u 



HORTICULTURE 



January 4, 1913 



Seed Trade 



A Seed Trade Bomb. 



A time honored custom of the 

 American people has teea to pay five 

 cents a paclsage for their seeds, flower 

 or vegetable. Of course, we would 

 once in a while see the "fire sale" 

 wagon on the street— ten for a penny! 

 But five cents has been the standard. 

 Now then— five cents is too low but 

 what we want to discuss now is an en- 

 tirely new phase of the matter— in- 

 jected into the arena by Burpee. We 

 have felt for many years that twenty- 

 five cents ought to be the standard for 

 packets, instead of five cents, but here 

 comes Burpee with a school-children's 

 proposition at half of five cents— In 

 hundred lots. 



The idea is so revolutionary tl at we 

 hesitate to talk about it— outside of 

 seed trade circles, where matters Of 

 that kind would be understood. Nev- 

 ertheless there are some potentia itiea 

 about this that appeal to the idealist 

 and the prophet— things that suggest 

 future possibilities and HORTICLL- 

 TURE is so broad and its readers so 

 catholic that this seems a proper p!ace 

 to analyze it. 



For one thing: There is nothing 

 more fundamental than the kid. Get 

 the young idea a-budding and tl row 

 your manna around. Long after \ou 

 and I and Burpee are gathered to our 

 fathers, these notions about interest- 

 ing the kids will be bearing fruit and to 

 this new altruistic insi)iration (o give 

 the school children seeds at one-fourth 

 their value, I as a business man, ob- 

 ject. It will demoralize values. Val- 

 ues are far too low now without mak- 

 ing them worse. Abroad, they fet a 

 shilling (twenty-five cents) for what 

 our seedsmen sell for one-fifth (five 

 centsjwhich is ridiculous considering 

 the relative cost of other commodities 

 here and abroad. Our American tour- 

 ists expect to purchase goods at Just 

 about one-half American prices, and 

 that's pretty near about what they do 

 pay. But if our American tourist 

 starts in to buy seeds on the other side 

 he pays — not half of the American 

 price but five times the American 

 price, and this because the people in 

 Europe have a keener Idea of the value 

 of the seedsman's business in ss'ect- 

 ing and reselecting and cleaning and 

 polishing and charging according to 

 the labor and brains put on it! We 

 American seedsmen are doing the 

 same — if not better and brainier — 

 work and are not getting a quarter of 

 what we are entitled to. Orr every 

 five cent package is twenty-five cents 

 on the other side— ergo if "a dollar 

 equals a shilling," for every packet we 

 now sell for five cents we ought to get 

 a dollar. Now go ahead and thresh it 

 out. There's my case! 



G. C, WATSON. 



Notes. 

 Mechanicsburg. 0. — The J. E. Wing 

 & Bros. Seed Co. will hereafter be 

 known as the Wing Seed Co. 



Minneapolis, Minn. — The Albert 

 Dickinson Co., seedsmen, were dam- 

 aged to the extent of about $75,000 in 

 a large fire on December 20. 



New Crop Florist's Flower Seeds 



VERB£NA Tr. Pkt. Oz. 



Mammoth Fancy Blae 30 $1.25 



Pink 30 1.25 



Scarlet 30 1.25 



Striped 30 1.25 



" Wblt« 30 1.25 



" " Mixed 30 1.00 



SALVIA 



Michell's Scarlet Glow 50 4.00 



BonBre 40 2.00 



Zurich 50 4.00 



Splendens 25 1.25 



King of Carpets 50 3.00 



BEGONIA 



Vernon 25 2.50 



Gracilis Laminosa 40 



" Prima Donna 50 



Kosea 30 



.Vlha 30 



CENTAUREA 



Gymnocarpa 1000 seeds, 15c. .40 



Candidissinia 1000 seeds. 30c. .75 



LOBELIA _ 



Crystal Palace Compacta 30 1-25 



Barnard's Perpetual $.25 $1.00 



Crystal Palace Speciosa 15 .50 



PETUNIA ^Jt'/kt. 



MicheU's MoDBtrosue $.00 $1.00 



California Giants 30 .50 



Grandiflora Fringed 30 



Dwarf Inimitable.^ 30 



Snowball 



PHLOX DRUMMOhD II 



Tr. Pkt. 



Dwarf Crimson with Eye $.40 $1.75 



Fireball 40 1.75 



Pink ...^ 40 1.75 



SnowbaU 40 1.75 



Mixed 40 1.25 



PYRETHRUM 



Aureuni 10 



THUNBERGIA 



Wtiite with Dark Eye 15 



Buff with Dark Eye 15 



Orange with Dark Eye 15 



Mixed 15 



ASPARAGUS 



Plumosus Nanus (Greenhouse Grown) 



100 seeds, .5lic. : $3.75 per 1000 seeds; 

 5000 seeds, $18.00; $»4.00 per 10,000 

 seeds. 



.50 

 .50 

 .30 



Oz. 



.25 



.60 

 .60 

 .60 

 .50 



Send for our Flower Seed Order Sheet. It's very handy to order your Flower 

 Seeds from this order sheet. 



HENRY F. MICHELL COMPANY 



518 Market Street Philadelphia, Pa. 



porary quarters expects to put up a 

 building next spring for his own use. 



Kcpartnieiit »f Agriiulturo wants to 

 kiiDW how to produce an odorless skunk, 

 s .rt of 1 pure food poleiat. Move to 

 lo:ive it to a rommittee composed of 

 •Wizard" Hurliank, Dr. Wiley, the man 

 wlio invpntod attar of rinses and any citi- 

 zens whose olfactories are not working.— 

 .New York Telegram. 



Firma H. H. Pein, Halstenbek, Ger- 

 many. — Wholesale Price List of Ever- 

 greens, Deciduous Trees and Fruit 

 Tree Stock. August Ilolker & Sons, 

 New York, are American agents for 

 this firm. 



Edwin Lonsdale, in a letter just re- 

 ceived, states that while some parts 

 of California, hoth north and south of 

 Floradalc. have had rains, that sec- 

 tion has had less than one-half inch 

 of rainfall since last March. They 

 now have an irrigating plant in opera- 

 tion, however, which, although not so 

 good as rain, is yet a most excellent 

 substitute. 



Samuel McGredy & Son, Porta- 

 down, Ireland. — Rose Catalogue. A 

 very handsome publication with plates 

 showing beautiful portraits of ten new 

 introductions in H. T. roses. Cover 

 in rich purple and gold embossed on 

 white. Blue ink used throughout the 

 contents. 



In the most disastrous fire that 

 Newport, R. I., has ever Ifnown, and in 

 which two lives were lost, on the 

 morning of December 29, the building 

 and stock of the George A. Weaver 

 Co., seed and agricultural supply deal- 

 ers, were totally destroyed. The fire 

 is believed to have been caused by 

 an explosion of gasoline. The heat 

 also broke the plate glass window of 

 Stewart Ritchie's florist store. 



M. Herb, Naples, Italy. — General 

 Catalogue of Seeds. Vegetable, flower, 

 grass, aquatic, conifer, palm and so 

 forth are all included in this extensive 

 list, which is given in three languages. 

 From the same establishment comes a 

 handsomely illustrated list of novel- 

 ties for 1913. 



The Vermont legislature is trying 

 Its hand at so-called "pure seed" legis- 

 lation. In October such a bill was 

 filed, which, if it passed, would have 

 made it impossible to sell or move a 

 pound of seed in Vermont, so utterly 

 impossible were the regulations. Upon 

 report of this bill to Vermont seeds- 

 men by counsel of the American Seed 

 Trade Association, this bill was quick- 

 ly killed in the committee. Now the 

 committee has filed another bill which 

 is a copy of the Maine law — decidedly 

 more fair, but yet requiring amend- 

 ments to make the bill, if enacted, 

 really workable. 



New Carlisle, O.— C. C. Vale, who 

 is conducting a seed business in tem- 



CATALOGUES RECEIVED. 

 Sluis & Groot, Enkhuizen, Holland. 

 — Advance Price List of Vegetable 

 Flower and Agricultural Seeds, A 

 very extensive list, wholesale prices 

 quoted up to cwt. on many items. 



Watkins & Simpson, Covent Garden, 

 London. Eng. — We have received three 

 publications from this firm — "Special 

 Offer of Flower Seeds." season 1913, 

 "Novelties in Vegetable and Flower 

 Seeds" and "A Souvenir of Our Gold 

 Medal Exhibit." The latter contains 

 eight plates photographed in natural 

 colors showing exhibits at Internation- 

 al Exhibition and views in the nurser- 

 ies at Feltham. 



Sutton & Sons, Reading, England. — 

 The annual catalogvie of this well- 

 known seed firm has just reached us. 

 It is a big volume of over two hun- 

 dred pages, bound in niauve and with 

 silver lettering and profusely illustra- 

 ted with half-tone cuts of remarkable 

 beauty which show up at their best 

 on the heavier paper used as com- 

 pared with our American catalogues, 

 .fudging from the evidences in the 

 higher class Rritish horticultiiral cata- 

 logues the art of plant and flower por- 

 traiture has reached a development 

 rarely attained by our American pho- 

 tographers. Special equipment and 

 plenty of experience are required to 

 secure the best results in this dis- 

 tinct class of work. 



