THINNING FRUIT.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XVI, Issue 4960, 25 February 1895, Page 3

THINNING FRUIT.

The following article is supplied to a contemporary by a practical fruitgrower, who has experimented with great success in the thinning of fruits. He says that thinniug invariably pays, and is the secret of securing large marketable fruit, and as far as peaches are concerned, to obtaiDi good fruit it is imperative. Ordinarily if left to mature all the fruit net, tho peaches will be small and utterly uulit for market. Moreover, tho vigour of the tree will b osooYertaxed, that wood growth will ibe checked, and tho tree stunted. In all plant lifebearing of seeds exhausts the parent. A young four-;year-old peach tree, if left alone will probably mature over 1000 peaches, but if four out of live of the peaches are removed, the remaining 200 will weigh as much as the 1000 | would have done. It has been found in ac tual practice that the diameter of the fruit is thus increased from one and a half to two and a half J inches. Now a peach two and a half i inches in diameter does not appear | to be soyery much larger than one | of only one and a half inches, but if they are weighed and measured it will bo found that one of the former weighs or measures in cubical contents nearly ns much as live of the latter, so that there is really no loss in weight or bulk of fruit by picking off four peaches out of live when the tree is overloaded, On the other hand, the small fruit would have been valueless for the market,while the large selected fruit commands top prices. The thinning process should begin when tho fruit is as big as a small marble and after danger ol falling is past, In California a four-year-old tree is not allowed to bear over 10011)3 of fruit, while a five-year-old tree may carry 1251b5, and a six-year-old tree loOlbs. At the lower rate, with trees 21ft. by 24t't., and the fruit was only Id. per lb, an acre would yield £52. In reality there is no extra cost in thinning, for all fruit must ultimately be picked, and it costs loss to pick olf the fruit while green, so that the labour put in at the period of thinning is the most! profitable labour that keeping an orchard necessitates.