The ranch. [volume] (Seattle, Wash.) 1902-1914, 1908-03-01
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Question No. q These trees are
three years old the coming spring.
Would it do to leave the pruning till
summer, with the idea of their throw
ing out fruit spurs and commencing
to bear young instead of going to
wood so much?"
think Mr.. Fisk has made mistake
In cutting his new growth too much
Had he clipped off the points OF the
new growth instead Of cutting back
to Is inches it would have caused
side limbs to develop. This question
of how to develop fruit buds and pre-
vent the tree from running too much
to wood growth Is one upon which fruit
men have spent much time and hard
study. 1t must be borne in mind that
some varieties of the apple will not
come into early bearing. Why one va
riety will come. into bearing early and
another will not, Notwithstanding that
both are treated exactly alike, Is
problem no one is able to solve. The
Northern Spy is slow in coming into
bearing, while the Rome Beauty is
lust the reverse The SpitZenberg,
while not as slow as the Northern Spy
in coming into bearing, must be class
ed among the varieties that are slow
in fruiting. To illustrate this | will
| mention the fact that in the spring
of 1905 we top-worked about $50 trees
| to Rome Beauty and about 300 to
| Spitzenberg The past fall (1907) we
| picked and packed an average of two
| boxes of Romes to the tree, while the
| Spitzenbergs did not average one ap-
,,ln m Tho RnnaC fOn-
worked onto Ben Davis, Northern Spy
and Mammoth Black Twig (Arkan-
sas). | could see no difference in the
yield on these different stocks. The
Spitzenbergs were grated onto Ben
Davis and Missouri Pippin. | am sat-
isfied that the stock will not materially
affect the bearing so far as earliness
or lateness is concerned. What | say
here applies to top-working and not
root grating. BY root grating the
apple on Paradise stocks the trees
are dwarfed and all dwarfing tends
to fruitfulness.
It may be stated here that authors
do not fully agree on some or the
points under consideration. The best
work | have ever read on such mat
tiers is the book entitled "A Treatise
on the Physiology of Plants by so
rauer." This Is German work but
is translated into English by Prof. f.
E, Weiss. | wish to make some quo
tations from this valuable work, FOR
think they help us to understand some
of these problems better than we other
wise could. Sorauer says: "An our
efforts then Tin pruning) will be in the
direction either of producing more
leafy shoots or in promoting the for
nation of fruiting buds. In the first
case we prune for wood in the latter
case. we prune for fruit. If we find
that a tree has the tendency to pro-
duce every year a number OF SHOOTS
with an excessive number of fruit
buds, so that the tree is In danger OF
exhausting itself and not producing
proper crown, the tree must be
pruned for wood. We know that
rich and continuous supply OF water
increases the vegetative activity or
shoot, the leaves become larger and
the internodes longer. The supply or
water to the various buds can, how
ever, be relatively increased by de-
creasing the number Of buds. The
number of eyes will therefore have
to be diminished by pruning the
branches, and the stronger the shoots
are to be next year, the shorter the
branches must be cut. Pruning for
wood is therefore merely the cutting
away of branches, leaving only short
piece of each shoot
Pruning for fruit, on the other
hand, becomes necessary when a tree
produces long unbranching shoots OF
vigorous character, but which show
no Towering buds. This production
of woody shoots can only be stopped
nv quitting away the tins of the