Rensselaer Republican, Volume 18, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 June 1886 — Pruning. [ARTICLE]

Pruning.

One of our chief aims is to form an evenly balanced, open, symmetrical head, .and this-can -often be accomplished better by a little watchfulness during the season of growth than at any other time. If, for instance, two branches start so closely together that one or the other must be removed in the spring pruning, why let the superfluous one grow at all ? It is„. just so much wasted effort. By rubbing off the pushing bud or tender shoot the strength of the tree is thrown into the branches that we wish to remain. Thus the eye and hand of the master become to the young tree what instruction, counsel, and admonition are to a growing boy, with the difference that the tree is easily and Certainly managed when taken in time. Trees left'to themselves tend to- form too much wood, like the grape-vine. Of course fine fruit is impossible when the head of a tree is like a thicket. The growth of unchecked branches follows the terminal bud, thus producing long naked reaches of wood devoid of fruit spurs. Therefore the need of shortening in, so that side branches may be developed. When the reader remembers that every dormant bud in early spring is apossible branch, and that even the immature buds at the axil of the leaves in early summer can be forced into immediate growth by pinching back the leading shoot, he will see how entirely the young tree is under his control. These simple facts snd principles are worth far more to the intelligent man than any number of arbitrary rules as to pruning. Reason and observation soon guide his hand in summer, or his knife in March, the season when trees are usually trimmed. Beyond shortening in leading branches and cutting out crossing and interfering'boughs, so as to keep the head symmetrical' and open to light and air, the cherry does not need very much pruning. If with the lapse of years it becomes necessary to take off large limbs from any fruit tree, the authorities recommend early June as the best season for the operation.— E. P. Roe, in Harper's Magazine.

It Was the Judge.

, “What a murderous-looking yilltiifi the prisoner is,” whispered'an old lady in a court room to her husband. ‘'EiL be afraid jo get near him. ” “Sh! B warned her husband, “that ain’t the prisoner. He ain’t been brought in yet. ” s “It ain’t! Who is it, then?” . ..