JULY 14, 1.S9S. 



The Weekly Florists' Review. 



149 



Partial view of a field of Japanese Iris, with Nymphaea Odorata Rosea in foreground, at H. A. Dreer's, Riverton, N. J. 



late ill thie season and he thinks this 

 may have had something to do with it. 



In 1896 he liept a record of the re- 

 turns per square foot of bencli surface 

 from a number of varieties and below 

 is the result. Viviand-Morel 56 cents. 

 Yellow Queen 50 cents, Robinson 47 

 cents, Mayflower 46 cents. Golden 

 Wedding 46 cents. Dean Hole 35 cents. 

 Pink Ivory 32' ^ cents. Jerome Jones 25 

 cents, Bonnaffon 20 cents. 



Last year their largest bloom of Mo- 

 rel was 7 inches across and 7 inches 

 deep, a remarkable depth for Morel. 

 Their largest flowers of Mayflower 

 and Golden Wedding were each 7 

 inches rcross and 6 inches deep. 



Of the new varieties they are try- 

 ing this year a few each of Mrs. Ar- 

 thur Caton, W. H. Chadwick, Mrs. C. 

 H. Peirce, Solar Queen. Frank Hardy, 

 Blackhawk, Spottswood, Robt. Carey, 

 Alice F. Carey, Gladys Vanderbilt. Au- 

 tumn Glory and half a dozen new 

 French varieties. 

 They will follow one house of chrys- 

 anthemums with Japan longiflorum 

 lilies and hydrangeas and another 

 with sweet peas. The sweet peas will 

 be sown about the middle of August, 

 a dozen seeds in a 4-inch pot. These 

 pots will stand out in a cold-frame till 

 the mums are cleared away late in No- 

 vember and the benches filled with 

 fresh soil. Then the pots of sweet 

 peas will be planted out in the beds 

 about twelve inches apart. The vines 

 will be trained on the same strings 

 that were used for the mums. They 



expect to begin cutting flowers by 

 Easter or before, depending upon the 

 weather, the sweet pea having proved 

 rather capricious as to time of bloom- 

 ing under sucb conditions. The pea 

 produces flowers from each leaf axil 

 and they find that about three of these 

 blast and then they begin to come per- 

 fect. They are curious as to the cause 

 of this. 



When the sweet peas get short 

 stemmed and low in price they pull 

 them out and use the house for bed- 

 ding plants. 



If they had more houses they would 

 follow one house of mums with roses 

 for summer blooming. 



WATER AND SUNSHINE. 



The following, rather interesting 

 communication, has been referred to 

 me for remarks: 



So much is said about watering 

 flowering plants wben sun shines, that 

 I wish a word from you. At Rich- 

 mond, Va., but a few feet above tide 

 water' I continued this for years, and 

 noticed no harm from it, yet here on 

 the Alleghanies, am again told to look 

 out. What is it? Why, if so? I con- 

 tend that the sun shines at and after a 

 shower. And why should watering be 

 worse? H. A. C. 



West Virginia. 



There is an ancient fallacy that if 

 a drop of water remains on the leaf of 

 a plant under glass and the sun 



should be shining at the same time 

 that a burn or scald of the leaf will 

 be the result. Somewhere in that 

 grand old book "Lindley's Introduc- 

 tion to Botany,'" the author takes oc- 

 casion to say that "Seeds will not 

 germinate in the light." On the mar- 

 gin of the page in writing, very 

 familiar to me and which was penned 

 00 years ago, is the simple word 

 "nonsense." If as great a man as 

 Lindley could assert what we all know 

 now to be ridiculous, why should not 

 lesser prophets fall into error. 



Watering in our greenhouses is usu- 

 ally done in the early hours of the 

 day in winter, so that excessive mois- 

 ture may be gone by night, and in 

 the hot days of summer it is best done 

 towards evening when evaporation is 

 not so quick and in their artificial 

 condition the plants will have the 

 hours of night to enjoy the humidity 

 of soil and atmosphere, but how many 

 times in May and June do you (or you 

 ought to) damp down your houses? 

 Under the benches and paths is the 

 place to throw the spray of water, but 

 thousands of plants get wet in the 

 operation, and this is at about mid- 

 day. And did you ever see any leaves 

 burn from it? Never! If the leaves 

 of geraniums, cannas, fuchsias, cala- 

 diums or any plants burned it was be- 

 cause they were parching dry and the 

 fierce rays of the sun, through convex 

 glass, produced a focus on the leaves. 

 A plant with its tissues filled with 

 moistures would take no harm, but a 



