i885.| 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



II 



anew, and it should be an especial care that the 

 new plants should be wholly free from the insect. 

 Their presence can be readily detected by a strong 

 pocket lens, which should be always present in a 

 gardener's pocket, as well as a pocket knife or a 

 pencil. The presence of the insect can then be 

 readily detected on the main roots by a granular 

 smutty surface which is really the excrement of 

 the minute insect, or the decaying tissue caused 

 by the insect work — or there may be small galls, 

 too minute to be seen by the naked eye on the 

 annual fibres. It is the great fault of cultivators. 



that the roots of theirplants are seldom examined ; 

 indeed the majority of plant cultivators are wholly 

 ignorant of roots, their nature and requirements. 

 The discolored leaves come from a fungus 

 which works beneath the surface of the leaves, 

 and cannot be reached by any external application. 

 In our opinion it is not one of those which attack 

 healthy vegetation, but only those, the vitality of 

 which have been already somewhat impaired. 

 Quite likely the leaves are from the plants which 

 have been already weakened by the root fungus 

 above alluded to. — Ed. G. M.l 



Fruit and Vegetable Gardening. 



SEASONABLE HINTS. 



The writer of this was invited recently to look at 

 agarden where, in the proprietor's language, " bad 

 luck" prevailed. His ornamental trees, that had 

 been "pounded in" when planted, died for all, 

 and his fruit trees, both of "large" and " small " 

 fruits, were a general failure. The gardener was 

 a remarkably industrious man ; and he had the 

 happy faculty of knowing how to keep everything 

 clean and neat around him, and he was a great 

 favorite with his employer, as he deserved to be. 

 But the best of us have a weakness, and his was, 

 that as he had " served his time " in the famous 

 gardens of Sir Bountiful Buncombe, of Buncombe 

 Hall, he thought he " knew his business," and, to 

 use a favorite expression of his, it was "'tarnal non- 

 sense" to suggest that there was anything to learn 

 from a book or a magazine. 



Walking with the proprietor through his remark- 

 ably neat and well-kept garden and orchard, the 

 first complaint was, that the standard pears all lost 

 their leaves early in the summer, and on the leaf- 

 less trees the fruit did not ripen, notwithstanding 

 the good culture given by the gardener. The trees 

 were dug under carefully and manure applied, but 

 the conclusion came to was that the wrong sorts had 

 been chosen. We ventured to point to a few large 

 and healthy trees in a neighbor's fence corner, 

 but had only for reply that the owner of that place 

 was wholly ignorant of good gardening. The 

 next trouble was with the dwarf pears ; they grew 

 amazingly, and flowered every spring profusely — 



white as a snow bank with blossoms — but " a late 

 frost or something " always destroyed them. The 

 trees were carefully summer pruned, and growing 

 shoots were cut back like osier blocks to the 

 stumps from which they sprung. We started to 

 say something about the influence of pruning on 

 j the vital forces, and the connection of the vital 

 i forces in starting the young fruit ; but were cut 

 short by the information that in Sir Bountiful's 

 garden the great effort was to ge^ all the spurs 

 possible on a pear tree, and we could not have 

 spurs without frequent prunings. The apple or- 

 chard had been planted little more than fifteen 

 years, but were commencing to die from some 

 unaccountable reason. They had been remark- 

 ably well cultivated, and cared for; had grown 

 well, fine leaves, borne remarkably good crops of 

 fine fruit ; but the trouble now was that the fruit 

 easily rotted, the leaves in summer were golden 

 and had powder all over them, and. the short 

 branches died back to the main wood. It was 

 thought that the manure used was "too rank" and 

 induced late growth. Sure enough there was an 

 apple tree of much older growth in his stable 

 yard, right in the midst of the rank manure, to 

 which we called attention, but that was merely 

 "some hardy kind that would stand any bad treat- 

 ment." The grapes rotted, mildewed, and we 

 don't know what, all for want of "proper selection 

 of kinds adapted to the locality ;" but again a 

 grand vine with a stem as thick as one's arm, and 

 also growing out at the end of the manure pile 

 and covering hundreds of square feet of wall, 



