734 



HORTICULTURE 



June 9, 1906 



HORTICULTURE 



AN ILLUSTRATED JOURNAL 

 DEVOTED TO THE 



FLORIST, PLANTSMAN, LANDSCAPE 



GARDENER AND KINDRED 



INTERESTS 



HORTICULTURE PUBLISHING CO. 



II HAMILTON PLACE, BOSTON, MASS. 



Telephony Oxford 292 



WM. J. STEWART, Editor and Manager. 



Next week the Peony Society, the 

 The coming youngest of our special organizations, 

 peony show holds forth at Boston. It is expected 

 that the combined exhibition of this 

 and the Massachusetts Horticultural Society will be a 

 gorgeous affair, as befits the regal flower in the inter- 

 ests of which it is inaugurated. As a garden orna- 

 ment and as a florists' useful decorative flower the 

 peony stands in the first rank. Boston is always pleased 

 to welcome the craft — none more so than the peony 

 enthusiasts, who come at the season of the year when 

 her particular attractions are most in evidence. We 

 hope the crowd will be a big one. 



With the rapidly growing strength 

 Our advertisers an( j influence of the professional 

 have prospered horticultural press, the commercial 

 interests of the people they serve 

 have been extending and developing at a marvelous 

 rate. Florists and nurserymen have been brought into 

 touch with one another and the more progressive, tak- 

 ing advantage of their opportunity, are rapidly opening 

 up now and lucrative avenues for business. The reason 

 just closing has seen much the largest aggregate of 

 sales thus far in tin- country, of hardy plants, green- 

 house stock, bedding plant- — in fact, everything which 

 anybody has had the courage to advertise. Horticul- 

 ture is happy in the satisfaction of having been a par- 

 ticipant and rendered creditable service in the good 

 cause. It has the assurance of its advertisers to this 

 effect and that is sufficient. 



We feel a sincere sympathy with 

 Rhododendrons those of our horticultural friends 



who, by climate or soil or other 

 cause beyond their control, are denied the pleasure of 

 having and enjoying the rhododendrons which at the 



present time are the glory of the gardens about Boston 

 and along the Sound and elsewhere. The hardy rho- 

 dodendron, when in congenial quarters, is easily the 

 peer of any garden shrub. It bursts into bloom with 

 an exultant exuberance that but few plants can equal or 

 even approach and. when out of bloom, it is still beau- 

 tiful in its dark glossy evergreen foliage. Enterprising 

 nurserymen can confer no greater benefit than to follow 

 up and prove and gradually bring to the front a good 

 list of reliably hardy varieties in bright colors. Those 

 who are working to this end can depend upon an ample 

 public appreciation of every advance made. 



Attention has been called to the fact 

 The menace that, although our national government 

 of insects aas |',,|| power to control the introduc- 

 tion and spread of insects hurtful to 

 men or animals, it has no laws relative to those that 

 injuriously affect plant life, and yet the total value of 

 agricultural and forest products in the United States is 

 very many time- that of all the animals and products 

 therefrom. The losses annually from insect depreda- 

 tions are appalling anil yet Congress hesitates to take 

 action in the case of the gypsy moth and browntail moth 

 invasion — an invasion which those having the best 

 opportunity to know, can see means inestimable destruc- 

 tion unless something far beyond the ability of State or 

 individual is done, and done quickly, to check its 

 progress. It is plainly the duty of the national govern- 

 ment to aid in the work that is now being prosecuted 

 locally to prevent the further spread of these odious 

 pests ami. not only that, but to enact such laws as are 

 necessary to prevent as far as possible the importation 

 hereafter of injurious foreign insects. 



The communication from Mr. Fewkes on 

 Judges' another page of this issue will be carefully 

 problems rea d by all who are interested in horticul- 

 tural exhibitions and realize the trying 

 responsibilities under which the judges at these affairs 

 have to work. Any gardener with a spark of pride 

 about him would naturally prefer a certificate to a small 

 cash gratuity as a recognition of his exhibit. Yet it 

 must be kept in mind that the more liberal the distri- 

 bution of certificates the less their value and as soon as 

 it becomes apparent that they are being given out other 

 than for objects of unusual merit they will no longer be 

 considered worth striving for. It is the duty of 

 judges to guard jealously the issuance of these honors 

 so that their standard of value may be maintained. We 

 do not like to hear a competitor in the prize classes mak- 

 ing a fuss because he was not awarded the prize he 

 tie night he should have but we do believe it to be 

 entirely proper that the exhibitor of a novelty or other 

 object of especial excellence should request the judges 

 to state upon what grounds a certificate has been 

 bestowed or withheld and the judges should always be 

 able and willing to give reasons which will justify their 

 action in the eyes of reasonable people. 



