Apples. The quantity is such, that by the
report of the gentleman himself, the Parson
hath for tythe'many hogsheads of cyder.

The hogs are fed, with the fallings of
them, which are so many, that they make
choice of those Apples they do eat, who will
not taste of any but the best."

This little item of history, without going
farther back to Roman authority, shows that

147

the cultivation and uses of the apple are no
new things under the sun. Indeed, a fruit so
hardy, so productive, so easy of cultivation,
coming into maturity during so many months
of the year, and adapted to such numerous
uses, must ever be deserving of the first atten-
tion of the orchardist.

The apple is cultivated both as a standard
and a dwarf.

fcii -

Oh 5.'

SECTION I.

STANDARD APPLE TREES.

•KU -V» nail

Choice of a tree. — A good apple-tree for
setting in an orchard, should be from about
seven to eight or ten feet high, and branching
out, according to the owners' taste, at any
point from four to six or seven feet from the
ground. The limbs ought to be well formed,
diverging handsomely and equally in every
direction, and they, and the trunk also, should
'be entirely free from moss or black canker.
The length of the scions on the ends of the
limbs, is a good criterion of the trees' health*
The trunk ought to be straight, smooth and
stocky.

The collar— or part of the trunk just at the
surface of the ground — should be free from
the appearance of borers. The root ought to
be well formed and, like the top, diverging
equally in every direction, having a plentiful
supply of fibres, particularly in its outer por-
tions.

149

One must not expect to find all these desira-
ble qualities combined in every tree that he
raises or purchases ; and of course they are
not all essential ; — but the purchaser should
always unite as many of these good proper-
ties as he can.

Soil. — The apple will thrive in any deep,
rich soil, except the very dry or very wet.
'• A strong loam of a calcareous nature," says
Downing, " is its favorite soil, in all coun-
tries." Kenrick recommends "a deep pan
soil rather moist than dry ;" Thomas^ " Such
soil as will give good crops of Indian Corn."
Hill-sides are Very much preferable to plains.
Rocky hills, too steep or rough for other cul-
tivation, may be converted into profitable
orcharding.

If the soil is damp and low, the trees should
be set somewhat higher than they stood in the
nursery. The trees may even be placed di-
rectly upon the surface of such grounds, and
sufficient soil carted around them to cover
their roots properly. But it is much better to
dig holes, two or three feet deep, and put into
them a drainage of cobble stones, brick-bats
or other rubbish.

On the contrary, if an orchard is to be set

150

out upon very dry land, plant the trees quite
as deep as they grew in the nursery, and give
them a rich, generous soil around their roots,
and a heavy mulching also. We cannot im-
press it too strongly upon the reader's mind,
that drainage is necessary in quite moist land,
and that a deep, rich fertile soil is essential to
the success of an orchard, wherever it may
be situated.

Distance. — Apple-trees may be set for a
limited time, say fifteen feet apart j and, when
they become half grown, every second row
each way may be removed to some other place,
leaving the remaining rows thirty feet apart
each way. Full grown apple-trees require to
stand from thirty to forty feet apart, and this
is the proper distance for setting a permanent
orchard.

Transplanting. We have already given
all necessary directions for transplanting
trees. The apple will bear more abuse in the
planter's hands, than some other trees. But,
by all means, let this work be done well, or
not at all ; for an extra half hour's labor, and
twenty-five cents' worth of rich soil at set-
ting, will be re-paid to the planter an hundred
fold in the improved growth and healthiness
of the trees. • '

151

Cultivation. We have stated, in the first
chapter of our little work, that a fine fruit-
tree is the combined product of nature and
human skill. It is not enough therefore to
select a good apple-tree, and to plant it out in
the best manner. A great deal of further
care must be bestowed upon it. The cater-
pillar and the canker-worm must be gaurded
against or destroyed; the famishing mouse
must not be suffered to gnaw the trunk under
the friendly shelter of the snow-crust ; and
the insidious borer must be made to under-
stand that his intrusions are not to be tolera-
ted. Moss should neither be permitted to over-
grow the trunk and limbs, nor a thick grass-
sward to bind itself around the tree and ab-
sorb the moisture of the earth about its roots.
We have already given general and suffi-
cient directions upon this subject. It should
be remembered that the apple-tree will always
be abundantly grateful for a deep rich soil,
and generous cultivation. Cattle ought nev-
er to be turned loose into an orchard, un-
less one wishes to destroy it. If it is not de-
sirable to cultivate the whole orchard, cultivate
a circle around each tree, say quite as many
feet, as the tree is inches, in diameter, and let
the rest of the field be mowing-land.

152

Pruning. Whenever the apple needs heavy
pruning, the work may be performed at any
time from the latter part of autumn till early
in the spring. Light pruning may be done
at the same time, or it may be advantageous-
ly deferred till the latter part of June. The
apple, once property formed in the nursery,
needs little further pruning, except to remove
suckers, and dead limbs, (which always ought
to be taken off,) and occasionally also a limb
that is growing so as to deform or crowd the
head of the tree.

DESCRIPTIVE LIST OF APPLES.

Nearly fifteen hundred varieties of the ap-
ple have been tested, in the garden of the
London Horticultural Society, and several
hundred also in this Country.

Instead of this formidable, worthless Cata-
logue, we propose to describe only twenty-eight
varieties — all of which we know to be here un-
impeachably excellent fruits.

We have numbered and described them
nearly in the order of their ripening. This,
as we have before remarked, cannot be done
very accurately, for reasons already stated •
and, further, because several ripen simulta*

neously; some also ripen gradually, while
others ripen suddenly, and are quickly gone.
Some, more than others, are hastened or re-
tarded in their approach to maturity, by the
state of the weather in different seasons.
&c. &c,

For size, quality, $•£., see the Preliminary
to Part II. of this Book-

154

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156

The list just given comprises twenty-eight
varieties of the apple. For general cultiva-
tion in the interior of New England, we con-
sider this the best list of that number of va-
rieties of which the reputation is as yet well
established. We have prepared it with a
great deal of care, and have confidence that
it will prove satisfactory to the fruit-growing
public who consult it.

Crab Apples are sometimes desirable for
preserving, &c. The best two are the Yellow
Siberian and the Red Siberian. If any one
prefers that these should be of a dwarfish
size, he should select trees that have been
worked upon paradise stocks.

Those who would go beyond the limits of
the above descriptive list, can select from the
following :

Summer -4?>/jfes,-^Astracan, Benoni, River
(a capital fruit, but the tree is a very poor
bearer,) &c. &c.

Autumn Apples, — J)uchess of Oldenburg,
Foundling (or Shirley,) Fameuse, (Red)
Hamburg, {for cooking,) &c. &c.

Winter Apples. — American Golden Russet
(very fine,) Minister, Jewett's Fine Red, Blue
Pearmain, Seaver Sweeting, Dutch Mignonne,

157

(perhaps) Northern Spy, Lady Apple (very
pretty and also very small,) Sutton Beauty,
Rpckport Sweeting, Black Gilliflower, Sweet
Russet (fine for baking,) &c. &c.

SELECT LIST of twelve varieties. — We sub-
mit the following : — Summer — Early Harvest,
Early Sweet Bough, Williams' s Early Red.
Autumn — Porter, Leland's Spice, Gravenstein.
Winter — Hubbardston Nonesuch, R. I. Green-
ing, Baldwin, Esopus Spitzenburg. Spring,
— Danver's Winter Sweeting, Roxbury Rus-
set.

SELECT LIST of six varieties. — Summer —
Williams' s Early Red. Autumn — Porter,
Leland's Spice. Winter — R. I. Greening,
Baldwin. Spring — Roxbury Russet.

A single Apple-Tree for a city garden,
might be grafted with three sorts, viz : Wil-
liams's Early Red, Porter, Leland's Spice ; —
being thus limited to a single tree, it would
be better to buy later varieties.

. , r>feaHT ^.*>k>i>?3 i V<.-y.«-U .£?sft«*H

10

.

f*.

;

i

SECTION II.
SM«*

DWARF APPLE-TREES.

.?ft#>\'*t J

No one, we suppose, will attempt to culti-
vate these little trees in this country, except-
ing for ornamental purposes. They are very
pretty garden pets in the midst of a flower-
bed, or at the corners of alleys, or elsewhere
where fancy may locate them. They sel-
dom bear more than a dozen or twenty apples,
and therefore the economical orchardist, look-
ing to profit alone, ought not to consider them
as worthy of his attention. To form these
dwarfs, set grafts of such apples as you de-
sire into what are called Paradise, or by the
French, Doucin stocks.* These stocks are
of rather a tender habit, and they require kind
treatment, and a generous rich soil. Where
a number of these trees are planted together,

* The Parad'se is a distinct kind of apples. Its stocks are
raised, in Europe, from suckers or from cuttings and layers.

159

they may be set three or four feet apart.
They are subject to the same diseases and
depredations of insects to which apples on
free stocks (i. e. apple seedling stocks) are li-
able. There is nothing very peculiar in the
management of the dwarf-apple. Its place
is the garden, not the field ; still less will it
answer to put these little trees in grass-ground,
or to subject them to rough usage.

Very large si^ed apples, such as the Twen-
ty Ounce and the Gloria Mundi ; fine looking
apples, such as Leland's Spice, the Lady Ap-
ple, Maiden's Blush, Siberian Crab, &c., are
pretty for this mode of cultivation.

SECTION III.

INSECTS, DISEASES, &C.
It

The insect-enemies of the apple are chiefly
the Caterpillar, the Canker worm, the Borer,
and the Appleworm.

1. The Caterpillar. Several species of this
insect prey upon the apple leaf; but the com-
mon caterpillar which is hatched and comes
out just as the leaves begin to expand, is the
pest of the orchard, unless it is promptly des-
troyed.

The character and habits of this insect are
too well known to require a description here.

By far the most effectual way of destroying
them, is to pi-ek off their eggs any time from
autumn till the last of April. These will be
found on the outer parts of the tree, just at the
base of the young wood of the previous sum-
mer's growth. They may be taken off with
the ringers, or cut off with a pruning knife or
the pole-shears, which we have described un-
der the head of Implements. (See page 116.)

161

The eggs are deposited in cylinders, or
rings, about half an inch wide, presenting the
appearance of a small quantity of brown wax
encircling the twig. When taken off with
the fingers, they separate easily and leave the
twig entirely clean.

If this work has been neglected, other means
must be resorted to for destroying this insect.
A caterpillar-brush affixed to a pole, is the
best of these. Go among your trees, early in
the morning or in a wet day, when the vermin
are all in their nests, and you can easily wipe
them off with your brush, before they shall
have done any injury.

2. The Canker-worm. Whole orchards
in New England have been destroyed by the
ravages of this insect. Happily it does not
make its visits every year, but only after long
intervening periods, — making its appearance
gradually from year to year until in the third
or fourth summer, the orchard will appear as
if it had been burnt over with fire.

Whenever the ground is not frozen, from
the first of November till the middle of May,
the female of the canker-worm crawls up the
trees to lay her eggs. The most effectual way
to prevent her ascent that we are acquainted
with, is to tar the trees.

162

With this design, says Kenrick, the bark
around the circumference of the trunk is
scraped smooth, and the crevices in it where
the application is to be made are filled with
clay or mortar. Over this a strip of canvass,
three or four inches wide, is bound around the
tree, the lower band consisting of a large tow
cord, to prevent the running down of the tar
and its consequent injurious effect on the tree.
On this strip the tar is laid with a brush.
The tarring ought to be applied, every after-
noon toward sunset when the weather is
moderate and the ground unfrozen, from the
first hard frosts in October till the latter part
of May. A small portion of soft grease may
be mixed with the tar to preserve it from dry-
ing, and in this way it will answer to visit the
trees every other day. Some farmers apply
the tar directly to large trees without the
canvass, and we have not seen any injury
resulting from the practice. Tarring two
years in succession in the months of March
and April has entirely rid orchards of this
pest.

Downing says, old India Rubber, melted in
an iron vessel over a very hot fire, forms a
very adhesive fluid, which is not effected by

163

the weather, and is preferred by those who
have tried it, as being a more convenient and
serviceable article than tar, for smearing the
bandages.

It is hardly necessary to say that the object
of the tarring process, is to stop and entrap
the female in her ascent to lay her eggs. It
will readily be seen therefore that the omission
of a single night favorable to the movements
of the grubs, may prove fatal to the remedy
for that season, and defeat the whole object of
the labor previously bestowed. (Kenrick.)

Various other methods of destroying this
insect have been tried, but with only partial
success. The above described mode, faithful-
ly followed, we have known to be attended
with perfect success.

3. The Borer. This insect enters the tree,
chiefly from an inch or two below, to a foot
above the surface of the ground ; but some-
times even as high up as the branches. The
eggs are laid, from the last of April till into
June. Upon small trees, an effectual preven-
tive consists in washing the parts of the trunk
exposed to attack, with a solution of one
pound of good potash dissolved in about four
or five quarts of water. A small conical

164

mound of ashes, leached or unleached, put
around the tree in the spring, sometimes
affords them sufficient protection. A wrapper
of brown paper previously saturated with
strong tobacco water, would doubtless prevent
the insect from depositing its eggs.

The presence of the borer already in a tree,
is indicated by the dust, (resembling a spoon-
full or more of saw dust,) which he ejects
from his hole. If taken early, you may de-
stroy him with the point of a knife. When
he is farther in the wood, use a flexible barbed
wire, with which to extract him or punch
him to death. A good ear will be able to hear
the success of the latter operation.

4. The Apple-worm. This insect frequent-
ly destroys or greatly injures more than one
half the entire crop of a tree. Thomas says
the best preventive is to allow swine to eat the
wormy fruit, as fast as it falls, thus destroying
the enclosed insects and preventing their
spread. A quart of salt sprinkled over the
ground under a large tree each year, will be
found to diminish the number of these insects,
and add also to the health and productiveness
of the tree. In all your warfare with insects, do
not forget that a prompt, early movement is
nine tenths of the victory.

5. The Woolly Aphis. This insect, (Aphis
langinera,) called erroneously in Europe the
American Blight, has as yet rarely made its
appearance in this country. In France and
Germany, and in other parts of Europe, it is
the pest of the orchard.

The appearance of this insect is like a
small quantity of down or white frost, in the
forks and crevices of the twigs and branches.
This, examined with a glass, proves to be
composed of an immense number of woolly
lice. If not destroyed, they will increase very
rapidly. Fortunately the remedy is an easy
one. London says it is only necessary to
wash the affected parts, with diluted sulphuric
acid — one ounce by measure of the sulphuric
acid of the shops, mixed with ten ounces of
water. This liquid should be applied, by
means of a piece of sponge or rag tied to a
stick, the operator taking especial care not to
get it upon his hands or clothes. One appli-
cation of it, assisted by the disseminating
powers of the next succeeding rain, will effect-
ually destroy these insects.

We noticed a slight appearance of the
woolly aphis in the nursery last summer.

166

Black Canker. The trunk or limbs of trees,
affected with this disorder, should have the
diseased, black outer bark carefully shaved
off, in the month of June ; after which appl y
a generous coating of the gum-shellac com-
position, described in the Chapter on Priming.
We have practiced this with great success.

Blight. — Apple-trees are sometimes affected
by a disease, similar to what is called the
Pear Blight. For a description of the disease
and the best known preventives and remedies,
see the Chapter on The Pear.

Bearing year. In common management,
this takes place each alternate year. By
thinning out half the blossoms on the bearing
year, you may easily have about an equal
quantity of fruit, every season. The bearing
year may be entirely changed, by taking off
all the blossoms or young fruit on that year,
and allowing them to remain, on the year
which we wish to make the bearing one.

We have a fine Baldwin, one limb of which
was several years ago struck by a frost, while
in full blossom. When the other parts of the
tree are loaded with fruit, this has none at
all. On the alternate years, this bears two or

167

three bushels of fine apples, while there are
scarcely as many single specimens, on the
whole of the rest of the tree. What nature
did in this case, art may. easily effect upon
other trees,

SECTION IV.

GATHERING AND RIPENING THE APPLE.

The following remarks are intended, chiefly ,
to apply to winter varieties of the fruit.

Mr Pell, the great orchard ist of Ulster Co.,
N. Y., reccommends to gather the apples
carefully by hand on a dry day ; lay them
gently by hand twelve or fourteen inches deep
on the floor of a cool dry room, and let them
dry and season there, for three weeks. Then
carefully take them up, on a clear day, and
pack them by hand, in clean dry barrels,
rilling the barrels so full that a gentle pressure
will be necessary in order to head them up.
In this way they may be kept without rotting,
and safely sent to any part of Europe, or the
West Indies. (Genessee Farmer^ Smaller
quantities of apples may be put up, in com-
mon, tight, wooden buckets. The best place
for keeping them, is a dry airy room or cellar,
of which the temperature ranges from 35° to

169

45° Fahr. Thomas recommends packing
alternate layers of apples and dry chaff mixed
with a small portion of dry, pulverized lime.
Apples for exportation are often wrapped each
one separately in clean soft coarse paper like
oranges, and then pat up, in boxes or barrels
as above directed.

The common practice with our best or-
chardists here in Worcester, is to gather
winter apples, during the last week in Septem-
ber, generally.

The fruit is taken from the tree, when it is
not moist with dew or rain ; it is at the same
time assorted and carefully placed directly in
clean, dry, tight flour barrels. The barrels,
when filled, are placed on the north side of a
fence or building, or in some other cool, shady
out-door situation, and then covered with
boards, in such a manner as to keep out the
rain and cold. Here they are left, until the
danger of freezing requires them to be removed
into a cellar. The best fruit cellar is one
which is dry, airy and of a uniform tempera-
ture of about 40° Fahr. Fruit will very
soon decay in a close, damp cellar, particularly
if the cellar is also warm. Late-keeping
apples, like the Roxbury Russet, should be

iro

*

headed-up in the barrels, as soon as they are
gathered, and it is not well to open them, un-
til the latter part of winter, unless they are
wanted for use sooner.

Iff!

itnixkfft /Vt ' • v - <-^>

SECTION V.

USES OF THE APPLE.

We shall treat of this topic quite summari-
ly, lest we trespass upon ground already
occupied by the numerous Cook Books and
Kitchen Guides, with which species of litera-
ture the public has been so plentifully sup-
plied.

Uses of the Pulp. From the first of Au^
gust, for ten or twelve months, the finer sorts
are extensively used for the dessert.

In the kitchen it enters largely into the
composition of numerous articles of food*,
sauces, jellies, pies, tarts, &c. &c. It is boiled
in dumplings ; and it is roasted for the sick*
Apple-Butter, or apple-sauce, is a common
side dish upon every farmer's table.

Dried Apples are also much used for pies,
puddings, &c. Good preserves may be made
of this fruit. The pulp of the apple mixed

172

intimately with lard, constitutes the pomatum
used by perfumers.

Sweet apples especially, and even sour ones,
are a valuable crop to cultivate for feeding
swine or cattle. Some intelligent farmers
consider them quite as valuable as potatoes,
for this purpose.

For milch cows and other cattle, and for
swine, we believe trees bearing sweet apples
might be made far more profitable than any
of the cider orchards ever were ; to say noth-
ing of the moral benefits which every farmer
would derive, from feeding to his four-footed
hogs, what he formerly was sometimes wont
to employ as a means of making a two-footed
hog of himself.

Uses of the Juice. The juice of the apple
is called Cider. Cider is commonly made of
the refuse apples of the orchard, mixed togeth-
er. But to make the best cider, use mellow
sweet apples only. Grind them finely in a
clean mill, let the pomace lay in the trough of
the mill, two or three days or even a week, if
it can be without fermentation. This gives a
fine color, and a peculiarly rich, saccharine fla-
vor to the liquor, not otherwise obtainable.

Strain the liquor, as it comes from the press.

173

through hair cloth or fine wire sieves, and
put it up, into clean, tight barrels, or hogs-
heads. These being filled full, and the bung
left out, are placed in a cool airy cellar, As
fast as the cider works over, replenish the bar-
rel. When it has done working or ferment-

O

ing, rack it off carefully into another bar-
rel. Let it have opportunity to work a sec-
ond time, if necessary, and then rack it off
again. It may now be put into bottles or tight
barrels, and be kept for use. Bottled cider
may be kept, and will improve for years, like
wine. Fill the bottles up to their necks, cork
them tightly, and lay them on their sides in
layers of sand, in a cool cellar. It is an ex-
cellent plan to seal them with wax. Cider is
generally made, with much less labor than we
have just described. Nine tenths of the cider
made in New England, is probably not rack-
ed off at all from the barrels in which it was
first put at the mill. Once racking, we sup-
pose, would generally answer for all ordinary
purposes.

From sweet cider, molasses may be made,
by evaporation ; and from this molasses, sug-
ar may be produced. A barrel of cider, stand-
ing out doors in summer with the bung out,
11

174

will turn into vinegar. Sweet-apple cider is
by far the best for all these uses.

Sweet cider may be boiled away, over a
slow fire, and afterward carefully put into
a clean cask, where it will keep well for a
long while. This boiled cider is very useful
in preparing pies &>c. Cider is sometimes
greatly strengthened, by freezing it ; the bet-
ter part of it resists the action of the frost,
and may thus be separated from the inferior,
watery particles.

CHAPTER II.

THE PEAR.

"If the long period of nearly ten months,*'
says General Dearborn, " during which the
numerous most admired varieties of the pear
are successfully matured for our tables, is
taken into consideration, with the diversity of
graceful forms, beauty of color, agreeable
aroma and delicious flavor of many of them,
it may, with propriety, be placed at the head
of the list of fruits, in all the states where
the orange cannot be cultivated."

The pear is the favorite fruit of the more
intelligent and scientific cultivators of the
present century, and its finer qualities have
in consequence been wonderfully developed
within the last sixty or seventy years. But
the passion for new varieties — amounting al-
most to a mania with some distinguished hor-
ticulturists— has retarded rather than accele-

176

rated the general dissemination of the most
truly valuable kinds of the fruit.

The pear — so difficult to raise here from the
seed — when once it has become a well-rooted
plant of three or four years' growth, and as
many feet in height, is a fr.uit tree of easy
cultivation, of great hardihood and produc-
tiveness ; it is subject to few diseases, and of-
ten attains to a great age.

A pear tree in Illinois, on the authority of
Rev. H. W. Beecher, produced in 1834, while
yet not over forty years of age, a crop of one
hundred and eighty-four bushels of pears !
An English writer mentions a pear tree in
Herefordshire, Eng., from which fifteen hogs-
heads of perry were made in a single year.
This tree covered more than half an acre of
ground, the branches bending down and tak-
ing root, and, in turn, producing others in the
same way.

M. Bosc, mentions several pear-trees in
Europe, which are known to be nearly four
hundred years old. (See Downing 's Fruits
and Fruit Trees.}

It is somewhat remarkable that the states
of Massachusetts and New York have each a
patriarchal pear-tree still standing in memory
of their early colonial governors.

177

The old Endicott pear-tree — which may
be seen from the cars of the Essex Rail Road,
as they pass through the town of Danvers in
this State— now numbers . more than two
hundred and twenty years. It still rears its
head where it was planted by Gov. Endicott,
and bravely stretches forth its vigorous arms,
dropping the autumn fruits of its green old
age into the bosoms of- a distant posterity.

The Stuyvesant pear-tree, planted by Gov.
Stuy vesant of the Dutch colony of New York,
more than two centuries ago, was very recent-
ly— if it is not now — standing, healthy and
productive, in the upper part of what was
then the city of Nieuw Amsterdam.

The pear-tree is extensively and profitably
cultivated in this country, both as a standard
and a dwarf. With high cultivation, and
very careful and judicious management, a
larger crop and also much more valuable spe-
cimens of the fruit might be produced from
an acre of dwarf pear-trees, than from one of
standards.

SECTION I.

STANDARD PEAR TREES.

Choice of a Tree. A good standard pear-
tree for orchard planting, should be from five
to eight feet high, and not larger, unless it has
been previously re -set, once or twice, when
of the height of three to seven feet ; for the
roots of the pear are not abundantly supplied
with fibres, and large trees of it cannot there-
fore be safely moved, the first time, without
very great care.

The tree should branch out at a point to suit
one's fancy, from about four to six feet above
the ground, according to its general size.
The top ought to be well balanced, diverging
outward and upward, so that the head of the
tree may appear to promise to grow in a some-
what conical or pyramidal form. Every
part of the trunk and limbs should be free
from moss and black canker. The length of

179

the last season's growth is a good evidence of
the health of the tree. The trunk should be
straight, smooth and stocky. The root ought
to be well shaped, neither one-sided, nor very
destitute of fibres. As in purchasing apple-
trees, one must not expect to have all these
good qualities combined in every pear-tree
he obtains from a nursery, but the purchaser
should always endeavor to unite as many of
them as he can, even though he should be com-
pelled to pay a greater price for the trees.

Soil. "The best soil for the pear," says
Downing, "is a strong loam of moderate
depth on a dry subsoil." Kenrick recom-
mends " rich soils and gentle declivities, not
moist situations." Thomas advises the same
soil as for the apple. On a cold soil with a
clayey subsoil, the trees are stunted and short-
lived, and the fruit is of an inferior quality.
We should prefer a deep, rich sandy loam on
a dryish subsoil, — such land as would pro-
duce eighty or a hundred bushels of Indian
corn to the acre. For setting the pear on
damp or very dry soils, see observations in
the chapter on The Apple. If the subsoil is
heavy clay, it will be better to cultivate dwarf
pears only, unless the places for the pear-root-

180

ed trees have been prepared, by digging large
deep holes, and filling them with rich, sandy
loam, having a drainage underneath.

Distance. Pears may be set, for a term of
years, at a distance of ten to twelve feet apart
each way. When they are half grown, take
out every alternate row each way, and the
remaining rows — twenty to twenty-four feet
apart — will be at the proper distance for a
permanent pear orchard. An entirely safe
mode of removing the trees of these alternate
rows, is described under section 3d, of the
chapter on Transplanting. The peach and
the pear may be thus set alternately, and the
former will be dead and gone, before the latter
will need the space occupied by it.

Transplanting. The pear is a more costly
tree than the apple, and it will not bear so
rough treatment; we therefore advise to be
careful in transplanting it. We have already
given sufficient directions for performing this
work. (See the Chapter on Transplanting,
and also that on the Apple.)

Cultivation. Observe the same directions
as those given in the chapter on The Apple.
Read also what is said under the head of
Root-pruned dwarf-pears. Wood ashes, bone

181

dust, and a very small quantity of pot-ash
dissolved in water— say two or three Ibs. to
a cart load of other manure — are fine fertilizers
for the pear.

Pruning. The standard pear requires less
pruning than any other fruit tree. Whatever
applications of the knife may seem necessary,
may be guided by the directions given in the
chapter on The Apple.

Duration of Varieties, $*c. Some theoret-
ical writers both in Europe and in this coun-
try, have maintained that the older varieties
of the pear — and also of other fruit-trees —
are deteriorating; that through the infirmi-
ties of age many of them have become, and
others are gradually becoming unworthy of
cultivation. It is certainly true, that many
of the fine old pears have in some localities
neither the appearance nor the flavor that
they once had. But neglected cultivation,
diseased stocks, bad soils, unfavorable cli-
mates, etc., have most probably done the mis-
chief which has been lamented as the effects
of old age. And this is the opinion of Pro-
fessor De Candolle, one of the most distin-
guished physiologists of the present century. •
And further, it has been ingeniously main-

182

tallied that a bud inserted upon a thrifty stock,
is essentially the same thing for practical
purposes as a seed planted in the ground.
If this be true, let us hope — at least till we
have better evidence to the contrary — that
our finer sorts of pears and other fruits may
continue to be among the luxuries of rural
life, so long as " the earth bears a plant, or
the sea rolls a wave."

DESCRIPTIVE LISTS OF PEARS FOR CULTIVATION
ON STANDARD TREES.

The general remarks introductory to this
part of our work and also to our Descriptive
Lists of Apples, would be appropriate here.

As with the apple, a similar diversity of
opinion prevails in regard to the comparative
merits of many varieties of this fruit; the
different purposes for which one may wish to
cultivate it, — ^for his own use, for market, for
exhibition, &c. &c. — are even more numer-
ous ; and there is as great a number of kinds
from which taste, fancy or whim may make
a selection.

Seven hundred varieties of the pear have
been tested, in the experimental garden of the

183

London Horticultural Society ; and, at the
Twentieth Annual Exhibition of'the Mass,
Hort. Society, two hundred and sixty sorts
were exhibited, from the Pomological Garden
at Salem in this State. As in the lists of ap-
ples, we shall present no such frightful cata-
logues, to confuse and perplex those who may
do us the honor to consult our pages. If one
of the most extensive cultivators of the pear
in America could not furnish Downing with
the names of more than twenty varieties of
unvarying and unquestionable excellence,
surely thirty or forty varieties will be deemed
sufficient for so small a work as ours. We
arrange and number the pears in the lists,
about in the order of their ripening. But as
with other fruits, some ripen contemporane-
ously ; — some ripen nearly all at a time, while
others ripen gradually for several weeks-.
The soil and location also have considerable
effect upon the time of a fruit's maturity, par-
ticularly of the pear.

For Tables of Quality and Size, (fee., see
the Preliminary Remarks to Part II.

184

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186

We have given in our General List thirty-
one varieties of the pear which we deem the
most valuable for one's own consumption or
for the New England markets.

If any person desires a more extended cat-
alogue, he may select from the following: —

Summer — Julienne, Muscadine, Passans
du Portugal (fine,) Summer Franc Real, Wil-
liams's Early.

Autumn — Dunmofe, Napoleon (better on
quince,) Sieulle, Thompson's, Surpasse Virga-
lieu, Verte Longue, Bezi de la Motte, Beurre-
de Capiaumont, Beurre d'Anjou, Doyenne
Boussouck ; (the latter two do well on quince.)
Also, (worthy of trial,) Swan's Orange.

Winter— Glout Morceau, Knight's Monarch,
Prince's St. Germain. Winter Baking Pears.
The Iron or Black Worcester, Catillac, Bell or
Pound, are the best cultivated in New England.

We now propose a select list of fourteen
pears, which we hope may prove satisfactory
to those whose ambition is for the truly valua-
ble rather than for a multiplicity of varieties.

SELECT LIST. Summer.— Madeleine, Bart-
lett, Rostiezer.

Autumn — St. Ghislain, Buffum, Louise
Bonne de Jersey, Henry IV., Seckel, Flemish
Beauty, Urbaniste, and Dix,

THE

187

Winter— Vicar of
Aremberg, Winter Nelis.

SMALLER SELECT LIST of seven varieties*
Summer — Madeleine, Bartlett.

Autumn — L. Bonne de Jersey, Seckel, Dix,

Winter— Vicar of Winkfield, Winter Nelis.

STILL SMALLER LIST of three varieties.
Summer — Bartlett. Autumn — Flemish Beau-
ty. Winter — Vicar of Winkfield.

Those Wishing but a single tree, would do
well to have it grafted with one or all of the
last three named varieties ; in the latter case,
putting- the Vicar on the top of the tree, and
the others lower down.

The Bartlett has attained a greater popu-
larity in the United States, than has been ac-
quired by any other variety of the pear.
This is owing to a combination of valuable
properties which it possesses. The hardihood
and early productiveness of the tree, the facili-
ty with which it adapts itself to different soils.
its fine growth and general health, etc., to-
gether with the large size, beautiful appear-
ance and good flavor of the fruit, have earned
it a reputation among its brethren, the right
to which several rivals are already beginning
to contest.

SECTION II.

DWARF PEARS.

The pear may be advantageously cultivated
as a dwarf. -Indeed, this is almost the only
mode in which the fruit is raised for the mar-
kets of Paris. And in this country,, quince-
bottomed pear trees are coming into extensive
favor with those who have had experience in
managing them. Root-pruned dwarfs are
less cultivated, but chiefly, we suppose, be-
cause the manual operation and effects of root-
pruning are as yet but very little known in
this country.

Amateur cultivators may amuse themselves
in rendering the pear still more ' diminutive,
by working it upon the common white thorn,
or the mountain ash. The point of grafting
should be just under the surface of the ground.
By commencing early with the root-pruning-
process already described, these little dwarfs,

189

particularly those on the thorn, may be kept
down to a size scarcely above that of a goose-
berry bush, and when in fruit they are very
pretty. They are, however, shorter lived
than the dwarf of a larger size. In China,
the different species even of the largest grow-
ing forest trees, are dwarfed to a similar di-
mirmti veness, by a modification of Layering
already described. These Chinese dwarfs,
once formed, are said to live and bear fruit for
a great number of years.

Root Pruned Dwarf Pears. The mode of
dwarfing the pear by root-pruning, has been
very successful in England ; and, from some
little experience of our own, we are strongly
inclined to believe that it will prove equally
adapted to our New England soil and climate.
Trees of one to three inches in diameter,
branching low, and of a stocky habit, are the
best subjects to operate upon. The process of
forming them is simple, thus :

Dig a circular ditch around the tree, about
one foot wide and two feet deep. The ditch
should be somewhere about as many feet dis-
tant from the tree, as the latter is inches in
diameter ; for rather large trees the distance
should be less than in this proportion ; but the
12

190

judgment of a skillful operator will be a suffi-
ciently safe guide in all cases. In digging
the ditch, the roots of the tree should all be
cut off and pared smoothly even with the
inner side of the ditch ; and the outer frag-
ments of the roots should be removed as
cleanly from the surrounding ground as It
may be convenient. This done, fill the ditch
with generous, rich soil intermingled with the
specific fertilizer for the pear (Seepage 100.)
Head in the top of the tree judiciously, cut-
ting off from one-fourth to three-fourths of
the growth upon the last year's scions. It is
well, though not strictly necessary, to cover
these little wounds with the gum-shellac com-
position. This work may be done any time
from the first of November to the middle of
April, except when the ground is wet, freezing,
or frozen. Root-pruned dwarfs will need this
treatment as often as once in three years, and
frequently, under high cultivation, they will
require it once in two years, or even annually.
A close observation of the effects of the prun-
ing will be the best guide as to the necessity
of repeating it.

Almost any large fruit tree, other than the
pear, which does not grow well, or appears

191

unthrifty , may be greatly benefited by a sin-
gle application of the treatment just above
described.

All varieties probably both of the pear and
the apple, may be dwarfed in this manner ;
and, doubtless, if for no other purpose, it is
the best mode in which to cultivate those
large-sized fruits which the wind so often
strips prematurely off of large trees. Such
trees also come early into a bearing state.

Root-pruned dwarfs require the same soil
as that for the full-sized trees of the same
species. Their distance apart need not ex-
ceed from eight to twelve feet.

In heading-in these as all other trees, al-
ways cut — as we have before advised — just
above a wood-bud on the outer side of the twig
or limb, or on the side of it facing the direc-
tion in which it is desirable that the twig or
limb should extend its growth. By observing
this simple direction, a pruning of which
dwarfing is the main object, may also be
made subservient to a great improvement in
the form and general appearance of the tree to
which it is applied.

Q uince bottomed Dwarf Pears. Grafting
upon the quince stock is a deservedly popular

192

mode of cultivating the pear, in fruit-gardens
and other highly and carefully cultivated
grounds. Nearly all the class of Beurre, or
melting pears, succeed in this way,* and
many of them are greatly superior to what
they usually are when raised upon the pear-
rooted standard. The trees grow to the
height of ten or twelve feet, and have a pecu-
liar, stocky appearance. They commence
bearing in three or four years from the graft-
ing. In ten or fifteen years they come to ma-
turity, bearing from a peck to a bushel of
fruit. We have seen a quince-bottomed
dwarf-pear, in Col. Wilder's grounds, some
fifteen feet high, that has several years borne
about a barrel oiDuchesse d? Angouleme pears,
— fruit which sells readily in Boston at twelve
and a half cents apiece.

Quince-bottomed pear trees require a deep,
rich soil, such as is suitable for the quince.
They may be set temporarily four or five feet
apart. In the course of some years, if neces-
sary, take out every other row, one or both

* Almost, if not quite every other variety of the pear may be
cultivated in this way, by what is called double-working, that is,
work the Martin Sec, Beurre d'Amalis, L. B. de Jersey, or other
•ariety, on the (juince, and then, in another year or two, re-work
this graft, with the kind that you desire to grow as a dwarf.

193

ways, and the remaining trees may stand
during their life-time, at from eight to ten feet
apart. An occasional root-pruning — once in
three or four years — has been found very ben-
eficial to the quince-bottomed pear.

In purchasing quince-bottomed dwarf-
pears, examine the quince part of the tree to
ascertain whether it has been injured by bor-
ers. Select good stocky, low -branching, well-
rooted trees. In setting out, dig holes sufficient-
ly deep for the purpose, and set the whole of
the quince part entirely under ground, without
any regard to the height above the roots at
which the grafting was performed.. Fill up
the hole and among the roots with rich soil,
and aim to have the tree stand, when the
work is done, so that the point of union be-
tween the quince and pear shall be about one
inch below the surface of the ground, — just
low enough to hide the quince from the borer,
and not so low as to allow the pear to strike
roots of its own. It would not answer to
plant high grafted dwarfs, so deeply, were it
not that the quince has an almost peculiar
power of emitting thrifty roots from any part
of its trunk or limbs when buried in the earth.
We have set many dwarfs in this way, and
have never lost one.

194

The quince-rooted pear enjoys a rich, high-
ly cultivated soil, and is much less able to
endure rough treatment or neglect, than his
stronger-footed brother of the pear-root. Its
appropriate place is the garden, where, prop-
erly treated, it is, at once, one of the most or-'
namental and profitable tenants that can dwell
there. Quince-bottomed pears should be
headed-in, more or less severely every year.

Dwarf pear-trees whether on quince or
pear, which are not to be trained to a wall or
trellis, ought to be pruned to a' pyramidal or
conical form. In order to this, take a tree of
one year's growth upon the graft. Shorten
back the leading shoot, nearly or quite one
half its length. This will develope the desir-
able side branches ; to encourage the growth
of which still more, it is well to shorten back
the leading shoot, about the first of July.
This will, about the middle of the growth of
next spring, cause to start out another tier of
branches, a foot above the last. The next
summer in July the leader is again cut back
to within about a foot of the last tier, which
will cause the growth of a third set, and this
must be repeated every year, till the tree is
from six to ten or more feet high, as the taste

195

of the cultivator may dictate. In the mean
time, the side shoots should be pruned into
the desired conical form, each spring, or, what
is considered by some preferable, they should
be kept shortened:in, by pinching off their
ends in the summer. This is Down ing's
plan, described almost in his own words.
We have found a simpler mode of operating
to answer every purpose — that is, to shorten-
in the leader and side shoots, in the spring on-
ly, of each year. We should continue this
process, as with the peach, every year so long
as the tree continued to make scions, cutting
off from one-fourth to three-fourths of the
length of each scion every year, — always
having an eye to improve, and as far as pos-
sible to render conical the form of the tree.
To this end we should as we have said be-
fore always cut just above a wood-bud, on the
outer side of a limb or twig — i. e., the side
farthest from the central parts of the tree.

From two to four feet is a sufficient length
for the lowest tier of branches ; the next tier
should be four to eight inches shorter, and so
on. Where the dwarf has not been pruned
for two or three years from the graft, the first
heading-in must be done more severely, in

1%

order to get the tree into shape. (See
76 to 83.)

A somewhat different, but equally severe
pruning is necessary for the dwarf-pear, when
trained upon a wall or espalier rail. In all
pruning, a skillful operator will modify the
mode to suit the particular cas°. in hand.
Whatever may be the shape given to the tree,
all dwarf-pears, (quince-bottomed or root-
pruned,) require the annual heading-in in
some form or other, and those upon pear-
roots, an occasional, if riot annual root-prun-
ing also.

We may add, by way of caution, that the
pear on quince, is not a suitable tree for one
who has neither leisure nor taste to attend to
its cultivation. It is a very artificial plant,
and left entirely to nature's nursing, it will
soon die, just as a Parisian dandy would perish.
were he suddenly transferred to the haunts
and habits of a western savage. Quince-bot-
tomed dwarf-pears, if they appear to be low
in the ground after standing some years, ought
to be staked and tied, as they are sometimes
liable to be blown over.

For Tables of Size, Qualify fyc., See
pages 143 and 144.

197

ARF-PEARS

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ATIONS.
FORM — pyr. pyriform, or long pear-shaped
vate, or egg-shaped, with stem in small end
binate, or shaped like a top, as Dearborn's
roundish; teg. regular.
REMARKS.— P. productive ; very; J
beautiful ; But. buttery ; Ast. a
cr. cracks.

ABBREV
; 2, medium-size; 3, small.
ood ; v. g. very good; b, best.
; K, kitchen ; T K, table and kitchen
January; Feb. February; Jan. Feb.

low; b, brown
the sunny sid

pale
(me
ped.

SIZE.— 1. la
QUALITY.—
Uss.— T, ta
SEASON.— J
both months.
COLOR.— p,
green; r, red
set ; str. strip

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198

Our list of Dwarf pears might easily be
extended — almost to any limits, indeed, if we
were to include those which require Double-
working. — (See the note above.) Without
this mode of double grafting, however, we
might add to our list, Summer, — Madeleine,
Jargonelle, Autumn, — Napoleon. Seckel (bet-
ter double- worked,) Doyenne Boussouck,
Beurre d'Anjou, Sieulle, Urbaniste, and prob-
ably the Dix, as this makes a good growth
here directly on the quince. Swan's Orange
is well worthy of trial on quince, in our
climate. To those of Winter we might annex,
Van Mons Leon Le Clerc, Catillac (for cook-
ing;) and for warm, sheltered situations, with
some hesitation, we venture to subjoin Chau-
montelle, Passe Col mar and Brown Beurre.

SMALL SELECT LIST of quince- rooted Dwarf
pears. Summer — Summer Franc Real, Bart-
lett. Autumn — Golden Beurre of Bilboa,
Flemish Beauty, St. Michael, Louise Bonne
de Jersey, Duchesse d' Angouleme, Beurre
Diel. Winter — Glout Morceau.

STILL SMALLER LIST — We recommend, (or
rather humbly submit,) Summer — Bartlett,
Autumn — St. Michael, L. B. de Jersey,
Beurre Diel. Winter — Glout Morceau.

199

For a single dwarf tree, we know no better
grower than the fine flavored Louise Bonne
de Jersey, and no better fruit than the Saint
Michael, or, as otherwise called, the White
Doyenne. Either of these ought to be satis-
factory to any reasonable man. Should one
desire both upon a single tree, work the St. M.
upon the top of the L. B. de Jersey.

SECTION III.

INSECTS, DISEASES, AND REMEDIES.

There are but two insects that we have
known to injure pear trees in New England,
although Downing affirms that the same in-
sects that infest the apple do sometimes attack
the pear also.

1st. The Slug-worm. This insect (Selan-
dria Cerasi of Harris,) is .a kind of olive-
colored naked snail, about a quarter of an inch
long. It appears on the upper sides of the
leaves, from June to August, and frequently
does serious injury to young trees, by preying
upon the juices of their leaves. An excellent
way to kill these vermin is to water the
leaves with the whale-oil soap liquid, de-
scribed on page 109. Ashes or quicklime
sprinkled upon them, will also destroy them.

3d. The Scolytus Pyrl This insect is
supposed to cause what is called the Fire-

201

blight. In the midst of the luxuriant growth
of summer, a limb affected by this disease
suddenly turns brown and dies. If the disor-
der is not arrested the entire tree is usually
destroyed by it. There is no half-way reme-
dy ; the malady extends downward from the
point of its external appearance, and it is
necessary to cut off the affected limb imme-
diately, at least a foot below all symptoms of
the disease.

Winter Blight, called by Downing, Frozen
sap Blight. This disorder manifests itself by
the extremities of the limbs shrivelling, turn-
ing black and dying. Downing attributes the
cause of this to the action of frost in winter ;
others think it is owing to the strong penetra-
ting rays of the sun in summer. Trees that
grow luxuriantly in moist soils in the nursery,
are the most subject to it. We have rarely
seen a large tree in this vicinity affected with
the disorder, although we understand, that it
is almost confined to large trees in some sec-
tions of the country. There probably may
not be less than three sources of the pear
blight; an insect causing the Insect- Blight ;
the changes of winter weather, causing the
Winter-Blight ; the rays of the sun causing
what might be called Sun-Blight.

202

*

As a preventive of any of these forms of
the disease, plant out the trees, in dryish, rich
soil, and occasionally root-prune them. As a
remedy, cut off seasonably the affected parts
down to the perfectly healthy, sound wood.

Downing says of this malady, that it has,
at different times, been " the terror and the
despair of pear growers." The disease is
irregular both in the time and the manner of
its attacks. It sometimes destroys only a
single limb ; at other times it, in the course of
a few days, causes the death of an entire tree.
In some sections of the country it is scarcely
known ; in others its ravages have been such
as to greatly discourage the cultivation of the
fruit. The disorder has, as yet, done com-
paratively little mischief in the New England
States.

SECTION IV.

GATHERING AND RIPENING THE PEAR, AND USES

OF THE FRUIT.
/1!li .^>i> J&> 1

All our winter pears (and apples also,) are,
of necessity, ripened in the house. Nearly all
summer pears and a very large proportion of
the autumn varieties, are greatly improved
by ripening them in the house also. Nor is
this peculiar to the pear. Wheat and some
other grains, gathered at a particular time
just before maturity, will be more bulky,
heavier and better thab when left to get dead
ripe, as it is called, in the field. We cannot
in this little work go into an investigation of
the theory of this process. It is enough to
assert the unquestionable fact.

Generally, then, we advise to take summer
and early autumn pears from the trees just
when some of the earlier full-grown, speci-
mens begin to ripen. Gather them carefully
by hand in a dry day, spread then on the

204

shelves of y out fruit room, or upon the floor
of a cool dry chamber. Here they will ripen
by degrees, and without further care.

Late autumn and winter pears should also
be gathered very carefully by hand, in dry
weather. Put them away very carefully —
so as not to bruise or indent them in the least —
in tight clean, wooden boxes, buckets or bar-
rels ;* and keep them in a cool, dry, airy
room or cellar, of which the temperature shall
be from about 38° to 45° Fahr. Examine
them occasionally and if they are sweating,
take them out carefully, dry them upon the
floor and then repack them as before.

About ten days before their usual time of
maturity, bring them into a room of which
the temperature is from 60° to 70.° Whoev-
er follows the above directions for the first
time, will be agreeably surprised at the result
of his experiment. The Beurre d' Arem-
berg and probably some others may be suc-
cessfully managed in the same way as winter
apples.

Many pears early and late are lost to their

* Some advise to wrap each pear in soft paper before putu&g
it into the boxes, &c.

205

cultivators from an ignorance of the proper
modes of ripening them. In Europe, this
branch of fruit-culture is considered almost a
science of itself. Never, therefore, throw
away a specimen, or re-graft a tree of a pear
of doubtful charactSr, until all the modes of
ripening the fruit have first been tried for at
least two successive years.

The Uses of the Pear are riot dissimilar to
those of the apple. It is, however, much
more highly esteemed for the dessert, as the
market value of the fruit sufficiently evinces.
One dollar per dozen for the Duchesse d1 An-
gonleme pear is not an uncommon price ; and
specimens of the Beurre Diel have been re-
tailed at twenty-five cents apiece, solely too
for the gratification, not of the eye, but of the
palate of the purchaser. For preserving,
baking, stewing, marmalades, and for drying,
it is extensively in use, wherever it is known.
Generally, melting or Beurre pears are prefer-
able for the dessert, and those with firm, crisp
breaking flesh, for the kitchen.

The fermented juice of the pear is called

Perry. The process of preparing this liquor

is precisely similar to that of making cider.

As a beverage most people prefer it to the juice

13

206

of the apple. In former years considerable
quantities of perry were manufactured in the
vicinity of Portsmouth, N. H. and elsewhere
in the eastern States. Of this article an old
English writer affirms, " Wine made of the
juice of the Pear, being taken in small quan-
tities, cornforteth and Warmeth the stomack,
and causeth good digestion.''

CHAPTER III.

THE PEACH, AND THE NECTARINE.

SECTION I.

CULTIVATION, &C.

Choice of a tree. — The best age at which
to plant out the peach in an orchard, is one
year from the bud and two years from the
seed. Nothing is gained by purchasing trees
older than this, unless they have been trans-
planted once or t \vice before. Select a stocky,
rather low branching, vigorous looking tree,
free from gummy exudations in every part.
This gummy matter will appear, if anywhere,
on the roots, about the collar, on the sides and
in the forks of the limbs. The insects, doing
this mischief, live but a single year and are
easily destroyed. Trees otherwise satisfacto-
ry ought not, therefore, to be rejected on this

208

account solely, unless they have suffered quite
severely from the ravages of the worm. How-
ever, it is always preferable to obtain trees
entirely exempt from this injury.

Dwarfs and Standards. The peach is
dwarfed, by working it upon a plum-stock.
For a very cold climate these dwarfs are con-
sidered more hardy than standards. They
are also well adapted to cold clayey soils,
which are unfit for the peach root. With
these exceptions, dwarf peach-trees are not
valuable to cultivate, unless it may be as
curiosities.

Soil " The very best soil for the peach, );
says Downing, " is a rich, deep sandy loam ;
next to this, a strong mellow loam." Thomas
recommends " a light soil ;" Kenrick, " a rich,
sandy loam." An extremely rich soil, in our
cold climate, sometimes imparts too rank a
growth to the tree, thereby rendering it rather
too tender to brave the severity of the winter.

Distance. Twelve or fourteen feet apart is
a sufficient distance for the trees of a New
England orchard. The trees may be set in
rows extending north and south, the rows be-
ing twelve to sixteen feet apart, and the trees
eight to ten feet apart in the rows. This will

209

often be found a convenient arrangement
where the whole ground is kept under cul-
tivation.

Transplanting. We have succeeded as
well, transplanting the peach in the autumn,
as in the spring. Doing the work in autumn,
however, we have been very particular to
place a good-sized conical mound of soil
around the tree, as recommended in section
2d. of the Chapter on transplanting. Culti-
vators generally, in the northern states, advise
to transplant the peach, in the spring; and
some think they meet with better success,
moving the tree, only two or three days before
its blossoms begin to open. Little peach trees,
budded the previous autumn, may be quite
successfully transplanted, in the spring, with-
out injury to the bud. But generally, it is
better to wait till the bud has had one year's
growth.

Cultivation. The rules are nearly the same
as for the apple and pear. What is called
very high cultivation, as we have remarked,
is hardly safe in our climate. We may, how-
ever, remark that high cultivation is not an
offence, often committed by our farmers against
the peach, or any other fruit tree. The crim-

210

inality extends mostly in an opposite direc-
tion— neglected cultivation. Doubtless, this
sin of omission lieth even unto the doors of
ninety-nine in a hundred of the fruit cultiva-
tors, of this section of the country.

The peach — perhaps better worked on plum
stocks, for this purpose — will succeed even in
a very cold climate, when trained upon a
south wall, and slightly protected by pine
boughs through the winter and, more especial-
ly, through the changeable weather of early
spring. For a mode of training the peach, in
very rigorous climates, see the Chapter on
Training.

Pruning. The peach needs little pruning
except the shortening-in system, recommend-
ed in Sec. 1. of Chap. V. Part 1. Any time
from late autumn until the latter part of April,
cut off with no great carefulness, from one-
fourth to three-fourths of the last year's growth,
all over the tree. The Very best time perhaps
to do this, is in the month of March. This
shortening-in pruning should be done every
year, as long as the tree lives, commencing
on the first year's growth of the bud. The
operation is performed much more rapidly
than one would suppose. The appearance.

211

the health, and the productiveness of the
peach, the nectarine and the apricot, are all
greatly improved by this treatment.

Insects. The only insect that seriously in-
jures the peach-tree in this section of the
country, is the Peach- worm, (J^geria exitio-
sa.) This insect deposits its eggs in the
trunk of , the tree, at the surface of the ground
and in the forks of the limbs, &c. The egg
hatches and becomes a worm of one-fourth to
three-fourths of an inch in length. This
worm devours the inner bark and sap-wood
of the tree, at and about the points where the
eggs are laid. Its presence may be known by
the gum which exudes from the bark in con-
sequence. When the worm gets into the
forks of a tree, it causes the splitting of the
tree at those points ; and unless its progress
is arrested, it will sometimes do very serious
damage.

The preventive against this insect is very
simple. It is only necessary to put half
a peck of ashes or air-slacked lime, close
around the collar of the tree, (that is at the
surface of the ground,)in the month of May,
and remove it again in October. For other
preventives and the modes of getting rid of

212

this insect, see directions for destroying the
Borer, in Section 3d of the Chapter on The
Applet

The Yellows. This destructive disease
has proved fatal to whole orchards, in some
sections of the country. Its symptoms are, —
1st, a growth of slender, sickly, wiry shoots,
with small yellowish leaves ; 2d, the prema-
ture ripening of the fruit, two or three weeks
earlier than its proper season. This disorder
seems most disposed to attack rapid growing
varieties. It is propagated by planting the
stones of peaches grown upon affected trees,
by budding, and also by the pruning knife
communicating the infectious sap from one
tree to another. It is universally believed to
be a contagious disorder, and whoever has a
tree decidely affected with it, ought to cut
down and burn the tree at once. There is no
other sure remedy yet known. Downing
thinks that those who have trees healthy in
this respect, may keep them so by the shorten-
ing-in system, already strongly recommended
for its other beneficial effects.

Identifying Varieties. Different varieties of
this fruit are less easily identified by their
form and color, than those of the apple and

213

pear. Collateral aid to this is derived from
the size and color of the blossoms, and from
certain marks on the leaves. There are three
classes of peaches in reference to these leaf
marks.

Class 1, Those whose leaves are deeply
and doubly serrated, (cut like saw-teeth,)
having no glands*

Class 2. Those whose leaves are crenate
or serrulate, (that is having smaller rounded
teeth,) with globose (or round) glands.

Class 3. These have crenate or serrulate
leaves like class 2d, with reniform (kidney-
shaped, or longish) glands.

These marks upon the leaves of the peach
are invariable. The use of these to the
cultivator is obvious; for example, if any one
should buy a tree, say for the Early Craw*
ford variety, and its leaves either should have
no glands at all, or have those which are reni-
form, it would be certain that the the tree was
not what it was purchased for ; because the
Early Crawford always has globose glands.

* The glands are of the size of a pins' head or a little larger.
They are easily discoverable upon that part of the stem of the
leaf where it begins to widen out into the leaf, and just beyond
that point, on the edges of the leaf.

214

Gathering the fruit. Unlike the pear, the
peach is always best, ripened upon the tree.
Gather and keep it (if necessary to keep it,)
in a cool dry airy room until wanted.

Uses of the Fruit. The peach is one of
the most delicious of dessert fruits. In some
sections of the country, it is preserved by dry-
ing. In the south, it has been extensively
cultivated for the pnrpose of distilling its juice
jnto brandy.

SECTION II.

DESCRIPTIVE LIST OF PEACHES.

Fine varieties of the peach are often pro*-
duced from the seed. Hundreds have been
thus originated and described by nurserymen
and others within the last few years.

The following lists comprise those which we
believe to be the best adapted to the wants of
those generally who cultivate this fruit, either
for their own tables or for the market. The
reputation of these peaches is so well estab-
lished, that one may safely engage in their
cultivation upon as large qr as small a scale
as he may desire.

For Tables of Quality, Size, $*c. $*c., See
the Preliminary Remarks .to Part II.

216

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217

Our list of peaches might easily be extend*
ed to fifty or more varieties. Were we to add
to the above described catalogue, we should
select from among the following :

Last of Summer— Early Anne, Dixie's EIP
reka, Lemon Rareripe, &c. Early Autumn — -
Cheney's Perfection, (W. Co. Seedling.)
Bergen's Yellow, Red Rareripe, Walter's
Early, Early Newington, Large Yellow Me-
locton, Jaques (very large,) Brevoort, Belle-
garde, Morris's Red, &c. Mid Autumn —
President, Prince's Red Rareripe, Kenrick's
Heath, Late White, &c. — also, for preserving,
the Blood Clingstone, and (in warm situations)
the Lemon Clingstone.

All the above described peaches, except the
latter two, are freestone varieties, clingstone
peaches not being valuable in so cold a climate
as ours.

SELECT LIST. Last of Summer — Early
Sweet Water, Cooledge's Favorite, George
Fourth. Early Autumn—- Yellow Rareripe,
Crawford's Early, Old Mixon Freestone, Yel-
low Red Rareripe, Mid Autumn— Crawford's
Late.

SMALLER SELECT LIST. Cooledge's Favor-

218

ite, George Fourth, Crawford's Early, Craw-
ford's Late.

For a single tree, none is better than George
Fourth, or Crawford's Early.

THE NECTARINE.

The nectarine, or smooth peach, is only a
smooth-skinned accidental sub-species or va-
riety of the peach, requiring precisely the
same cultivation and management in every
respect. The fruit of nectarine trees like that
of the apricot is greatly injured by the Cur-
culio. For preventives, &c. of this insect, see
the chapters on The Apricot and The Plum.

The nectarine is not a valuable fruit for
general cultivation, and accordingly we recom-
mend only three varieties of it, all freestones,
namely, Early Violet, Elruge, and Boston.
The latter of these is altogether the best, —
the tree being hardy and productive, and the
fruit very beautiful and excellent.

CHAPTER IV.

THE CHERRY.

Choice of a tree. The cherry being among
the handsomest of all fruit trees, one may re-
quire the tree which a nurseryman shall offer
him, to have a straight trunk and a fine synv
metrical top. The" root also should be well
proportioned and sufficiently supplied with
fibres.

Dwarf and Standards. The cherry is but
very little cultivated in this country as a
dwarf. The Mahaleb stock, on which the1
dwarfs are worked, or the little bush trees
themselves, may be had of the importers.

Standard cherries are generally worked upon
those excellent stocks, the Black Mazzard seed-
lings.

Soil. Downing recommends a sandy or
gravelly loam. The trees will bear quite a
dry situation. A mixture of one bushel of

£20

leached ashes to two or three of peat is an
excellent manure for the cherry.

Distance. The distance for cherries, in an
orchard, is about the same as that for pear-
trees, say eighteen to twenty-five feet. Some
varieties may be set nearer together than
others.

Transplanting. Two years from the bud
is a sufficiently large size for setting in the
orchard. Like those of the pear, large cher-
ry-trees are not easily moved, unless they have
been previously re-set, once or twice (since
they were in the nursery. See directions al-
ready given, in the Chapter on Transplant-
ing.

Cultivation. Follow the directions in the
chapters on The Apple and The Pear.

Pruning. The cherry needs but very lit-
tle pruning, less than almost any other fruit-
tree. The directions, in the Chapter on The
Apple, may be followed so far as it may seem
necessary to prune at all.

Insects, Diseases, Remedies. The cherry
in our climate, is happily exempt from dis-
eases and the depredations of insects.

Birds may be kept from the fruit by a cov-

221

ering of netting, or by various modes of
frightening them.

Gathering the Fruit. Always if practica-
ble gather the cherry when it is not wet and
with the stems attached. If the fruit is put
into an ice-box and cooled before being brought
to the table, it will be greatly improved.

Uses of the Fruit. The Cherry is chiefly
used for the dessert ; it is employed also in
making tarts, &c.

In some parts of Europe both the tree and
its fruit have a use which, by a pardonable
digression, we may mention here.

From Brunn to Olmutz, says Loudon, the
road lies through an avenue of cherry trees
for sixty miles in length . Beneath the friend- !
ly shade of these, the poor pedestrian finds
rest and refreshment, on his weary journey.
Whenever the proprietor of the lands through
which the avenue passes, desires to reserve
the cherries on a particular tree, he has only
to let his wishes be known, by tying a wisp
of straw around the tree. This simple appro-
priating mark affords a protection to the fruit
which an American, whose only security is a
faithful watch-dog or strong picket fence,
ought hardly to be blamed for envying.
14

222

Downing divides cherry-trees into four
classes, according to their forms of growth
and the characteristics of their fruits.

Class 1. Heart Cherries. These trees
grow vigorous, tall and upright. The fruit is
heart-shaped, sweet, and tender-fleshed. The
Common Mazzard and the Black Heart are
types of this class.

Class 2. Bigarreau Cherries. — The trees
and fruit are the same as in class 1st, except
that the fruit is hard-fleshed and breaking, in-
stead of soft. The Yellow Spanish is a type
of this class.

Class 3. Duke Cherries. The trees grow
upright when young and finally form round
heads, something like an apple tree. The
fruit is round, tender, juicy and subacid.
The May Duke is the type of this class.

Class 4. Morello Cherries. The trees of
this class, have a somewhat low bushy
spreading growth, with long wiry branches.
The fruit is the same as in class 3d, except
that it is smaller and more acid. The Kentish
or pie cherry is a type of this class.

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223

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224

We have deeseribed only fourteen varieties
of the cherry. Those who wish to extend
the list can add Knight's Early Black, Flesh-
colored Bigarreau, Davenport's Early, Holland
Bigarreati, Sparhawk's Honey, Tradescant's
Black, Kentish, Black Morello (for preserves,)
&c, &c.

SELECT LIST of six hardy, productive, and
fine cherries for the interior of New England ;
—Early White Heart, May Duke, Black
Tartarean, Black Eagle, Black Heart, Down-
er's Late.

SMALL, SELECT LIST of three Varieties.
We say, without much hesitancy, Early
White Heart, (or for a very cold locality,
May Duke,) Black Eagle, Downer's Late.

The Black Eagle is as valuable, for a sin-
gle tree, as any with which we are acquainted.

Hi

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CHAPTER V.

to ai ; '^riJoffA:

THE QUINCE'

The Quince requires a deep, rich
soil, not necessarily moist. Downing says
"a rich mellow, deep soil even if quite dry,"
suits it admirably. This tree, however, will
bear a moister soil than most other fruit trees.

Distance. Quince trees should be set about
eight or ten feet apart.

Cultivation. This is the same as for the
apple and pear,

Insects. The Quince-borer has the same
habits as that of the apple ; and yields to the
same preventives and destructives.

Blight. When a blight appears on the
quince similar to the Pear Blight, employ
the preventives and remedies as for the pear.
See Chapter on The Pear.

Uses. The Quince is a Kitchen fruit, used
for preserving, sauces, &c.

Varieties. — There are two varieties gene-

226

rally cultivated in this country, — the Orange
and the Pear. The latter is the later of the
two, and is perhaps less valuable than the
the other.

Another variety, the Portugal Quince, is of
rather better quality than either of the oth-
ers ; but it is so shy of bearing that it is little
cultivated, excepting by some as a stock on
which to graft the pear. Its larger and strong-
er growth render it well adapted to this use.

Propagation. The quince bush may easi-
ly be raised from the seed, (See page 58.) But
seedling quinces, like those of the apple,
etc., manifest, though in a less degree,
that same disposition to degenerate which
seems inherent in all our finer cultivated
fruits. Unless, therefore, one is willing
to graft his seedling quinces, it will be
quite as well to propagate the bushes, by the
mode recommended on page 29th.

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CHAPTER VI.

THE PLUM.

Choice of a Tree. A good plum tree is
straight, well formed and entirely free from
black excrescences on the trunk and limbs.
It should be grafted upon a finely-rooted free-
growing plum stock. Plum as well as other
trees, of which the graft appears to be over-
growing the stock, should always be avoided;
for such growing trees rarely fail of disap-
pointing the, wishes of those who cultivate
them.

Standards and Dwarfs. The plum is
dwarfed by grafting it upon the Mirabelle
plum stock, but dwarf-plums are not worthy
of cultivation except as curiosities. Standards
are worked upon strong free growing English
plum stocks, and never very advantageously
on the peach or the wild plum, or on any other
stock.

Soil. Downing recommends " heavy loams

22S

with considerable mixture of clay." The
plum does not do so well, in dry soils, as other
fruit-trees.

Distance. A plum orchard may be set
with the trees ten to fifteen feet apart.

Transplanting. The plum is a tree very
easily transplanted. (See the Chapter on
Transplanting Part 1.

Pruning. The directions are the same as
those for the apple. Unthrifty plum trees are
sometimes benefited by an occasional appli-
cation of the shortening-in system, recom-
mended for the peach, arid also for the dwarf-
pear.

Insects, Diseases, Remedies. These are
the Curculio or plum-weevil, and the Black
Excrescence. The Curculio is the worm
found in the fruit. It is of a dark brown col-
or, and about a quarter of an inch long. The
insect at the season of laying its eggs, may be
frightened away, by frequently shaking it off,
or even by persons often passing close by the
tree. It may be caught by shaking the tree,
having sheets spread on the ground under-
neath. Both of these methods have been fre-
quently practised with great success, Letting
swine among the trees to devour the wormy

229

fruit as it drops, will in a year or two destroy
the whole race of this insect. Paving the
ground all around the tree, has answered the
same purpose. About one quart of salt should
be spread around and under every plum tree
in the autumn, to keep it in good health.

Black Excrescence. The only remedy yet
known for this excrescence is a severe one,
namely, to persevere in cutting it off and
burning it, whenever and wherever it appears.
And it is true as the Book of Proverbs, —
whoso spareth the knife in this work, hateth
his plum tree.

Uses of the Fruit. These are similar to
those of the cherry.

The Preliminary Remarks to Part II. will
be generally applicable to the Plum, although
its season is comparatively a short one.

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Additional varieties may be selected from
among the following: — Columbia, Duane's
Purple, Yellow Egg (for cooking,} Prince's
Yellow Gage, Blue Imperatrice, (for preser-
ving^) Huling's Superb, Purple Favorite, &c.

SELECT LIST. Bleecker's Gage, Washing-
ton, Prince's Imperial Gage, Green Gage, Jef-
ferson, Coe's Golden Drop.

SMALLER LIST of three varieties. We find
it quite difficult to make the selection ^ but
with some considerable hesitation, we ven-
ture to recommend the Washington, Green
Gage, and Jefferson. The (old) Green Gage,
though quite a slow growing tree, is the best
flavored of all plums.

A tree of this is worth as much as any other
single tree, of which the reputation is well es-
tablished here. For a single tree, in his lo-
cality, Downing prefers the Jefferson.

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CHAPTER VII.

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±HE GRAPE.

The Grape requires a deep, rich, fer-
tile soil, with a drainage or dry sub-soil. It
.is not lost labor to make the soil two or two
and a half feet deep, placing underneath a
drainage of cobble-stones or— what is very
much better — of old broken bones. Mix with
the soil the general manure— see p. 98 — and
add a small quantity of lime, ashes, and plas-
ter of Paris,— also bone dust, if you have it.

Cultivation.^-The grape is raised easily from
layers, and sometimes from cuttings. It may
also be grafted on common wild vines, (see
Grafting.) In Europe, the grape is extensive-
ly cultivated for making wine. Some idea of
the extent of this cultivation may be formed
from the estimate, that 500,000,000 imperial
gallons of this wine have been made in Prance
in a single year.

In vineyards, vines may be planted about
eight feet apart each way, and trained each
one to a strong stake, something after the
manner of cultivating hops. For training
the grape upon a trellis, see page 85th.

Pruning and Training. — Never, if avoid-
able, touch the knife to a grape-vine (for
heavy pruning,) except in late autumn, or in
the winter ; for its appearance and health are
injured by the bleeding which results from
spring pruning. When your vine is formed,
according to the plan described in Chap. VI. .
of Part L, cut down all the shoots at the time
above-mentioned to within two or three buds
of the old or last year's wood ; — Downing
says cut the shoots down to within an inch of
the shoot from which they sprung.

This Shortening-in, $•£., (somewhat similar
that of the peach,) is about all the pruning
that our native out-door grapes require, and
they often succeed admirably without any
training or pruning at all. Downing, however,
recommends very severe pruning; he consid-
ers a space eight feet square to be as much
surface as a native grape vine ought to be
allowed to cover. '

Grafting the Grape. This has been done

234

with good success, by the common mode of
deft- grafting. The operation ought to be
delayed until the vine is in full leaf, the scions
having been kept dormant in a cool cellar un-
til used. (See page 43.)

Keeping ^the Grape. Take the ripe clus-
ters when free from external moisture, and
pack them in jars, filling all the interstices
with baked saw-dust. The grapes which are
exported from France and Spain, are packed
in this way. Alternate layers of grapes and
kiln-dried bran would probably answer equal-
ly well.

Grapes have also been successfully kept for
several months, by putting them in common
flower-pots, and filling in, under, around and
above them with common fine sand, a drain-
age of broken earthen or the like having first
been placed in the bottom of the pot. The
sand must be kept moist, and at a temperature
a little above freezing.

These modes of preserving the grape are
well worthy of trial ; for, though not highly
prized in its season, the fruit might be quite a
luxury at mid-winter.

Uses of the Grape. Our hardy native
grapes are not very much esteemed for the

235

dessert. Good house-keepers make some use
of them in the kitchen. We hope, however,
that new hybrid seedlings will yet be raised,
which shall be far more valuable than any
now cultivated.

Varieties — The Isabella succeeds well, in
warm situations, in Worcester county ; but
the best three grapes that we know to be per-
fectly hardy with us, are, first and most
valuable, the Blackstone ; second, the Fitch-
burg (both natives of this county ;) third,
the Carter (which originated near Lowell.)
In situations too cold for the Isabella, there is
no better grape to cultivate than the Black-
stone.

The Catawba, and the White Sweetwater
(or Chasselas) are delicious grapes, They
may be successfully cultivated, in the interior
of New England, by pruning them heavily,
in November, and laying them down, under
a covering of three or four inches of loam and
straw intermixed. Or they may be covered
with a foot or more of soil, which should be
carefully removed, early in the spring.

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CHAPTER VIII.

won

THE APRICOT.

The Apricot would be a very desirable tree
to cultivate, were it not for the difficulties in
the way of obtaining even a small crop of its
fruit.

The apricot is best, worked on the plum-
stock ; although it grows well also on the
peach. The tree is of small growth, and is
even less hardy than some varieties of the
peach. It requires a deep, dry soil, and a
somewhat sheltered situation.

The apricot needs the same cultivation and
shortening-in pruning, which we have recom-
mended for the peach.

Insects, fyc. The insect (Peach-worm)
which sometimes does so' much mischief
among peach trees, also works upon the apri-
cot. But the greatest obstacle in the way of
obtaining a good crop of the fruit, is the Cur-
culio. It has been remarked that strong

237

offensive odors were often efficacious, in pre-
venting the approach of insects. Thus we
have heard of an apricot's being protected
from the curculio, by winding a small rope
strongly impregnated with tar, around and up
through the trunk and branches of the tree.
Downing recommends rags- dipped in coal-
tar to be hung in the tree, for this purpose.
See the Chapter on The Plum.

Varieties Downing recommends for a
small garden, the Large Early. Breda, Peach,
arid Moorpark.

The hardiest varieties worthy of cultiva-
tion are the Red Masculine, Roman, and
Breda. For a single tree the Roman or the
Red Masculine is as good as any.

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15

CHAPTER VIII.

r

NUTS.

These fruits are certainly deserving of notice.
Among those which are perfectly hardy in
our climate we enumerate the Shell bark, Oil-
nut or Butternut, Chestnut, Black Walnut,
Beach nut, Hazle nut, and — what is not gen-
erally known — the Filbert. It is said that all
these nuts may be propagated by the ordinary
modes of grafting ; and, doubtless, they are
in this way susceptible of as much improve-
ment in size, flavor, &c., &c., as has been
effected with the apple, and other cultivated
fruits.

The European Walnut. This is better
known by the name of the Madeira nut.
The tree is of a fine lofty form, resembling
that of the common Butternut or Oilnut. It
is perfectly hardy, on Long Island and to the
south of New York. And, as far north as
the city of Charlestown in this state, there

239 // ^ °*

may be seen, in the enclosure of a residence
on Harvard street, two fine trees of this kind,
either of them much taller and laTgerlhan
the largest -sized of our apple-trees. We have
eaten nuts from these trees, well-ripened and
fully equal to any of those which are import-
ed. The trees often bear a crop of some
bushels of the fruit. Downing says this tree
" may, with due care, be grafted on the com-
mon hickory nut.5'*

The Filbert. This is only an improved
variety of the common wild hazel nut of Eu-
rope. It is not very generally known, that
this fine nut may be easily grown, in open
culture, in a suitable soil, here in the eastern
states.

We saw fine samples of the filbert, which
were grown in Boston, and exhibited at the
last Annual Exhibition of the Mass. Horti-
cultural Society. From an Article, on the
457th page of the second volume of Down-
ing's Horticulturist, we learn "that a filbert
tree (or rather bush,) may be rendered produc-
tive, in almost as small a space as is occupied
by an ordinary gooseberry or currant bush.
In fact — says the writer — under favorable

* Ha« it been *oae ?

240

circumstances, the produce of these neat
bushes is astonishing." It is said that, from
a single forest near Recus, in Spain, sixty
thousand bushels of this nut have been gath-
ered in a single year. A loamy soil, with a
dry subsoil, suits the plant well. The bushes
may be raised best from suckers or layers, or
they may be easily grafted on the common
hazel nut. They may be suffered to grow
either in the tree or the bush form, probably
the latter is the best. They require the same
annual pruning and thinning that is given to
the gooseberry. "A few plants of them,"
says Downing — " should have a place in all
our gardens." Phillips and Loudon both
represent this nut as well deserving of culti-
vation on account of the profitable return
which it makes for the labor bestowed upon
it. The former states that the crop of a sin-
gle acre of filberts has been sold for fifty
pounds (upwards of $200.)

CHAPTER IX

BERRY-FRUITS.

SECTION I.

THE STRAWBERRY.

The strawberry is a perennial plant, a
native both of the old and th° new world. It
is considered by many the most delicious and
wholesome of all berries.

Soil. The best soil for the plants is a deep
rich loam. Two feet of this soil will give
finer plants and larger crops of the fruit than
a'depth of only one foot would produce.

Specific Manures. — Slight intermixtures
with the soil, of super-phosphate of lime,
sulphate of ammonia, guano, bone-dust,

242

soot, nitrate of soda, &c., are recommended
by English writers ; but we hardly need them
in rich soils here.

Propagation. The varieties of the straw-
berry, excepting the Bush Alpine, * easily
and rapidly propagate themselves by their
runners. They thus form a great number of
new plants every season.

Transplanting. The strawberry may be
transplanted (that is the new plants of it,) in
August and September ; but in our climate it
is perhaps better to do this work in the spring.
Downing advises to select the new plants
from the runners of those old plants which
were the most productive the previous sum-
mer. Other plants, however, answer very
well.

Setting in Rows. — For market cultivation
of the strawberry on a large scale, having
prepared — trenched or subsoiled and manur-
ed,— the ground, let the new plants (so called)
be set out in rows three or three and a half feet
apart, and at any distance from each other in
the row, from two or three inches to as many
feet, according to the supply of the plants.

* This variety is increased by dividing the roots. It may also
IMJ reproduced by sowing the seed as soon as it is ripe.

243

The cultivation of the ground between the
rows, the first season, may be chiefly per-
formed with a horse and cultivator. Keep
the plants well hoed and clean of weeds, re-
membering always that the oftener they are
cultivated and wed, the less the labor will cost ;
for if the beds get once choked with weeds
and grass, it will be found a sorry job to clean
them Train the runners the first season
lenghthwise of the rows. In the autumn of
each year, it is an excellent plan to apply a
little top-dressing of compost-manure, leaves
or old rotted straw to the beds, in quantities
nearly sufficient to hide the plants. The next
season, the vines will spread so that it will
hardly be practicable to go among them with
the horse and cultivator. The plants, this
and the next year, must be wed chiefly by
hand. The vines will bear quite a moderate
crop the first season, and their best crops du-
ring the second and third summers from their
planting out. On the third or, at farthest, on
the fourth spring after setting them, dig up all
the old plants and throw them away; for
their fruit-bearing days are over. If it is not
a particular object to increase the number of
plants, the number and size of the berries may

244

be increased, by cutting off the runners two
or three times, during the second and third
summers after they were planted out.* As
soon as the blossoms have set their fruit, it is
an excellent plan to carefully weed the plants
and then cover the whole ground, under and
around the vines, with a good quantity of old
straw. This is beneficial to the growth of
the plants, as a mulching, and protects the
ripening fruit from the dirt. The vines thus
treated need no further hoeing or weeding, un-
til they have done fruiting.

An English writer recommends a fine sub-
stitute for this common practice. Have cheap
tiles made, say twelve inches long and six
inches wide, with a semi-circular notch in one
side of each, so that when two are laid to-
gether there will be formed a roupd hole
between them of about four inches diameter.

Place these, instead of the straw, around
every bearing plant, so as to cover the whole
ground. The weeds cannot grow under
them, and they will keep the berries clean and
hasten their maturity.

The cost of these tiles would be but trifling

* This is, in fact, a kind of *hortening-vn, similar to that prac-
ticed upon the peach, grape, &c.

and we think they would answer a gooa pur-
pose here.

" To accelerate the ripening of strawber-
ries," says Downing," it is only necessary to
plant the rows or beds on the south side of a
wall or tight fence. A still simpler mode is
to throw up a ridge of earth three feet high,
running east and west, and to plant it in rows
on the south side." Ten days or more may
be gained in this way ; and if later fruit is de-
sired, rows planted on the north side would
probably have their fruiting retarded nearly
as much.

Cultivation in Alternate Strips. — This is an
easy mode of renewing the plants, considera-
bly practiced near Boston. On the third sum-
mer from planting, suffer the runners to grow
and root into the spaces between the rows. —
(See above, Setting in Rows ;) — then, in the
fall or spring, dig up the old plants and your
new rows are already formed in what were
last year the spaces between the rows. At
the end of three years, repeat the process and
so on, not forgetting to spade in a generous
quantity of compost manure whenever you
dig up the old rows.

The Bush Alpine. Strawberries, having

246

no runners, are the prettiest to cultivate in
hills or in borders ; and they produce consid-
erable fruit, even until the setting-in of the
frosts of autumn.

Some cultivators allow their vines to cover
the whole ground ; others quite as successful-
ly keep them very neatly in hills. The essen-
tial requisites are —

1. Selection of proper varieties;

2. A deep rich soil ;

3. Seasonable destruction of weeds;

4. A renewal of the plants once in three or
four years.

II. CHARACTER OF STRAWBERRY BLOSSOMS.

There is another very important feature, in
the management of the strawberry, which
ought not to be passed over. Strawberry
plants of different varieties — (some think even
of the same variety,) — -produce three kinds of
blossoms, the staminate or male, the pistillate
or female, the hermorphradite or perfect
blossoms.

The Cincinnati cultivators have practically
proved, that the former two varieties produce
their largest crops when growing in proximity
to each other. Thus, in making a plantation

347

ef the strawberry, they set every fourth or
fifth row with staminate, and the intermediate
rows with a pistillate variety, one plant of the
former being sufficient to fertilize five or ten
pistillate plants.

The success which has practically attended
this mode of culture, justifies us in strongly
recommending it to all who raise the straw-
berry either upon a small or a large scale.
We should prefer this mode to that recom-
mended by Downing, which is to select the
n&w plants, for forming a bed, from the run-
ners of those older plants which have distin-
guished themselves by their productiveness.

Of nearly a hundred varieties described in
the catalogues of nurserymen, we shall here
recommend only a very few.

Those who wish to cultivate the strawberry,
not for fancy, but for the size, beauty, excel-
lence and productiveness of its fruit, cannot
do better, in our climate^ than to plant out
first a row of the Large Early Scarlet (a
staminate * variety,) then four or five rows of
the Hovetfs Seedling (a pistillate variety,)
in the manner above described under Setting
in Roivs, and Character of Strawbei*ry Blos-
soms.

* " Sometimes, perfect"— Downing.

248

Other fine staminate varieties for our cli-
mate are, the Old Scarlet (or Early Virginia
Scarlet ,) and the Hautbois. Another capital
large fruited pistillate variety is the Black
Prince. The Hudson's Bay is a fine, hardy,
rather late variety.

For perfect-blossomed plants there are
none better than the jRee?-fruited and White
fruited Alpines. These continue in bearing
from June till November. A large autumn
crop may be secured, by cutting oft' the blos-
soms in the spring.

The Red Wood and the White Wood are
also hardy perfect-blossomed varieties, ripen-
ing their fruits in July ; they are well worthy
of cultivation.

The perfect-blossomed varieties, of course,
need no intermingling of other plants to ren-
der them fruitful.

Gathering the Fruit. Gather the fruit
when it is not moist with dew or rain. . It may
be kept for a little while, by placing it in a
cool dry room or in an ice-box.

Uses of the Fruit, fyc. The strawberry
is a dessert fruit of the first rank. It is some-
times used also for preserving. Boerhave
considered it a valuable remedy in cases of

249

putrid fever. Hoffman asserts that he has
known consumptive people cured by the use
of this fruit.

Eaten plentifully the strawberry averts
rheumatic complaints. It also dissolves the
tartarous incrustations on the teeth. We are
very sorry that we feel obliged, also, to tell our
cold-water friends, that an agreeable dessert
wine may be made from this exquisite fruit.

Downing eulogises the strawberry as " the
most delicious and wholesome of all berries/'
and after quoting from a northern bard,

" A dish of ripe strawberries, smothered in cream,"

which he calls a perfect pastoral idyl in
itself, he boldly doubts the existence of any
individual who does not relish the fruit.

The cultivation of the strawberry for mar-
ket is not an unprofitable business. Six thou-
sand bushels of the fruit are annually sold in
the city of Cincinnati. Some of the West
Cambridge gardeners have sold in Boston,
during a single season, from $700 to $1000
worth of strawberries from less than an acre, of
land!

Size of the Fruit. — The Hovey's Seedling
attains, on an average, the size of three to

250

three and a half inches in circumference.
Specimens have been raised, by high cultiva-
tion and thinning the fruit, as large as five or
even six inches in circumference.

The largest Strawberry of which the writer
has any information, — (See Farmer's Library,
pagel$6, Oct. No. of 1845.) — was raised in
1845 at Doddington Hall in England. The
specimen was of the British Queen variety.
It was nine inches in circumference laterally,
and six inches in circumference through the
stem and point, — being about the size of a lair
specimen of the Baldwin apple. This is a
most striking exemplification of what nature
can do, when assisted by the cunning inge-
nuity of human skill; for, doubtless, that
which wins our admiration, in the Brit-
ish Queen, — meaning, of course, the straw-
berry,— is the result, chiefly of cultivation
and assiduous training for successive years ; — •
just what might have been effected with any
other of that little ignoble, uncultivated tribe,
so quaintly described by Gerarde.^

* " Strawberries do grow upon hills and valleies. likewise in
woods and other such places that bee something shadowie."

HEKBALL, p. 485.

*> %*?»

SECTION II.

THE CURRANT.

The Currant will grow in any soil that will
produce corn or potatoes. It is more easily
cultivated than any other fruit. The best
mode of propagating the currant, is by plant-
ing out cuttings of it, in the fall, or quite ear-
ly in the spring. (See Chap. 2d, of Part 1.)
It is well to procure the cuttings in the
fall and keep them like scions until spring.

Tree and Bush Currant. By taking out
all the eyes of a cutting except the three or
four upper ones, currants can easily be kept in
the form of little trees. By leaving all the buds
on the cutting, or by propagating by dividing
the roots, the plants will assume quite a bushy
habit. Downing prefers the tree mode of
culture; but we very much prefer the bush
mode. We have never seen tree-formed cur-
rants so healthy and vigorous as those grow-

252

ing in the old fashioned way, although we ad-
mit that, while they live, they yield very
large fruit and appear very pretty. It is an
excellent plan to renew currant bushes, once
in six or eight years.

When you desire extra sized fruit, pinch oft'
the ends of the growing shoots about the 20th
of June, and thin out the clusters just as you
would to produce the same result with the
grape. No farther treatment is necessary, ex-
cept to keep the ground around the bushes
well cultivated and free from weeds, and to
prune out the superfluous wood every winter.

The best varieties of a reputation well es-
tablished here, are the large Red Dutch and
the large White Dutch. Other fine, large va-
rieties, highly recommended by those who
have cultivated them, are Knight's Early Red.
Knight's large Red, and the Victoria (a very
large, fine currant.) These are nearly twice
the size of the common red and white currants
and are in every respect superior to them.

Of Black Currants, the Black Grape is one
of the best. People who have acquired a
fondness for this species of the currant, often
place a high value upon it.

Uses of the Currant. The currant, stewed

253
.in tfOlTDMH

while yet green, is an excellent article for
tarts, sauces, pies, &c. As a dessert, the white
varieties being less acid are preferred by most
people. The white and red kinds are very
pretty, when mixed together upon a glass dish
or salver. Wine is also made from the cur-
rant ; and frequently this is a no contemptible
beverage. Fine jellies are made both of the
red and the white varieties. When white
currants are to be made into jellies, use the
whitest suarar that can be obtained.

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SECTION III.

THE GOOSEBERRY.

The Gooseberry requires a deep, strong
rich soil. It is propagated precisely in the
same way as the currant. The ^ree-gooseber-
ry succeeds better than the tree currant, and
nearly as well as the bush form of the plant.
The plants should also be renewed, as direct-
ed for the currant. The uses of the gooseber-
ry are the same as of that fruit.

Pruning. One half of the top of a goose-
berry bush, should be thinned out at the win-
ter pruning, so as to admit light and air
through the head of the plant. When the ber-
ries are fairly set, thin them out, taking away
one half or more of them, for the benefit of
the rest.

Mildew. The best preventive and remedy
for this, is to keep the plants well manured
and pruned every year.

The following varieties are recommended
by Downing and others : Red — Keen's Seed-
ling, Crown Bob, &c. ; White— Early White,
White Honey. &c. ; Yellow— -Yellow Ball,
&c. ; Green — Green Walnut. Pitmaston,
Green Gage, &c.

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SECTION IV.

S t X

THE RASPBERRY.

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The Raspberry is indigenous both in Eu-
rope and America.

Soil. Downing recommends " a deep rich
loam, rather moist than dry." Kenrick says
" a moist rich soil." Thomas recommends
the same, with " an admixture of swamp
muck."

Cultivation. The raspberry is universal-
ly propagated by suckers or offsets from the
main roots. A few varieties are raised by
means of layers. They need the same cul-
tivation as the currant.

Pruning. All dead wood and the smaller
sterns should be cut away, in the spring, even
with the ground. Four or five shoots should
be left, and tied to a stake, the tops having
about on£ foot of their upper extremities
headed off. Set the plants in rows, three or

256

four feet apart each way. The raspberry
plant is in perfection, when it is three years
old. When it is about six years old, it should
be dug up and a new plantation made, on a
piece of ground where the plant has not re-
cently grown before. It is an excellent mode
to make a small plantation every year, so as
to continue a supply of the fruit. In extreme
cold latitudes, it is necessary to bend the
plants down and cover them with earth or
straw through the winter.

Varieties. White Antwerp, Red Antwerp,
FastolfF, and Franconia are the best for New
England ; the latter is the hardiest.

Uses. The fruit has the same uses as the
currant.

Plantations of the Raspberry for the supply
of the market, have been made almost as
profitable as those of the strawberry. This
fruit like the strawberry, is also wonderfully
susceptible of improvement by cultivation.

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