Brains and brawn

We have a picture hanging on a wall at home painted by Roger Fry about the time of the first world war and entitled ‘Pruning Trees’.

We have a picture hanging on a wall at home painted by Roger Fry about the time of the first world war and entitled ‘Pruning Trees’. He portrays two men, one of whom is cutting off a very large bough from an apple tree, while the other is pulling the bough with a rope. Every winter, before I go out into the orchard to do my own apple pruning, I study it carefully, since I feel I need to remind myself what a highly regarded activity pruning has always been. I expect this is because it is a physical activity, like sex and cricket, which largely depends for its success on what goes on in the head.

I cannot think of many gardening activities which demand quite such a range of cerebral attributes, such as good spatial awareness, visual discernment, and aesthetic sense, as well as a grounding in basic botany, entomology and plant pathology. It is helpful, of course, also to have patience, forbearance and a muscular forearm, but carefully thinking through what you are doing matters more.

The very word ‘pruning’ puts gardeners in a spin. But it would be hard to argue that these characteristics are not common to many keen gardeners, and all that is often lacking are experience and confidence. And they should know that even professional gardeners admit to going back to the books from time to time to check the precise way to prune a particular plant, especially if pruning also encompasses training against a wall.

No doubt Roger Fry’s pruners were hired men, and may well have grumbled at the cold, the long hours and the poor pay.