AVINTKll I'.LUOMINc; PLANTS 77 



day. No one thought of growifig from seed. I remember when I first 

 commenced growing from seed. I had florists from different parts of llio 

 country in and asked me how old they were, and I would tell them and 

 they would not believe it, and they did not think it could be done. But 

 they were not posted, and they did not know. The trouble with the 

 old bulbs was that they make lots of foliage, but no flowers. And while 

 you get some beautiful plants, and even large ones, yet large ones can 

 be grown from seed in the period of fifteen or sixteen months, and with 

 the bulbs there are too many that will not produce flowers enough to pay 

 to bother with them. 



A Member: Do you grow any of your own seed, or do you save 

 any of your own seed? 



A. Yes, sir. All of it I had last winter was my own seed and that 

 is a better way to obtain seed, providing you save some of the better 

 plants). We pick out our seed plants and set them aside, but if you 

 sell the best, and try to save seed from what is left, you soon have a 

 coarse strain. But if you save your best plants you will get better flowers 

 and better plants from the seed you get. 



Mr. Green: Now about that seed proposition. We save all our own 

 seed. I take five plants of each variety and we keep them around in 

 different places. We designate them so we will know. We have tlie 

 bright red and fringed set oft by themselves. And we take five plants 

 of the blood red and set them away. And the pinks we take a very light 

 and a very darlc and set them oft' some place; and the only trouble is. 

 we have a woman come up and want to buy it, and we sometimes lose, 

 them in that way, and after all, our own seed, we find, takes much more 

 trouble and time and money to get it than anything wo can buy. If we 

 have a particularly good plant we carry that over for seed for next year. 

 The old bulbs w'ill not make as many flowery, but each bulb will make 

 more seed. 



Mr. Fi-ey: The trouble vv'ith saving seed plants, so many of the flow- 

 ers come off. The flowers seem to wilt. 



Mr. Green: Did you. ever try fertilizing with a camel's hair brush? 



A. Yes, sir. 



Q. I think that is a good way. 



A. Yes, sir. 



A Member: What variety of lilacs do you use? 



A- Charles X. C, Marie Legraye and the Lemoine is beautiful, only 

 they won't have as many flowers. Charles X. C. is the best one of all. 



Q. What price as a rule, do you have to pay for them? 



A. They cost about 85 cents apiece in Chicago. They are bought 

 more, and grown more, in about ten-inch pots. They cost about $40 a 

 hundred on the other side. 



The Chairman: With your permission, I will change the program 

 a little, and as one of our speakers this morning wants to leave on an 

 early train, we Avill have as our next paper, "Growing Sweet Peas," by 

 J. W. Lawson of York, Nebraska. 



