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Close and early summer-pruning will do much to prevent it, throwing, as it does, all the strength of the vine into the young fruit, developing it rapidly, and also allowing free circulation of air.
In the interior valleys, on suitable soils with adequate moisture, early apples are profitably grown, while in the higher foothill and mountain valleys in all parts of the State, where moisture is sufficient, late keeping apples of high quality are produced. Summer-pruning Apples. Will summer pruning cause apple trees to bear fruit instead of growing so much new wood?
Fall-pruning, or cutting back, is but the beginning of the discipline under which we intend to keep our vines; summer-pruning is the continuation, and one is useless, and cannot be followed systematically without the other. Let us look at our vine well, before we begin, and commence near the ground.
The time to perform the first summer-pruning is when the young shoots are about six to eight inches long, and when you can see plainly all the small bunches or buttons the embryo fruit. We commence on the lower two spurs, having two buds each. From these two shoots have started.
I had seven nests on my premises here one summer; they go on breeding very late, and I have found their nests with young birds half-fledged while summer-pruning apple trees in August. I never remember seeing a goldfinch at Aldington, which should show that the thistles were well under control, for the seed is a great attraction.
Our vines being tied, ploughed, and hoed, we come to one of the most important and delicate operations to be performed; one of as great nay, greater importance than pruning. I mean summer-pruning, or pinching, i.e. thumb or finger pruning.
Both operations are, in fact, only different parts of one and the same system, of which summer-pruning is the preparatory, and fall pruning the finishing part. If we think that a vine is setting more fruit than it is able to bear and ripen perfectly, we have it in our power to thin it, by taking away all imperfect bunches, and feeble shoots.
Early and close summer-pruning is a partial preventative against all these diseases, as it will hasten the development of the fruit, allow free circulation of air, and the young leaves which appear on the laterals after pinching seem to be better able to withstand the effects of the mildew, often remaining fresh and green, and shading the fruit, when the first growth of leaves have already dropped.
My readers will perceive, that Fall-pruning, or shortening-in the ripened wood of the vine, and summer-pruning, shortening in and thinning out the young growth, have one and all the same object in view, namely, to keep the vine within proper bounds, and concentrate all its energies for a two-fold object, namely, the production and ripening of the most perfect fruit, and the production of strong, healthy wood for the coming season's crop.
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