920 



The Weekly Florists' Review* 



4,000 fine large bulbs, fully fifty per 

 cent larger than anything I have eve) 

 received from Europe. 1 have planted 

 for forcing about 3,000 of them and will 

 report my success with home grown bulbs 

 later on. 



1 have had about the same results 

 with Dutch hyacinths — that is they have 

 multiplied in the same proportion. The 

 only rule I have followed is to keep them 

 perfectly dry until they " ■' ed theit 

 moisture from the rains. Tins explains, 

 I think, why the general run of Custo- 



■ not succeed in keeping their hya- 

 cinth bulbs from year to year when 

 planted among othqr garden plants where 

 i Im i e is promiscuous watering. 



I find the same rule applies to daffo- 

 dil-, tulips, jonquils, anemones, crocus 

 and narcissus. I transplant my daffo- 

 dils about every third year, jonquils, m 

 lips and crocus every season, and the 

 anemones once in two years. Later on I 

 will give you sonic ideas in regard to iny 

 experiments with dahlias, ulmliolns ami 

 other such stock. G. 



MISCELLANEOUS 

 SEASONABLE HINTS. 



Forcing the Dahlia. 



lias been talk id 



written and illustrated for the past few 

 months angnt the dahlia. As 

 tive cut flower for the late summer and 

 fall months it has undoubtedly come to 

 stay. Tl S4r. Peacock read 



at a re ■ _ of the Pittsburg 



Florists' Club, and more particularly the 

 remark- md horticulturist. 



• interesting. Mr. 

 I ' said dahlias were at Easter, a 



"gri I - ess." : I' appears to hai e 

 grown them in 6-inch pots. There is no 

 doubt at all that five or six inches of soil 



We don't alter nature, but the gardener 



greatly assists nature, ff we had nothing 

 but the large double show varieties, 

 forcing them for i'aster may never have 

 been desirable, but the charming pom- 

 pons, cactus and other decorative types 

 have given us flowers of surpassing 



Chrysanther 



Miss Alice Byron. 



beauty of form and color. Think what 

 beautiful flowers they must be for church. 

 ■I rations tit Easter and, for that mat- 

 ter, for the serial functions which quick- 

 ly follow. You ean learn more from 

 pages 870 and 871 of The Review for 

 October 22 about planting time, tempera- 

 ture, etc., than I can tell you. 



Mr. Peacock tells us he has been grow- 

 ing dahlias under glass for thirteen years- 

 ami I have occasionally heard of a few 

 others doing it. Yet 1 think it is a very, 

 very small minority of the commercial 

 florists of tli' country who have given 

 the dahlia any thought as an Easter 

 flower. Some of our largest firms have 

 been making a specialty of supplying the 

 trade with a half dozen of the finest 

 decorative varieties for forcing purposes. 

 So there is no trouble iu procuring plants 

 in condition for starting in January. 

 Lifting and Storing. 



Only within a very few days have the 

 dahlias been injured by frost, even in 

 our northeastern states, and now the tops 

 are killed it is time to dig the roots. Any 

 place that will keep potatoes will do for 

 dahlias. I can remember in the "Auld 

 Sod ' ' that they were hung up to the sides 

 of the wall in any cool shed. Beneath 

 a carnation bench, with some old boards 

 under them, will winter them first rate, 

 and the less drip on them the better. 

 Whether these roots, when divided, would 

 be the proper thing to force for Easter 

 is a question I would like to hear about 

 from a specialist. Perhaps they are. We 

 treat the dahlia as if it was an herba- 

 ceous plant, as we do a eanna, but in its 

 native clime I think it is no more truly 

 herbaceous than is the eanna. Yet I will 

 venture an opinion that the best way to 

 prepare a dahlia for forcing would be to 

 take spring propagated cuttings and, in- 

 stead of planting out, grow them along 

 during summer in 4-inch pots, ripening 

 them off by the middle of September and 

 resting till time to force. 



Roses for Pot Forcing. 



The time is approaching for lifting 

 hybrid perpetual roses and Eamblers 

 from the ground for Easter and spring 

 blooming plants. We heard the other 

 day from one of the most intelligent gen- 

 tlemen who travel that a famous Phila- 

 delphia grower of fine plants grows his 

 Crimson Eamblers one year in the ground 

 and the following spring lifts them and 

 grows them through the summer in pots 

 and forces them the following winter. 

 This is indisputably the safest and surest 

 way to get a well-flowered plant, and I 

 have advocated that method often. But 

 this famous grower of fine plants, if he 

 docs it now, did not do it so a few years 

 ago, for we saw his plants coming into 

 the shed from the field about the 10th 

 of November. The majority of growers 

 lift tlmm in November and force them 

 that winter and many are very success- 

 ful. The critical time with the Rambler 

 grown in this way is the short period of 

 two months or less between lifting and 

 starting into growth in January, because 

 you do not cut down the Ramblers. You 

 lift them with more or less loss of roots, 

 but leave on all the growth to be sup- 

 ported by an entirely inactive root. With 

 the hybrid perpetuate it is somewhat dif- 

 ferent. Those you cut down severely 

 when brought in to force ; still they often 

 break poorly and weakly through the loss 

 of active roots and the drying out which 

 more or less occurs with the greatest care. 

 Lifting, Potting and Storing. 



It is a great advantage if you have 

 these roses on your own place, for then 



