494 



The Weekly Florists* Review. 



APRIL 13. 1S99. 



winterflowering plant for the green- 

 house. Several plants raised from 

 cuttings struck in spring and grown 

 on in a warm greenhouse in summer 

 have formed shapely bushes 2 feet 

 high and wide, and in December they 

 developed terminal thyrsoid panicles 

 9 inches high of flowers of the bright- 

 est gentian-blue color, which have 

 been an attraction for nearly two 

 months, and are still good. I know 

 no plant that is more efCective in the 



winter; certainly no plant at Kew has 

 been more admired. No doubt in a 

 clearer atmosphere than we have at 

 Kew in winter this plant would be bet- 

 ter even than it has been here. It is 

 worth the attention of all who are in- 

 terested in winter-flowering green- 

 house plants. The leaves are bright 

 green, coarsely serrated, and about 3 

 inches long and wide. — Gardeners' 

 Chronicle. 



CHRYSANTHEMUM NOTES. 



Propagation should be proceeded 

 with as soon as possible now if spe- 

 cially fine flowers are required. Vari- 

 eties for late woyk need not be started 

 yet. but all the stock for midseason 

 use should be in the sand by the end 

 of this month. April is a good month 

 to propagate mums because little or 

 no bottom heat is required and the 

 sun is not yet strong enough to sap 

 the vitality out of the cuttings and 

 make them wilt so much as it does in 

 May. The stock plants, too, under the 

 benign influence of spring are throw- 

 ing good cuttings and it is no trouble 

 to make a good selection. 



Personally, I believe that selection 

 of stock has everything to do with 

 future success. New varieties very 

 frequently don't do much the year 

 they are first sent out, because every 

 cutting that can be got, is rooted so 

 as to work up as large a stock as pos- 

 sible, the consequence being that the 

 constitution of the variety is impaired 

 and can only be restored by a careful 

 selection of cuttings the following 

 spring. It would be more correct when 

 we speak of a certain variety deterio- 

 rating to say that we let it run down 

 because we did not pay sufficient at- 

 tention to selection of cuttings at the 

 propagating season. Lots of old stan- 

 dard varieties have been grown in 

 England for fifteen and twenty years 

 and still give good satisfaction simply 

 • because they have not been abused. 



Here, the mum like everything else, 

 gets more of a move on, and the tran- 

 sition from the cradle to the grave, or 

 shall we say from the exhibition table 

 to the dump, is generally accomplish- 

 ed in three or four years. 



Some growers even yet cling to the 

 idea that cuttings should be rooted 

 singly in small pots, but really this is 

 entirely unnecessary. We have grown 

 as fine flowers as anybody in this 

 broad land and always root our cut- 

 tings in the sand bed. It is. however, 

 a very wrong practice to leave cut- 

 tings in the bench a long time after 

 they are rooted. Such a policy pro- 



duces a spindly debilitated plant with 

 long, wiry roots that are very differ- 

 ent from the thick, white roots which 

 the plant makes in soil. We like to 

 pot up the cuttings as soon as the 

 roots are an inch long, then they 

 seem to run right into the soil and 

 make nice thrifty plants in no time. 



Some varieties, like Morel and Mo- 

 desto, very often throw a bud as soon 

 as the cutting begins to grow, but if 

 they are started early enough they 

 will be all right by planting time, 

 either by starting away with a good 

 shoot or throwing up a sucker. We 

 prefer to get the sucker in such cases, 

 where it is possible, and cut out the 

 original plant because it makes a bet- 

 ter, straighter stem. If space in the 

 houses is limited, and it often is until 

 the bedding plants are got out, young 

 plants will do finely in cold frames 

 from now on. In fact, they are bene- 

 fited by such treatment, for they will 

 lay a good foundation by making lots 

 of root and not run up so much, and 

 be in fine shape for going right ahead 

 when planted out on the benches. 



Plants intended for specimens 

 should be potted on as soon as they 

 need it. Never let them get pot-bound 

 or suffer the least check in any way. 

 Pinch when small and keep them 

 pinched regularly to encourage all the 

 growths to come that will. The more 

 shoots you get the more flowers there 

 will be. The way to grow specimens 

 most successfully, is to keep them in 

 pots all summer, but they take a good 

 deal of looking after and many grow- 

 ers are fairly well satisfied with the 

 results they obtain by planting outside 

 and lifting in September or planting 

 on the carnation benches and getting 

 them potted up and out of the way be- 

 fore the carnations are housed. Which 

 ever way they are grown the results 

 are always in proportion to the time 

 and care expended. The grower 

 should always aim to grow the class 

 and quality of plants his previous ex- 

 perience has taught him will be most 

 readily disposed of at a living profit 

 in his own market. The magnificent 



specimens shown at exhibitions are 

 simply impossible for most florists to 

 produce, for they would starve to 

 death in the meantime. 



BRIAN BORU. 



AMONG PHILADELPHIA GROWERS. 



John Welsh 'Voung. 



Mr. John Welsh Young's range of 

 glass at Germantown is devoted 

 mainly to roses though considerable 

 bulbous stock is handled and there 

 are several houses of palms and other 

 decorative plants. Pandanus Veitchii 

 being especially noticeable, and in 

 fine condition. The larger specimens 

 of the pandanus are nearly all on pe- 

 destals. We believe Mr. Young was 

 the first to use the term "pedestal 

 grown" as applied to these plants. And 

 it means much, as plants grown on 

 pedestals, with abundance of light and 

 air on every side are always more 

 shapely and better in every way than 

 plants grown closely together on a 

 bench. 



He is still undecided as to whether 

 grafted roses will produce more dollars 

 to the square foot of bench surface 

 than own root stock, and will require 

 another season's experience to demon- 

 strate to his satisfaction that what is 

 gained in one part of the season is 

 not lost in another. 



His houses are all regulation three- 

 quarter span with side-benches next 

 the walls and he believes that this is 

 still the best arrangement of benches 

 to secure the greatest returns from 

 the space in the house. Certainly the 

 roses on his side benches were in very 

 good condition, though, of coui-se. not 

 equal to those on the center benches. 



John Burton. 



John Burton is inclined to favor 

 grafted roses and quite a quantity of 

 stocks were being grafted at the time 

 of our visit. Last season he lost a few 

 plants through the graft being thrown 

 off the stock. There is danger of this 

 when there has been an imperfect 

 junction of stock and graft, and care 

 should be taken to have the stock and 

 graft of equal size, so as to insure a 

 perfect union. 



His Beauties did well up to Christ- 

 mas and then many shoots came blind. 

 We noted many canes bent down in 

 order to make them break. And this 

 was seen at other places in the vicin- 

 ity. An old Beauty grower tells us 

 that this expedient is a mistake as it 

 given time each blind shoot will make 

 a second growth that will bear a 

 flower. Mr. Burton says, though, that 

 a Beauty plant that has given the 

 grower two blooms at Christmas does 

 not owe him anything. 



A house of Carnot that supplied 

 flowers last summer was dried off in 

 the fall and was made to produce a 

 crop for Christmas. It was then dried 

 out, the plants pruned hard back and 

 another crop is expected in May. 



Mr, Burton has several houses of his 



