Clean out your orchards. Let no branches lie scattered around. If in
crops, let the tillage be thorough and clean. In plowing near the tree
be careful not to strike deep enough to lacerate the small roots and
fibres. An orchard should be tended with a _cultivator_ rather than a
plow, and the space immediately about the tree should be worked with a
hoe. Look to the fence corners, and grub out all bushes, briers and
weeds. A fine orchard with such a ruffle around it, is like a handsome
woman with dirty ears and neck.
_Pruning_ may still be performed. Those who are raising young orchards
ought not to prune at _any_ particular time between May and August,
but _all along_ the season, as the tree needs it. If a bad branch is
forming, take it out while it is small; if too many are starting, rub
them out while so tender as to be managed without a knife and by the
fingers. If an orchard is rightly educated from the first, there will
seldom be a limb to be cut of larger than a little finger, and a
pen-knife will be large enough for pruning. In the West there is more
danger of pruning too much, than too little. The sun should never be
allowed to strike the inside branches of a fruit-tree. Many trees are
thus very much weakened and even killed if the sun is violently warm.
Over-pruning induces the growth of shoots at the root, along the
trunk, and all along the branches.
_Grub up suckers_, and clear off from large and well established trees
all side-shoots. After a tree is three inches in diameter through the
stem, it may be kept entirely free of side shoots. But young trees are
much assisted in every respect, except appearance, by letting brush
grow the whole length of their stem, only pinching off the ends of the
whips, if they grow too rampantly. In this way the leaves afford great
strength to the trunk, and prevent its being spindling or weak-fibred.
_Scour off the dead bark_, which, besides being unsightly, is a harbor
for a great variety of insects, and affords numerous crevices for
water to stand in. We have previously recommended soft soap, thinned
with urine to the consistence of paint, as a wash for trees; we have
seen nothing better.
_Examine grafts_ if any have been put in. See if the wax excludes the
air entirely; rub out all shoots which threaten to overgrow and
exhaust the graft; if it is growing too strongly, it must be
supported, or it will blow out in some high wind.
LOOK OUT FOR BLIGHT.—All trees that have shown no indications of
blight, will be safe for the season. But those which have shown the
affection may be expected to continue to break out through the season.
It is all important to use the knife freely; for although there is no
contagion from tree to tree, yet the diseased sap will, in the same
tree, be conveyed from part to part over the whole fabric. But prompt
pruning will remove the seat and source of the evil. Where a branch is
affected, cut chips out of the bark along down for yards; indeed,
examine the limb entirely home to the trunk, and you may easily detect
any spots which are depositories of this diseased sap, which, by its
color, and whole appearance, will be identified by the most
unpractised eye. Cut everything, below and aloft, that has this
feculent sap in it, even if you take off the whole head by the trunk,
and leave only a stump; for, the stump may send new shoots; but if the
tree is spared from false tenderness you will lose it, bough, trunk,
and root.