. The book of the garden. Gardening. THE PEAR. 477 in this manner is to cover the shoots with blos- som-buds, and to produce most excellent crops. Although this tying-down mode of training is productive of large crops of fruit, still the re- straint imposed upon the energies of the trees has the effect of rendering them comparatively shortlived. The French gardeners themselves admit that trees trained in the en quenouille manner do not last longer than ten or twelve years, and many of them are giving up the prac- tice. This, however, may be in a great degree attributed to overcropping and too
. The book of the garden. Gardening. THE PEAR. 477 in this manner is to cover the shoots with blos- som-buds, and to produce most excellent crops. Although this tying-down mode of training is productive of large crops of fruit, still the re- straint imposed upon the energies of the trees has the effect of rendering them comparatively shortlived. The French gardeners themselves admit that trees trained in the en quenouille manner do not last longer than ten or twelve years, and many of them are giving up the prac- tice. This, however, may be in a great degree attributed to overcropping and too severe root- pruning; for a French or Belgian gardener is everlastingly operating on either the roots or branches of his trees. Trees managed in this manner in Britain are not found to be so short- lived. The process of pruning may be thus described : Shorten the upright or leading shoot to a foot above the ground. Let the shoot from the uppermost bud be trained upright in summer, and those below outwards. It must be understood that we are speaking of a young tree commencing to be so trained, allowing all to grow without stopping. At autumn or win- ter pruning, cut back the upright leading shoot to 15 inches above where it was previously cut. The buds, of which several will be found situ- ated immediately below where a vigorous shoot has been shortened at the winter-pruning, are cer- tain to break into shoots in spring ; continue to train the uppermost or leading shoot in a perpen- dicular direction as before, and the others spread- ing. Thus proceed till the tree has attained the desired height, observing most particularly never to allow the upper tiers of branches to extend as far as those below them. The form which the tree should ultimately assume is that of a pyramid or cone, broad at the base, and gra- dually tapering towards the top. If the top branches overhang the bottom ones, the latter will become weak and useless for fruit; they will linger for a time, and then die
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1850, booksubjectgardening, bookyear18
