202 



The Weekly Florists' Review. 



JANUARY 26, 1899. 



rieties as Scott, Daybreak, Eldorado 

 and Portia, I have not lost over 10 

 per cent. I think this proves that it is 

 not in the planting, but in the condi- 

 tion of the plant and that some va- 

 rieties are more suliject to this dis- 

 ease than others. 



I have never tried sulphur as a rem- 

 edy, but it has always seemed to me 

 that we are working in the dark. I 



trust the matter will be investigated 

 by some of our state chemists, 



It has always been an idea of mine 

 that stemrot was a disease of the sap 

 similar to a blood disease of the hu- 

 man body: if so, while sulphur might 

 possibly be a preventive in destroy- 

 ing the germs as they matured, it 

 would not be any good as an eradicat- 

 or. A. J. B. 



Lemon Verbena. 

 There is a plant that is always ask- 

 ed for from the general florist and 

 which it is very difficult to buy in 

 satisfactory shape, and that is the 

 Lemon verbena (Aloysia citriodora). If 

 you grew some plants in 4-inch pots 

 last summer, and they have been rest- 

 ing under a bench since October, not 

 dust dry, but dry enough to lose their 

 leaves, it will soon be time to get them 

 up. Shake off the old soil and repot 

 in no larger a pot than they were pre- 

 viously in. Shorten back the strong 

 shoots and cut entirely away the weak 

 ones. Place in a temperature of 50 

 degrees, and when you are watering 

 the bench, raise the hose and always 

 syringe this plant. They will soon 

 break and give you all the cuttings 

 you want. 



I used to hear years ago that the 

 lemon verbena was a difficult plant to 

 propagate. We never find it so. It 

 may not root under the same condi- 

 tions as a carnation, that is, cool both 

 in the sand and above, but when the 

 sand is 65 to 70 degrees and the at- 

 mosphere 50 degrees, they root almost 

 as surely, if not as quickly, as an 

 achyranthus. The cuttings should 

 never be allowed to wilt, either from 

 lying around when made, or sun or 

 want of water in the sand. As I may 

 forget to mention this little favorite 

 again, will say that after being rooted 

 its treatment is no different from any 

 other soft-wooded young plant, for al- 

 though not a soft-wooded plant, you 

 are treating it as such by rooting the 

 young, tender growths; so grow them 

 along till early April, when the only 

 place for them is a hot bed. A plant 

 in a 3-inch pot once stopped and put 

 into a hot bed in middle of April 

 will make four times the plant of one 

 grown in any kind of greenhouse with 

 best of care. 



I trust my readers, or critical read- 

 ers, will not think it strange that I re- 



commend what they may consider such 

 an obsolete structure as a hot bed, but 

 nevertheless there are a few plants 

 that not only grow magnificently un- 

 der the influence of this primitive 

 method, but it is no fraud on your 

 customers to produce plants that way. 

 The man who would grow young roses 

 or carnations that way would be a 

 sinner. 



Begonia Manicata Au. ea. 

 Last year i mentioned the many 

 good qualities of this handsome bego- 

 nia. It is one of the very best house 

 plants that we know of, its succulent 

 growth resisting the dry air of the 

 room better than any of this beautiful 

 genus. It is never plentiful and propa- 

 gation is slow by the usual method of 

 cuttings, because you can't get cut- 

 tings enough, but it can be increased 

 almost as quickly as the Rex type, 

 either by sections of the leaf or lay- 

 ing the leaf on the surface of the sand 

 and pegging it down and severing the 

 main ribs of the leaf here and there; 

 perhaps the latter is the best way. 



Roses. 

 There is no better time in all the 

 year to root roses of the tea section, 

 which to us is by far the most im- 

 portant class. Large growers root 

 their roses with as much certainty as 

 they would verbenas. Though but a 

 small rose grower, the writer has for 

 years been propagating roses at vari- 

 ous times and using several kinds of 

 cuttings. The test of whether a cut- 

 ting is better with one eye or two, or 

 more, I once tried, and before it was 

 time to replant again the two-eyed 

 cutting had given the best results. 

 That old controversy of "flowering 

 versus blind wood" is slumbering, per- 

 haps never to be revived, and most 

 likely both sides satisfied that they 

 are in the right. It any one has had 

 perfect success by either way, don't 

 let them change; depend on It, it is 



not the way or form they started the 

 cutting, but their great care, attention 

 and skill that followed. I believe, and 

 experience has proved to me, that a 

 cutting of so-called blind wood, if suf- 

 ficiently strong, is just as good and 

 will make eventually as free flowering 

 and vigorous a plant as one made 

 from a portion of the flowering shoot. 



In selecting the cuttings or the ma- 

 terial that makes a good cutting, it 

 seems to me that a good gardener 

 knows it by instinct, the same kind of 

 faculty that some men possess who 

 are expert waterers; they know at a 

 glance whether the plant needs water 

 or not. The rose cutting should be 

 neither soft nor succulent, as we want 

 a verbena cutting, nor should it be 

 sufficiently old to be ripened and hard. 

 The right condition can be best de- 

 scribed by saying that the stem a few 

 joints below the bud, when the latter 

 is about opening, is in the ideal age 

 for propagating, and blind wood of the 

 same texture is just as good. 



American Beauty is as easy to prop- 

 agate in the winter months as any of 

 the teas, only there is more room for 

 exercise of the brain than in making 

 cuttings of the teas. Large, strong 

 growths should be avoided, and so 

 should the wiry, small growths. No 

 one thinks about making cuttings 

 from the flowering wood of the Beauty 

 because there is such an abundance of 

 blind shoots of better material from 

 which to choose. Shoots of medium 

 size are the ones, and the cuttings 

 should be made from that part of the 

 stem, neither too near the bottom, be- 

 cause too woody, nor near the top, be- 

 cause too sappy. Roses in the winter 

 months root in sand in a house where 

 the temperature is 55 degrees perfect- 

 ly without any bottom heat, but take 

 five or six weeks before they are ready 

 to pot off. If raising roses for my own 

 use, the ideal propagating bed would 

 be where the sand was 60 to 65 degrees 

 and the house 50 degrees. Roses should 

 be potted off as soon as there are any 

 signs of roots and not left till the 

 young roots are 2 inches long, for in 

 that state you will likely lose them 

 in removing from the sand. Many a 

 young batch of American Beauties has 

 been injured and many lost when 

 first potted from the sand, from want 

 of attention in shading and watering. 

 In these particulars much greater care 

 is needed with the Beauties than with 

 the tea varieties. 



WILLIAM SCOTT. 



BONNAFFON TURNING BLACK. 



Referring to the experience of "Illi- 

 nois," whose Bonnaffon chrysanthe- 

 mums turned black at the tips of the 

 petals, would say that I had the same 

 trouble with mine, and I can affirm 

 that in my case it was not caused by 

 overfeeding or damping. It seemed 

 to be in the flower itself. Over half 

 of my Bonnaffons were injured in this 

 way, though in three different benches 



