Then (and all this work
should be done, as it can readily be done, in your latitude during the
cold months when vegetation is at a stand) give the old trees a thorough
pruning, even going as far as to remove 90 per cent of all the leaf and
fruit buds on the tree. Then wait for results, looking for nothing more
than a new growth of wood the first year, but fruitfulness thereafter
and a new lease of life. But remember as in the first place, care must
be taken to supply abundant water, indeed as much more as the average
rainfall, so much being absolutely necessary to afford the roots the
amount of manurial plant food, in solution, the new departure demands.
Every fruit-grower knows when a dwarf pear has borne a certain number of
crops, fruit buds cease to form and the tree becomes nearly barren. If
at this stage the dwarf is deprived of every bud, whether fruit or leaf,
and the limbs are left to resemble bare sticks, and at the same time the
earth about the roots is fortified with wood ashes and well rotted
manure, a handsome growth of branches will be made the first year and a
crop of fruit result the second.
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