HORTICULTURE 



October 14, 1905 



HORTICULTURE 



AN ILLUSTRATED JOURNAL 

 DEVOTED TO THE 



FLORIST, PLANTSMAN, LANDSCAPE 



GARDENER AND KINDRED 



INTERESTS 



HORTICULTURE PUBLISHING CO. 



II HAMILTON PLACE, BOSTON, MASS. 



Telephone, Oxford 292, 



WM. J. STEWART. Editor and Manager. 



As a garden ornament and as a useful cut 

 Retarding flower for decorative purposes indoors, 

 the tlie hardy hydrangea holds an unassailable 



hydrangea position. To prolong its period of bloom- 

 ing, as Mr. Freeman claims to have suc- 

 ceeded in doing, by the simple process of "pinching 

 back," is to add materially to our garden attractions 

 and to the resources of the florist. The experiment is 

 one worthy of general attention. 



Our London letter in this number 

 The sportive gives interesting information regard- 

 dahiia ing another new race of dahlias which 



has been given the name of "paeony 

 flowered." The remarkable advances made in dahlia 

 production during the past few years are very evidently 

 but the beginning of a floral evolution such as has rare- 

 ly been recorded of any one genus, and we may confi- 

 dently look for still further exhibitions of friskiness 

 and a breaking out of sensational variations of form 

 and character hitherto unsuspected. It is evident that 

 the possibilities of dahlia development are as yet but 

 dimly surmised. 



The school children of Bochester, N. Y., 

 Fighting the ^^^^^.^ ^^^^^ enlisted in the work of com- 

 tussock |j.,^jjjg tussock moth, which has been in- 

 "'°^^ flicting fearful damage on the shade and 

 fruit trees of that section. Seven cents per quart is 

 the price paid the children, eacli quart containing about 

 400 egg masses. It is estimated that the $.500 appro- 

 priated by the park board for this purpose will pur- 

 chase 2,517,750 egg masses, representing, on an average 

 of 200 eggs to each mass, the enormous number of ap- 

 proximately 500,000,000 caterpillars destroyed at a 

 cost of $1.00 per million. "Wliere and how can a dollar 

 be spent more profitably? 



Imagine 3(53 colored plates with 



A boon to four shades of each color illus- 



cataiogue writers trated on each plate and the whole 



acruratoly described in English. 



French. German. Italiaii ;inil Spanish, and you will 



liave a faint idea of a long-sought boon to the catalogue 

 compilers. Tlie work is published by the Librarie Hor- 

 licole. 84 Eue de Grenelle, Paris, France, and costs, we 

 believe, something like ten dollars per copy. Chevreul, 

 Guichard, Saccardo, Warhurst, and other authorities 

 have been taken as the basis of accuracy in the names 

 and descriptions of the colors. Fourteen hundred dif- 

 ferent shades accurately named should be a help in get- 

 ting lists straight and horticultural writers will now 

 have no excuse for guessing at it. 



Perhaps it cannot be remedied but 

 Conflicting jt is much to be regretted that so 



exhibition dates many of the great fall exhibitions 

 all over the country are each year 

 crowded into the same dates. The time of maturing of 

 the chrysanthemums wliich form so essential a feature 

 of all these shows is, of course, the prime consideration 

 in arranging the dates and as the variation in flowering 

 period is not great as between different localities a cer- 

 tain amount of confliction and overlapping is unavoid- 

 able. But it occurs to us that some improvement is 

 possible, nevertheless, and that a conference committee 

 representing the various organizations under whose 

 auspices the exliibitions are given might be able to 

 formulate a series of dates that would, in some measure, 

 do away with the inconvenient conditions now existing. 

 It would be necessary for such a committee to meet at 

 least a year in advance of the events under considera- 

 tion. Certainly the exhibitors of novelties as well as 

 many others whose pleasure or profit is found in attend- 

 ing several of these widely separated shows in the same 

 year would be grateful if any improvement could be 

 made over the present situation. 



Surface indications disclose a crystal- 

 Exhibition ization of sentiment and effort in the 

 management clirection of the flower show, outside of 



the regularly equipped horticultural 

 bodies to which we have heretofore looked for the con- 

 duct of such affairs. The charge has often been made 

 that people engaged in commercial floriculture lack ap- 

 preciation of the great utility of floral exhibitions in 

 promoting their own prosperity. This may be true to 

 some extent, but we incline to the belief that the indif- 

 ference is largely due to misgivings born of the frequent 

 instances of financial failure with these enterprises 

 when engineered by bodies of florists. The management 

 of flower shows has been a fruitful theme- for discussion 

 for many years and repeatedly has the convittion been 

 forced upon us that florists are very poor showmen. To 

 properly advertise an exhibition and push it through to 

 a successful outcome, from the treasurer's point of view, 

 calls for the services of men well versed in the art of 

 coaxing the public to open its pocketbook and thorough- 

 ly experienced in the business of the box office. It is. 

 therefore, a very hopeful sign that men with these quali- 

 fications arc being called in to help make the flower 

 shows the success financially that they are acknowledged 

 to be from a cultural standpoint. Assurance that this 

 will ho done and that (he public interest is to be aroused 

 will do much to induce co-oporntinn in quarters where 

 tlic ctT.n-t to do so has Inlbcrto hccn fruitless. 



