Renovating Old Orchards (part 2).

Would you like to consider organic orchard care?  Low impact, sustainable fruit culture?  Try renovating your orchard the mid nineteenth century way!  Scrub your trees with lye, as Evelyn suggests.  That should do it.  We continue with his advice:

The New England Farmer and Boston Rambler
Boston, Saturday, March 29, 1851
Vol.  VI, No.  13

Renovating Old Orchards (part 2).
     MR.  COLE: - First, we will take the old orchard, which very likely from mismanagement has fallen into a premature old age.  There are many such in all parts of the country, and many of these are now-a-days having their rough trunks cleaned and their moss grown branches taken off to be newly grafted, with the expectation that when this is done, there is no more to do.  Perfect success is the boon which the owners of such orchards claim, and chill disappointment is often the realization of their hopes.  The young scion set in these old rough-barked, moss-grown trees, that have probably had their foliage harvested by the canker-worm for a quarter of a century, - we say scions set in these may live and have a sluggish growth for a year or perhaps for several years, but they will be sure to inherit the disease of the tree and in the end perish by them.
     If old trees are to be grafted, they should be subjected to the washing and scrubbing operation for a year or two before it is performed.  That is, the old rough bark and moss should all be scraped off, and two or three washings of strong lye be given each season to impart healthfulness and destroy insects.  Then another thing may need attention.  The trees may stand in grass land and the old turf may have become so thoroughly sodded that the air and the dews, the sunshine and the storm, those great elixirs of vegetable health, have but little influence upon the roots.  Tillage may be necessary to insure healthful vitality to the tree.  We once took half a dozen trees, which had nearly given over bearing, and after a thorough ploughing, planted the land to potatoes two successive years.  In 1842, this ground was thoroughly stocked, and that year and each successive one those trees have borne liberally, and yet there was no manure applied on this ground.  The change was all effected by a judicious pruning and cleansing of the trees and thorough working the soil.  Every particle of turf there and every bunch of moss that had driven the turf away from home, became manure, and told in connection with the deep tillage its efficiency.Yours, &c.,  EVELYN

It would seem to me that two or three washings of strong lye would use up a lot of the stuff to renovate even a small orchard.  Since lye is what the old orchardist’s wife used to make soap, this could mean that renovating an orchard could result in a lack of soap, and a pretty stinky orchardist family.