Page:A Practical Treatise on Olive Culture, Oil Making and Olive Pickling.djvu/22

 comparative repose—which vary according to seasons—and are not placed in the nursery within a reasonable time, say from one to two weeks, there is danger of the vitality in most of them dying out, and the loss will easily reach thirty, forty, or even fifty per cent., and possibly still more. In this respect, the cuttings of the olive tree differ from those of the vine, which can be cut immediately after the fall of the leaves, when vegetation comes to a stand-still, and which can be kept buried in the ground until March or April, without interfering with their starting when spring comes.

For the reasons here suggested, it can be understood why those who have attempted to reproduce the olive tree from cuttings which were not recently cut from the tree, and who have performed that operation at a season of the year when the sap was too active, have realized such poor results. I know of some parties whose loss has reached 80 and 90 per cent., and two of them who did not succeed with a single cutting. I can see no other cause for it than the one I have just mentioned. Let us now pass in review other modes of propagation.

Cuttings can be made from the suckers that grow from the base of the tree, but if they are taken below the grafting point of trees raised from the seed they will have to be grafted.

The olive tree is also reproduced from the woody excrescences that form generally on the trunk of old trees. This mode of propagation