The Florida agriculturist. [volume] (DeLand, Fla.) 1878-1911, 1890-09-17

| LlIIlo your IT0cS S0C ~ D0dflIlg d. lull crop,
these little twigs will have all disappear
ed. Besides as it is they are now stop
ping holes in the bark which you wish to
make by trimming them out, thinking
thereby to force the sap which they take
up to the outer limbs. Before you do
this if you have force pump, cut holes
in your hose, and go to pumping, and
find out exactly how this principle will
work. Again these twigs are considered
the least vigorous of any on the tree,
and of course would be the first to sue
cumb to the effects of root cutting, so let
them stay for that purpose if no other.
However candidly believe they are put
there as reservoir for the purpose OF
receiving food for the following fruit crop.
This belief is based upon the fact that
these twigs on the main trunk of the tree
die during the time of making it's first
fair crop of fruit and others similar take
their place further on up the branches of
the tree.
Now as to the culture of agrOve | agree
with an editorial, which appeared in the
AGRICULTUR1sT some months ago, in
which the words "heroic pruning" were
first mentioned, therefore l will leave
that matter altogether to the suggestions
of your own ''think tanK" as Bill Nye
would say Whenever [ think of this
editorial and Mr.. Bigelow's comment on
the same; coupled with the heavy trim
ming, and frost bite that my fifty old
trees have sustained, am only forced to
believe that Mr.. BigelOw certainly knew
what he was writing about, when he said,
"That an orange tree could stand more
set-backs, and other abuse than most
any other known tree, and then recover
and come out all right" For after lapse
of four years my old trees have come out
all right, and are loaded down with fruit,
and are decidedly better trees now than
they could possibly have been if the cold
had not cut them back. This is suffici-
ent evidence to warrant me in saying, that
if all the cutting of the orange trees in
Florida had been on their upper parts
instead Of the lower parts there would
have been but little harm done. AS it is
if I was Mr.. Flagler, would buy up all
these old dilapidated groves. Saw them
off to stumps two feet high in the early
spring time, and in four or five years |
would have better groves than they we're
BEFORE and that, too, without any fertil-
izer. Think of what a shock an orange
| tree must submit to when you hop upon
| it, and in less time than two hours clip
| from it ten or twelve boxes of fruit. Yes
| fruit that it would have taken the tree to
rid itself OF in a natural way, all the way
| from ten to twelve months. Think again
of what a vast difference there is between
the orange and other fruit trees in this
respect Also the different methods and
time taken in gathering the fruit from
the same. Think why it is that while
gathering the oranges from a heavy
laden tree if a. few are overlooked and
left on the tree, that they are more apt
to crease than those on the tree that only
bore few. And why are the creased or
anges of the first tree mentioned the
sweetest? Because the sour Or vaDory
portion OF the sap is drawn by the at
mOsphere to the wounds made by the