312 



GARDENING. 



July /, 



ous shades of red and purple, also white. 

 Nicholson gives very elaborate directions 

 for their culture, but they succeed finely 

 with me treated simply as above. 

 Berg n Co., N. J. "L. C L Jokd.vn. 



THE CfllNESE PRIMROSE SEEDS WERE GOOD. 



Early last March I piircluiscd from a 

 reliable seedsman of .Allegheny a number 

 of packages of various kinds of feeds, 

 among others Pn'muIaChinensis (mi.xed). 

 Everv precaution wasused in sowing and 

 vi-ate'ring these seeds, and when 1 had 

 waited about five weeks I reported to 

 the seedsman that while all the other 

 seeds were doing nicely the Chinese 

 ])rimula failed to germinate As I am 

 well aware that sseeds are not sold under 

 any guarantee 1 made no claim, but 

 merely mentioned the fact which 1 believed 

 to be true, that the seeds were bad. 



The seedsman told me that some people 

 were more lucky than others ( I don't 

 believe in luck), but he knew the seed was 

 p< od, and probably more out of courtesy 

 than anything else he gave me another 

 package.' About two weeks after sowing 

 the second lot of seed in I noticed the first 

 beginning to come up. I believe that 

 now every seed in the first and second 

 ])ackages has germinated, and as I wrote 

 to the seedsman, "I have primulas to 

 burn." I offered to pay for the second 

 package, but the seedsman refused to 

 accept payment and said he preferred a 

 satisfied customer. 



I merely write this to warn other 

 amateurs about condemning seeds that 

 are good. 1 hope I have learned my 

 lesson thoroughly from this experience. 



New Brighton.'Pa. K. M.wek. 



fl NEW FERN 



(Lomaria gihha hlechnoides). 



The photograph of these ferns was 

 taken when the new plant was about 18 

 months old from the spores. This fern is 

 a bi generic hybrid, a cross between 

 Blechnum Braziliense and Lomaria gihha; 

 in appearance it somewhat resembles 

 Lomaria gihha platyptera but is more 

 robust than that variety; and further it 

 differs from that variety in that it comes 

 freely from spores. Amongst seedlings 

 which I have raised from it, are two vari- 

 ties, one having green fronds, the others 

 coming red like the young fronds of the 

 Blechnum referred to. 



The trouble I had in finding out 

 whether the plant was really new or not 

 convinced me of the need there is in this 

 country ot a national horticultural soci- 

 ety where all questions in regard to no- 

 menclature of plants could be settled. I 

 am well aware of the work done by the 

 S. A. F., but that is merely a trade organ- 

 ization, and of course can not be expected 

 to do the work that a national society 

 could do. To return to my subject I 

 took a plant of my fern (expecting to find 

 a name for it) to the Mass. Hort. Soci- 

 ety's annual exhibition in 1893, and was 

 awarded a gratuity for it, but gained no 

 information as to whether the plant itself 

 was new or not. Again last fall I exhib- 

 ited a plant of it at our local Hort. soci- 

 ety's exhibition, and was awarded a 

 silver medal for it, as a new plant. Mv 

 next move was to exhibit plants of it at 

 the New York Florists' Club exhibition 

 at Madison Square Garden on Thanks- 

 giving, where it was awarded a first-clas.s 

 certificate as a new plant. 



At the instance of a friend I sent a plant 

 of it to Prof. Baker, Kew Gardens, Lon- 

 don, Eng. His answer was published in 

 the Gardeners" Chr.onicle Dec. 21st, 'O.^, 

 and was as follows: "The characters 



agree with a plant in Herb. Kew from 

 Herbarium I. Moore marked Lomaria 

 gibba, crossed with Blechnum Brasiliense, 

 Royal Horticultural Society's Garden, 

 Chiswick,1876." Inthele terof acknowl- 

 edgement which I received signed by the 

 director, the name there given is Lomaria 

 gibba var. hlechnoides. 



Alexa.nder MacLell.\n. 

 Newport, R. I. 



TAB SWORD FERN 



[Sepbrolepis). 



I have a fine sword fern, some of whose 

 gracefully curving fronds measure forty 

 inches in length. What treatment must 

 I give it this summer to insure as great 

 success this coming winter, the plant is 

 but two years old, is in an 8-inch pot and 

 1 have removed fifteen young plants from 

 it during last winter. Speaking from ray 

 own experience it requires an abundance 

 of moisture and light but no sun and a 

 cool room, but will it do as well in the 

 summer without rest? F. S. A. 



Hammond, Ind. 



Ans. Judging from the success that 

 you already have had we would advise 

 you to keep on with the culture that you 

 have been practicing. The sword ferns 

 are evergreen species and need no rest 

 apart from that induced by the natural 

 c joler temperature of winter even in the 

 house or greenhouse. But remember they 

 won't stand frost. 



VIOLETS IN POTS FOR SPRING. 



If your correspondent W. S., Otis, Ind., 

 will work up a stock of the Canadensis 

 violet and its white variety, he may pot 

 it in late summer, and keep it in frames— 

 or out either 1 fancy— but plunged. It is 

 only little inferior in size or fragrance, 

 and much the hardiest sweet violet. Here 

 and south and north to the lake it is 

 hardy and sweet and good enough. Some 

 florist of this city sold a lot of it it pots 

 this spring. It is also a capital edgingfor 

 herbaceous beds, mixed withchionodoxas 

 or other small bulbs My boys gathered 

 flowers of this species on a lawn here at 

 Christmas, more than once, and in quan- 

 tity in 1890 or 1891. 



Trenton, N. J. J.\mes M.\cPherso.n. 



[The violet you refer to cannot be Cana- 

 densis because itisatall, jointed stemmed 

 branched species with small white or 

 tinged purple (newer blue) flowers, that 

 are not fragrant; the plant grows from 

 one to two feet high and is a common 

 native in our rich woods. No doubt the 

 violet you mean is the run-wild form of 

 the European I7o/a odorata, both blue- 

 and white flowered forms of it of low- 

 growing spreading habit, have natural 

 ized themselves verv abundantly in some 

 places ] 



Crinum Kirkii .\nd C. or.s'mt.m — 0. 

 H., Two Rivers. Wis., writes: "Kindly 

 tell me how to treat Crinum Kirkii and 

 ornatum. Is it best to keep them in the 

 house, or plant them out? If I put them 

 out shall I sink the pots, or plant them 

 in the ground? If planted otit should the 

 bulbs be covered, or left partly out of the 

 ground? What shall I do with them 

 during the winter? 



/Ifjs.— Turn the plant out of its pot, 

 and i)lant it out into your garden, giving 

 it a place protected from the winds and 

 scorching sunshine, and let the ground be 

 deeply worked, — an east-facing border 

 would be an admirable place for it. If 

 the soil is deep and sandy cr gravelly or 

 even a well drained loam plgnt the bulbs 



deep enough that the earth may about 

 cover its neck, but if of a retentive or 

 clayey nature plant the bulb about twice 

 as deep as it is now in the pot. Lift 

 them in September or October and kecj) 

 them dry as you would a gladiolus. 



Miscellaneous. 



BIRDS IN TflE GARDEN. 



Just what birds will make their homes 

 in our garden, or even pay us oass-ing 

 visits will depend upon several obvious 

 circjmstances. The size of our ground; 

 the nmbir of trees and shrubs in it; 

 whether it is watered by pond or stream; 

 the location— whether in town or in a 

 thinly inhabited situation, are all gov- 

 erning factors. Certainly no garden 

 will be entirely destitute of birds. 



For many summers past the writer has 

 spent manv weeks at the country place 

 of a friend' in New Rochelle, N. Y., but 

 well away from village limits. The estate 

 has a c nsiderable frontage on Long 

 Island Sound, and is an ideal place for 

 birds. Every bird that flies, almost had 

 it been said, may be seen here, if not 

 breeding, during migration. And the 

 astonishing circumstance is that the 

 owner of this bird-paradise has not, or, 

 until the fact was pointed out, did not 

 have a suspicion that birds, other than 

 the commonest varieties, abounrted upon 

 the premises. But the bird-student here 

 may see crows, snipe, plover, ducks, heron 

 and gulls— these on or about the shore, 

 and, of course, at varying times of year. 

 In spring and fall, among the trees and 

 shrubbery, he will study the sparrows of 

 Boreal breeding habits, the fly catchers 

 and those elusive and often baflling little 

 beauties the wood warblers. .411 summer 

 long he will renew acquaintance with 

 bluebird, song sparrow, ovenbird, cat- 

 bird, bluejay, clape, bobolink, American 

 goldfinch, vesper sparrow, wood pewee, 

 house wren, chipping sparrow, wood 

 thrush, vireo (the red-eyed, the white- 

 eyed and the solitary), oriole (the orchard 

 and the Baltimore), of course robins and 

 so many others that this column would 

 seem but a check-list were they fully enu- 

 merated. And most of these birds actu- 

 ally nest upon the place. 



In winter he will surprise chicadees, nut- 

 hatches, horned larks and purple finches 

 industriously searching trunk, branch 

 and thicket for food, and anon harried 

 by that bold raider from the North, the 

 butcher bird, whose shambles,— a thorn 

 or jagged branch impaling the half'corl- 

 sumed body of the victim of a successful 

 foray,— he may occasionally find. 



To one accustomed to notice birds, it 

 seems, as before intimated, extraordinarj' 

 that such exuberance of bird life should 

 be at hand and, at the same time unsus- 

 pected. The writer's influence is, inde d, 

 ertectual to arouse passing interest. His 

 insistant summons musters the family *o 

 witness an unusual assemblage of gold- 

 finches clinging to sun-flower disks and 

 feeding upon the seeds, singing the while 

 as sweetly as canaries, with a song re- 

 calling theirs and scarcely less brilliant; 

 to look upon a wonderful spectacle occa- 

 sioned by swallows, as, in numbers im- 

 possible to count, they hawked amid a 

 cloud of gnats that hovered low over an 

 orchard, and where the wonder was that 

 flight so swift and tortuous could be 

 maintained without collision; to admire 

 the cunning workmanship of the vireo's 

 cup, cleverly suspended in the fork of a 

 slender branch; to be surprised by the unex- 



