■i8g6. 



GARDENING. 



i8i 



ill order to induce early ripening of wood. 

 Mr. Simmons, superintendent of Grace- 

 land Cemetery, Chicago, states that this 

 species is hardy with him. His soil is 

 ^-atidv, hence the drainage perfect. 



W. C. EOAN. 



FERTILIZER FOR OLD SflRUBBERy. 



J. I). H., Chicago, writes: "What is a 

 good fertilizer forold snowballs and other 

 shrubbery which have been planted 

 thirty-five years and show a want of 

 some stimulants? 1 have available hard 

 wood ashes, ground bone and horse and 

 cow manure." 



/177S. First of all go into that shrub- 

 bery and thin it, if that is necessary, cut- 

 ting out all the dead and sickly I)ranehes 

 and stems, and head back the long naked 

 ones, say hall their length. This will 

 spoil a good deal of this 3-ear's flowering 

 shoots, but one cannot help that. Gather 

 up and rake out all the prunings and cart 

 them away and burn them; this will 

 leave the shrubbery beds all nice and 

 clean and ready for fertilizing. Now sow 

 wood ashes broadcast over all the sur- 

 face, say a quarter of an inch thick, and 

 rake it in with a longtined, new steel 

 rake. Then mi.x the horse and cow ma- 

 nure together, using more of the latter if 

 possible, and spread a solid carpet of it, 

 4- to 5 inches deep all over the shrubbery 

 bed, leaving it there over summer. If you 

 had some fresh field loam mi.xed with the 

 manure before applying the dressing, the 

 compost would be much better. It will 

 act as a mulch in summer as well as a 

 substantial fertilizer. Don't dig shrub- 

 bery beds that are a living mass of roots; 

 it is well enough to fork the empty spaces 

 betw'een the shrubs, and little more than 

 scarify the general surface to make it per- 

 vious to air and water. Feed the ground 

 from the top and reoeat the dressing an- 

 other year. Ground bone is excellent, too, 

 but had better be scarified into the soil; 

 half as much as of ashes woulcf be a fair 

 dressing, but the ashes and manure are 

 enough to put one at one time. 



fl DOUBLE-FLOWERED FINK SFIRflEfl. 



C. S. H., Higganum, Conn., writes: In 

 a bouquet at the cemetery I saw some 

 branches of a double pink spirjeathat ap- 

 peared to be almost identical with the 

 double Spirxa Reeresi, excepting in color, 

 which was a very pretty shade of pink. 

 Can \'Ou tell me what it is? 



Ans. There is no pink spiraea answer- 

 ing that description, so far as we know 

 —and we know most of them that are 

 worth growing. We are inclined to think 

 it must have been a spray of the double 

 I)ink hawthorn, whose flowers much re- 

 semble those of the double Reeves's 

 spirjea, and are in bloom about the 

 same time, say about Decoration Day. 

 rity you couldn't send us a little bit- 

 even a leaf or a tip of a branch would 

 help us to tell what it is. 



.\.SDROMEDAS,are they poisonous to the 

 touch? asks one of your correspondents, 

 l)agcl4r). We have handled a great many 

 thousands of Andromeda Mariana, A 

 niccmosa and A. ligustrina, and also col- 

 lected seeds from them and never per- 

 ceived any ill efleets from it, but it is quite 

 common to find poison ivy (Rhus toxico- 

 dendron) growing with such shrubs, and 

 occasionally some of our men get badlj' 

 lioisoned by that. Wm. I!.\ssi-;tt. 



New Jersey. 



Jatan Mapi.ks i-rom Seed.— O. G. R. 

 asks: "Can I grow these from seed, and 



Yes, easily. You know maple seeds of 

 any kind, if kept dry, retain their vitality 

 only a short time, and this necessitates 

 that they he sown as soon as ripe; or if 

 the seeds are to be kept from fall to spring 

 keep them over winter in sand or earth. 

 As soon as the seeds are ripe or received 

 from elsewhere sow them broadcast in a 

 cold frame, covering thinlv, and shade 

 with lath-shading. Our good friend, Mr. 

 Trumpy, raises thousands of Japanese 

 maples in this way. 



The Greenhouse. 



GREENHOUSE VINES. 



One of our readers who has been much 

 interested in our recent articles on this 

 subject writes: "We have a city palm 

 house built upon an upper story and all 

 our climbers must be grown in pots or 

 boxes. The enclosed list embraces all the 

 vines mentioned in the articles referred 

 to." 



Ans. AUamandanobilis,grandmoraa.nd 

 ScAot^y/ are first-rate woody vines and all 

 do well in pots; indeed they can be better 

 handled in pots than when planted out, 

 by drying and resting them at will, and 

 having them in a flush of growth and 

 bloom when we will. 



Aristolochia elegans, ornithoceplialn 

 and Sturtevantii do well in pots. 



Bougainvillea glabra, speciosa, and 

 spectabilis are fine pot plants, and as in 

 the case of allamandas can be humored 

 better in pots than when planted out. 



Bignonia venusta and B. Chamberlavvii 

 do well enough in oots or boxes, and" be- 

 cause of their floral advantages, should 

 not be omitted, but they do better when 

 planted out. 



Cerejjs triangularis does fine in a pot. 



Clerodendron Balfourii is an excellent 

 pot plant. If you ever visited any of the 

 great summer exhibitions of the Roval 

 Hort. Society of England, you must have 

 noticed that this is most always one of 

 the chief specimen plants in bloom, and 

 pot grown. 



Ipomcea Horsfallias, Thompsoni, and 

 i>an are good either in pots or planted 

 out, with growth and blooms in propor- 

 tion to their root room. 



Nepenthes distillatoria, as a plant onlv; 



Passiflora racemosa, either in a pot, 

 box, or planted out; if planted out it 

 makes more growth and has more blooms. 



Qujsqualis indica, grow it in a box. 



Stigmaphyllon ciliatum does well in a 

 box. 



Thunhergia laurifolia an 1 T. Harrisii 

 are two names for one plant, the proper 

 one being laurifolia. It does well in a 

 pot or box, but grows and blooms more 

 when planted out. 



Ihihrothamnus (properly Cestrum) 

 Newelli grows fine in a box, 'and good in 

 a pot. 



Clematis indivisa, probablv better in a 

 pot or box than planted out." 



Displadenia hybrida in a pot. Lovely 

 flowers, but sometimes very refractorv as 

 regards growing well. 



Rhynchospermum jasminoides does 

 very well in a pot or box. 



Tacsonia Van Volxenii may be grown 

 in a pot or box with fair results, but to 

 have it in all its glory it should be planted 

 out. 



Lapageria rosea, grow it in a pot oi' 

 box. 



Pilogync saavis, we don't reconmiend 

 it for this purjiose. 



Tecomas mentioned are fine but we do 

 not recommend them for a palm house. 



Lonicera fachsioides, not for a hothouse. 

 It is hardy. 



Gelsemium sempervirens, gooi for a 

 cool house, but not for a palm house. 

 Still at John L. Gardener's near Boston, 

 there is a small greenhouse pretty well 

 filled with this sweet little vine. It live.s 

 fairly well out of doors at Dosoris. 



Hexacentris coccinea, IpomoEa Bron- 

 soni, Mandevillea siiaveolens, Myrsiphyl- 

 him asparagoides (greenhouse smilax), 

 and Solamim Seaforthianum are very 

 pretty in their way, but not such vines as 

 we would advise you to plant in a palm 

 house. The Cardiospernmm hirsutum 

 and Vitis heterophylla humilifolia are 

 hardy and not at all adapted for your 

 purpose. 



FflNCy-LEflVED CflLftDIUMS. 



I see A. Blanc & Co. advertising to 

 furnish the readers of Gardening five 

 fancy ealadiums for 50 cents. Where can 

 I raise them best? If in the flower garden 

 in the sun or partial shade from houses, 

 or on the banks of my lily pond, and here 

 in sun or shade froni a large oak tree? 

 Where and how keep the roots in winter? 

 H'in cellar in dirt or hung up dry like 

 crinums? l[ <_;_ 



Get them. They love warmth, partial 

 shade, and protection from winds. When 

 received put them into small pots, one 

 tuber in each. Keep them in a moderately 

 warm place, give no more water than to 

 keep the soil slightly moist, and avoid 

 rushing them into growth. When they 

 begin to grow give them more light, 

 more ventilation and a little more water. 

 After inuring gradually to outside tem- 

 perature plant them out in a sheltered, 

 slightly shaded place where the ground is 

 somewhat moist in your flower garden; 

 or repot them and grow them in pots on 

 the shady side of the piazza or outside 

 where you may have Rex begonias. As 

 regards by the side of the pond, that isan 

 experiment, and if the soil is not too cold 

 and wet we would expect them to do well 

 there, on the shady side ofthe oak. Much 

 depends upon the strength of the plant 

 and the variety; the finer bred kinds with 

 highly colored, pellucid, almost greenless 

 leaves are not well adapted for roughing 

 it, but as they are quite expensive proba- 

 bly you won't get them. Winter them 

 dry, much as you would gloxinias, and in 

 a warmish rather than cold room. The 

 tubers increase in size and multiply in 

 quantity year alter year. Thev are a 

 good deal used as fine-foliaged po"t plants 

 in summer, also in the filling of windows 

 and veranda boxes. 



CflLflDlLIHS, FflNCy LEAVED. 



0. G. B., Frankfort Springs, Pa., asks: 

 ".■\re the fancy -leaved varieties suitable for 

 veranda step decorations, position facing 

 west, with no trees nearer than 60 feet, 

 and if so. how large will they grow with 

 fair care in such positions?" ' 



Ans. Some of the commoner varieties 

 such as Chantini, Bieolor splendens. 

 Napoleon III and Belleymei, may grow 

 well e ough there; it depends a good deal 

 on how they are brought up and the care 

 they receive. If potted so as to make all 

 of their growth out of doors, and they 

 get abundance of water thev can begro wii 

 there, but not to full size. Fancy eala- 

 diums, like Rex begonias, prefer thin 

 shade, if you give them this sav by the 

 shelter afforded from near-bv vines they 

 will grow fairly well. Up close by the 



