Nursery

NURSERY. In horticulture, a nursery is a field or farm used exclusively for the propaga tion of trees and plants, and the cultivation thereof until they are of sufficient size for trans planting where they are to stand permanently.

Until within the last seventy years but little attention was paid to the rearing of nursery stock for sale, as a special industry, in the United States, and it is only within the last forty or fifty years that the great nurseries East and West have had a beginning. A competent authority states that very little attention was paid to the raising of fruits previous to the. Revolution, except for the manufacture of cider. The first apples were raised upon Governor's Island, in the harbor of Boston, from which, on the 10th of October, 1639, ten fair pippins were brought, there being not one apple or pear tree planted in any part of the country but upon that island. The first nursery of young trees in this country was that planted by Governor Endicott on his farm at Salem, now Danvers, in 1640, and it is related that he sold five hundred apple trees for two hundred and fifty acres of land. The systematic cultivation of fruit was not common in this country pre vious to the Revolution. Orchards were set out upon many farms, but they were designed chiefly for cider. Much greater care, however, was taken to raise good fruits in New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania than in New England, and several noted orchards and nurseries existed there in the latter part of the last century and the early part of the present, but they were the exception to the general rule even there. Choice varieties of apples, pears, peaches and cherries were known only to, a few careful cultivators, and the number of varieties of these was quite limited as compared with the present day. Cider we's plenty, but its quality was much less regarded than its quantity. It is stated that so late as 1825 there was not a nursery for the sale of apple and pear trees in New England. Trees had to be bought in New York or New Jersey, or imported from abroad. The first horticul tural society in the country was established in 1829. The orchard products, according to the census of 1870 were $48,000,000, and the general culture of fruit has since rapidly progressed. We have now nurseries established for growing certain given varieties of trees, as forest trees, and even evergreen trees solely. One nursery in Illinois, devoted solely to evergreens, has dis posed of over 20,000,000 in one year. As a rule however, the nurseryman grows or deals in a variety of trees and plants, and as in the case of one of the great nurseries of Rochester, N. Y., there is hardly a plant of use or ornament, whether native or exotic, hardy or to be cul tivated only under glass, but that may be obtained. The same may be said of one of the great Bloom ington, Ill., nurseries. In preparing the nursery grounds, the Most important point to be attended to in the West is thorough drainage by means of tile. One of the most successful nurserymen in the West, located at Springfield, Ill., stated to the writer that the measure of his great success Was in first thoroughly tiling his land, dry and wet alike, to a depth of three feet. Thus, there are no waste places; there was also no hunt ing after particular locations for particular plants, no weak places in the rows, apd com paratively few inferior or cull stock, and the subsequent expense of cultivation is lightened and the growth forwarded to fully reimburse the interest on the cost of the permanent investment and wear of the drainage, this last being in care fully laid tile hardly to be estimated. It will hardly pay the general farmer to raise his own nursery stock, since he can buy his plants and trees much cheaper than he can grow the seed lings and graft or bud them. The same may be said of ornamental and forest trees, both decidu ous and evergreen. In the case, however, where quantities of forest trees, or even where small groves and wind breaks are to be planted, it is altogether better that the trees be bought, quite young, and planted in nursery rows, to remain there until of a size for final transplanting where they are to stand. Thus,seedlirtg, conifers from four to twelve inches high, and deciduous trees one or two years old, and nursery stock either recent grafts or of one year's growth, may be ordered and planted out, the evergreens in rows two feet apart and pretty thick in the rows. As they begin to crowd each other in the row, take out every other one until they stand two by two feet. Then take out every other row, and again every other plant in the remaining rows. Those left will make specimen plants for various ornamental purposes. Deciduous seedlings should be planted four feet apart, as to the rows, by twelve inches in the row, thinning out as may be necessary, as heretofore directed Eventually, they may stand sixteen by sixteen feet, and these may be allowed to grow up into a grove, or the wind break may be planted thickly and thinned out as necessary, leaving enough to stand for permanent growth. The idea in all this is that trees and plants while young can be cultivated and taken care of more economically in compact bodies than,when planted out at the distances at which they are finally to stand. One plant will also support and act as a nurse to another if not too much crowded. The pruning, pinching, and training is more easily performed, and they may stand in the home nursery much longer and be transplanted far more safely than direct from the commercial nursery rooms, and for the reason that they will not have to be carried long dis tances. Thus by buying quite young stock (maiden trees)they may stand until quite of large size, four or five years for apples and pears, three to four years for plums and cherries, and be safely transplanted with an abundance of fibrous roots, especially if they have been root pruned the June previous to being finally trans planted. This is clone by thrusting a sharp spade deeply down to cut the leading roots at a dis tance of eighteen inches to two feet from the stem of the tree, according to size. Thus, they will be found the succeeding spring to be fur nished with an abundance of fibrous roots. It would be better that this root pruning be done two years before the final transplanting, when the roots may be cut from fifteen to eighteen inches from the stems of the trees. Thus a five or six year old tree may be transplanted and with ordinary care will scarcely be checked in growth. In relation to the home nursery and training, Dr. Warder, the veteran and venerable pomologist, says: Trimming should be practiced in the nursery with a definite object in view, and not at random ; much less with any expectation of increasing the height of the trees by trimming them up. The object in pruning nursery trees should be to develop them in every part, to pro duce a stout, stocky, sturdy little tree, one that may be turned out upon the bleak prairie, and be able to withstand the blasts. To produce this result, the leaves should never be stripped from the shoots to make them extend their growth, for the sake of making more leaves; the nurseryman should know the value of leaves, as constituting the great evaporating surface that plays a most important part in causing the ascent of the crude sap and also in its elaboration after it has been taken up into the organization of the plant. Leaves should. be carefully preserved, and in the trimming, which is necessary, this should be borne in mind. To make vigorous, stocky trees, the side branches should be encour aged rather than pruned off. The tops may sometimes need to be pinched, to force out the laterals, and to encourage their growth ; if two shoots start together as rivals, one of them should be topped or cut back, or twisted and broken, but not cut off at its origin, unless there be plenty of lateral branches or twigs to furnish the tree. When these become too long, they may be spurred-in, either in the fall and winter when cutting grafts, or in the summer, during the growing season. Whenever it becomes necessary to trim off any of these laterals, it is best to do it at mid-summer, as the healing of the wounds made at this period is very rapid. Heading off the nursery trees is to force them to branch uni formly the second year, to form their heads at the right place; this is to be done toward spring, and is applicable especially to those varieties that are prone to make a single shoot the first year with out branching, and which have not been pinched in or headed during the previous summer to force out side branches. Cherries, plums, and pears, and some apples, are very apt to make this kind of growth. It should have been pre mised that all nursery trees ought to be grown to one main stem, or leader, from which all the branches arise, and to which they should all be made to contribute their quota of woody fiber.

It has been asserted that the wood of a tree, instead of being a cone, as its stem appears to be and is, it should be a column of nearly equal size from the bottom to the top; that is, the mass of all the branches taken together, should equal the diameter of the trunk at any point below. A well-grown, stocky nursery tree, with its abund ance of lateral branches approximates this idea; but the main stem of such an one is very percept ibly a cone, rapidly diminishing in diameter from the collar upwards. The age of trees for planting depends so much upon the views of planters, that the nurseryman can not always control the period at which he shall clear a block of trees. . Peaches should always be removed at one year from the bud. Plums and dwarf pears will be ready to go off at two years from the bud or graft; so with apples and cherries. But many persons, purchasers and sellers, prefer larger trees; and they recommend that the trees should remain one, two, or even three years longer in the nursery. Others, a new school of planters, prefer to set out the maiden tree, in most of the species above named, except some very feebly growing varieties, that will scarcely have attained sufficient size to risk in the orchard. The nur seryman should beware of keeping his trees too long on his hands; they may become unprofit able stock, and are sure to require much more labor in the digging and handling. The pur chaSer is his own master, and his tastes and wishes must be consulted; if he wants large trees, by all means let him be indulged; he will have to pay in proportion, he will have more wood for his money, more weight to carry, or more transpor tation to pay for, more labor in planting, and vastly increased risk of the life of his trees; but, let him be indulged with his five-year-old trees, while his neighbor, for a smaller sum in vested, with less freight, less wood, less labor, and infinitely less risk, will plant his maiden trees, and five years after will market more fruit. The nursery orchard, as practiced by A. R. Whitney, of Illinois, one of the largest orchardists of the country, is well worthy of imitation by all those nurserymen, who desire also to become fruit-growers, In laying off the blocks of nursery stock, the varieties that are wanted for the orchard, should be planted in such a manner that they shall be in every fourth row, so that the orchard trees will stand in rows sixteen to twenty feet apart, according as the nursery-rows ate four or five feet wide. In cul tivating and trimming these rows in the nursery, a plant is selected, every twelve or sixteen feet, which is to remain as the orchard tree when the block shall be cleared. A Food tree is selected, and special care in the pruning is bestowed upon it to secure the desired form, and low branches; if necessary, the tree on either side of it is removed, to give it room. By the time the block is cleared, these orchard trees are often in bear ing, and while his customers are struggling to save their trees, and nursing them after their transplanting, the nurseryman will have become an orchardist, and is enjoying his fruits. The nursery will have become an orchard—one rather closely planted to be sure—but the trees can be dwarfed by root pruning with the plow, they shelter one another from the prairie blasts, and when too thick, alternate trees may be removed to the wood-pile, and thus cheer the owner on a winter's day. Winter-killing is a serious evil in the nursery, as by it whole rows and blocks of certain varieties are sometimes destroyed, or very seriously injured. It has been observed to be most marked in its effects upon those sorts of trees that make the most vigorous and sappy growth, as well as that class which continue to grow late in the season. Such varieties have very naturally acquired the epithet of tender, especially as orchard trees of the same kinds, even in a bear ing state, have been similarly affected; in some sections of the country, these kinds have been thrown out of cultivation. The bark looks shriveled and withered, the twigs seem dry when cut, and resist the knife; when thawed by the fire, or on the return of spring weather, the bark seems loose, and the inner bark, instead of being greenish-white, becomes brown, and the whole tree looks as though it was dead. In old trees, large portions of the bark start from the stem and large limbs, and hang loosely for awhile and then fall off. The buds alone retain their vital ity, and upon the return of spring they some times succeed in establishing the necessary con nection with the soil, and restore the circulation of the sap; the results are the deposit of the usual annular layer of woody matter, which encases the dead portions within, that become like a sequestrum of dead bone in an animal. The best treatment for the trees that have been win ter-killed, is to cut them back very severely, in the hope of producing a vigorous wood-growth the next season, to repair the injury. A partial winter-killing often affects small nursery trees, especially on low and wet, undrained soils; the plants recover, but for years they have a black place in the heart which embraces all of the wood-growth that was affected—all their wood at the period of the disaster. This is enclosed and surrounded by clear healthy wood; but such trees are not desirable, they are so fragile, as to be easily broken. The best preventive for winter-killing in the nursery, is to encourage the early ripening of the wood, and to drain the land, is one of the best means of producing this effect, another is the cessation of culture at mid summer, and the sowing of oats very thick at the last cultivation, has been practiced, and, it is thought, with excellent effects. The rank growth absorbs the superfluous moisture, rob bing the trees, and afterward forms a good protective mulch during the winter. The objections to it are, that it encourages the mice, which, by girdling the trees, effectually winter kills them. Many nursery and orchard trees often present a black discoloration of the bark, which is quite unsightly, and excites alarm for the health of the tree. This is often caused by OAK. Trees of the genus Quercus, the most valuable of any genus of forest trees, remarkable for their close grain, durability, firmness, and toughness of timber; noted also for their majes tic size, and handsome appearance. The white oak grows naturally in a rich, moist, loam, or rich sandy soil underlaid with clay, also on any moist, strong, clay soil. The bur oak (upland) grows on rich, rather dry soils called barren, and the swamp bur oak, on rich moist bottom lands. The barren scrub oak, and the black oak is found on the provost, sometimes on sands. The classification of American oaks, and including the European introduced species, by Michaux, are divided into tw'o divisions as follows: White oak (Quercu8 alba), seventy to eighty feet high. Common European oak (Quercus robur), sixty to eighty feet high. European white oak (Quercus robur pedunculata), sixty to eighty feet high. Mossy-cup oak (Quercus olivce fermis), seventy to eighty feet high. Over-cup white oak (Quercus macrocarpa), seventy to eighty feet high. Post oak (Quercus obtudloba), thirty to fifty feet high. Over-cup oak (Quercus lyrata), sixty to seventy feet high. Swamp white oak (Quercue bicolor), sixty to seventy feet high. Chestnut white oak (Quercus prinos), seventy to eighty feet high. Rock chestnut oak (Quercus Montana), thirty to forty feet high, Yellow oak (Quercus acuminata), sixty to seventy feet high. Small chestnut oak (Quercus chinquapin), a shrub of three to four feet high. Live oak (Quercus sirens), evergreen, forty to sixty feet high. Cork oak (Quercus saber), Spanish tree. Willow oak (Quercus Adios), thirty to sixty feet high. Laurel oak (Quercus imbricaria), shingle oak, forty to fifty feet high. Upland willow oak (Quercus cin ema), evergreen Southern, twenty feet high. Running oak (Quercus pumila), two feet high. Second Section.—Leaves lobed. Bartram oak (Quercus heterophylla), said to be found only on one plantation. Water oak (Quercus aquatica), thirty to forty feet high. Black Jack oak (Quer cus ferruginea), small, barren oak. Bear oak (Quercus banisteri var. ili4folia), two to nine feet high. Barren scrub oak (Querns Catesbal), fif teen to thirty feet high. Spanish oak (Quercus falcata), seventy to eighty feet high. Black oak (Querelle tinctoria), sixty to seventy feet high. Scarlet oak (Quercus coccinea), eighty feet high; produces brownish ink galls. Gray oak (Quer cus ambigua), a hybrid, seventy to eighty feet high. Pin oak (Quercus palustris), forty- to sixty feet high. Red oak (Quercus rubra), seventy to eighty feet high. To this list'may be added the Southern oak, Q. Michauv. Others have also been added, but the list we have given compose the important species.