JANUARY 12, 1899. 



The Weekly Florists* Review. 



159 



and every grower for market knows 

 that it pays to grow at any season, 

 and therefore may be expected to pay 

 best of all in midwinter. Provided you 

 have strong three-year-old roots to 

 bring in for forcing you need have no 

 •doubts as to the outcome. The roots 

 can be packed in thickly as close as 

 they will lie, covered with soil, and 

 kept moist, and the temperature of 

 the house will do the rest. 



Mushrooms 

 Suggest themselves as another possi- 

 bility, say beneath the center benches, 

 as affording the most space for mak- 

 ing a bed of sufficient volume to hold 

 the heat in the materials used to com- 

 pound the bed. The temperature at 

 which such a house should be run, 

 namely 45 to 50 degrees by night, with 

 a proportionate rise from sun heat by 

 day, is just an ideal condition for the 

 growth of mushrooms, and the only 

 precaution it occurs to me to suggest 

 in regard to this crop beneath occupied 

 benches is just to cover the bed with 

 tar-paper, or similar material that 

 ■would shed any water draining 



through from the bench above aftei 

 watering the crops thereupon. 



Sea Kale 



Is another vegetable that could be ex- 

 tensively forced beneath benches, but 

 why is it, this vegetable, considered 

 absolutely indispensable in every es- 

 tablishment on the other side of the 

 water, here is not grown at all? I im- 

 ported some roots, and grew it for one 

 season only, as after sending two lots 

 to the kitchen I was asked to send no 

 more; yet you see it daily in-the Lon- 

 don markets from December to June. 



String Beans, Cucumbers and Tomatoes. 



I have intentionally omitted to treat 

 of here, as they require higher tem- 

 perature and special treatment. Apart 

 from them, everything else mentioned 

 can be grown to the fullest measure of 

 success within one structure. To 

 those who have glass structures that 

 are no longer profitable to them, and 

 who are seeking a new field of enter- 

 prise, other essential conditions being 

 favorable, I say, unhesitatingly, "Go 

 and force vegetables under glass!" 



,. I 



Poinsettias. 



There may be yet a few who do not 

 know just how to treat the poinsettias. 

 After they are cut or the flowers are 

 gone lay them under a bench in a 

 warm house or store them in a warm 

 shed. It matters not how dry the soil 

 gets, the wood will ripen and that is 

 what you want. Leave them in that 

 condition till the middle of April. 



Azaleas. 



I have ■within a few years said the 

 most economical way to keep over 

 azaleas that were unsold was to throw 

 them away and buy a fresh lot every 

 fall. My experience and observation 

 the past year compels me to modify 

 that statement. For one reason it is 

 more expensive than formerly to im- 

 port plants, and undoubtedly the 

 plants that have been under proper 

 care during summer and fall make 

 better forcing plants, i. e., for Christ- 

 mas, than those imported but a few 

 weeks previously. If the newly im- 

 ported plants can be made quite as 

 attractive as the older plants they are 

 certainly not as satisfactory to the 

 purchaser as those which are better 

 established in the pots. I speak of 

 their care thus early because you are 



sure to have some plants of Deutche 

 Perle, Simon Mardner and Vervane- 

 ana, and perhaps other varieties that 

 have been left over from holiday 

 trade. It would be natural to en- 

 courage growth of these plants as soon 

 as the flowers ■were gone, but that 

 would bring them along very early. 

 They can be kept in a cool house, say 

 40 to 45 degrees at night, till after 

 Easter, when there will be others to 

 join their ranks, the treatment of 

 which I will deal of in the proper sea- 

 son. 



Don't neglect to stand over your 

 Easter azaleas every>':»three or four 

 weeks and rub off the young growth 

 which is much inclined on the newly 

 imported plants to grow so vigorously 

 that if let alone will take nrecedence 

 over the flower bulbs and you will get 

 no blossoms. 



Lilacs. 



There is no need of being out of 

 the flowers or plants of this sweet 

 shrub at any time now till spring. We 

 did not pot them this year, but lai-d 

 them in a cold frame with their roots 

 covered with earth, and pot them as 

 we need them, or rather pot up a few 

 every week. In a temperature of 65 

 degrees at night they develop their 



flowers in three weeks, and will keep 

 many days in a cool house after being 

 out. 



Geraniums. 



One of the heavy jobs just now is 

 shifting your geraniums from 2 to 3- 

 inch pots. I am aware that some of 

 my readers will say, "Can't afford it," 

 or "too much expense," thinking they 

 can't give so much space or labor to 

 so common a plant. In answer to that 

 I must say that if you want good bed- 

 ding plants in May, bushy plants with 

 one or two good trusses of flowers, 

 this midwinter shift is necessary and 

 will pay well. Another thing, if you 

 read the reports of the spring plant 

 trade last year, you will notice that 

 almost 75 per cent, of the bedding 

 plants sold last year in value were 

 zonale geraniums. Carpet bedding is 

 gone out and old-fashioned flowers 

 have returned. The geranium and the 

 canna are the two popular flowering 

 gardening plants of the day, so grow 

 all your space will allow. Shifting 

 them into a 3-inch now will not take 

 up much more space, for they will 

 have to have more room anyway; 45 

 degrees at night is plenty high enough 

 with the fullest light and abundance 

 of ventilation. A rather heavy loam 

 with a fifth or sixth of well rotted ma- 

 nure — old hotbed or well rotted refuse 

 hops — is a good mixture, and be sure 

 and pot firm. The tops of these plants 

 taken off about end of February and 

 rooted in 2-inch pots and gro^wn along 

 without a stunt will also make excel- 

 lent bedding plants. The Ivy geraniums 

 also need shifting. We never have 

 enough of them. 



Cannas. 



It may be three months yet before 

 you cut up and start your cannas, but 

 you should not entirely overlook 

 them. They are most likely under a 

 bench resting on boards, that's the best 

 place I have found fov them. Cellars, 

 if heated, are too dry, and if not heat- 

 ed too cold and damp. A very little 

 moisture at the root will start them 

 growing, which is not at all desirable 

 now, and water dripping on them is 

 most injurious; it will rot the dor- 

 mant roots. So give them a move of a 

 foot or two, which will check root ac- 

 tion, and if there is any drip on them 

 you can perhaps avoid it. If you de- 

 sire to raise any cannas from seed, 

 and often we do, as fine plants for bed- 

 ding if sown at once can be flowered by 

 middle of May, you should get them 

 into the sand as soon as possible. I 

 know no better way of getting a quick 

 germination than by putting the seed 

 to soak in hot water. Let the seed 

 remain soaked for 24 hours; then by 

 holding the seed with a pair of pliers 

 or pinchers, slice off a small piece of 

 the hard covering of the seed. Sow in 

 a flat of soil and cover the seed with 

 one-half inch of sand and place where 

 it will get a strong bottom heat. With- 

 out going to the trouble I have de- 

 scribed above and sowing as you 

 would peas, you may get 25 per cent. 



