For September, 1922 



257 



Any gloxinias, tuberous-rooted begonias, achimenes, 

 fancy leafed caladiums that are going to rest, dry off 

 gradually and when the foliage is gone they may be placed 

 in a dry position where the temperature does not fall much 

 below sixty degrees. We have seen many of them lost 

 by trying to rest them in a cool temperature. Plants in 

 flower just now are gloxinias, allamandas, flowering 

 anthuriums. Pancratium fragrans. dipladenias. Clcrodcu- 

 droii Balfouri, Eucharis arnazonica. 



This is the best time of the year to secure soil f(ir 

 potting. Get a good tough sod from an upland pasture 

 and stack it up with layers of cow manure in between, 

 also adding a good sprinkle of bone meal. We think it 

 is better not to add lime to the compost heap as when une 

 comes to use the soil, many greenhouse plants of a hard- 

 wood nature do not like it. Lime may be added when 

 mixing for potting when the plants require it. 



As the cool nights arrive, the roses will need stimulat- 

 ing. We give a slight topdressing once a week using al- 

 ternately bone meal, goat manure. Clay's fertilizer, tankage 

 and dried blood. Cow manure we think is better used in 

 a liquid form. If put on the rose bed as it comes from 

 the liarn it is apt to make a soft growth, the leaves then 

 becoming more subject to black spot and mildew. 



I'~inish potting any of the late fruiting pot fruit trees. 

 Grapes will now be ripening fast and plenty of air is in 

 order. I\eep the atmosjjhere as dry as possible. The 

 principal thing now will be to get them in a condition to 

 keep as long as possible and I think hanging on the vine 

 is the best place for them. If cut and put in the fruit 

 room in bottles with water in them, we think thev lose a 

 good deal of their flavor. 



Look carefully after the strawberry plants intended for 

 forcing next Winter. Xow is the time when a good 

 crown is built up by careful watering and feeding. 



Orchids from now on will need more careful watering. 

 Allow the compost to get quite drv before watering on 

 DenJrobiiim Phaliviiopsis and Caftlcya- labiafa. Dcn- 

 drobium nobilc will be finishing up their season's growth 

 and may be removed to a cool house and gradually dried 

 off ; also the Wardianums as soon as growth is com- 

 pleted. Phalccnopsis must also be more carefully watered, 

 and look out for slugs or they will soon destroy the 

 leaves and any flower spike that may be pushing up. 



Give the calanthes plenty of room and feed them well 

 as they are finishing up their bulbs, and begin to develop 

 the flower spike. 



Look out for sudden changes in the temperature. On 

 raw cool nights fires will be in order. 



THINGS AND THOUGHTS OF THE GARDEN 



(Coiitiiiiicil from page 252) 

 markets while gladioli, dahlias and asters have gone a 

 begging, perhaps because buyers realize that they are 

 everlastings. Statices particularly are coming into their 

 own each year. These charming flowers have an im- 

 mense sale abroad and the number of bunches sold in 

 Covent Garden IMarket is almost unbelievable. While a 

 fair number of the hairy Sfaticc lafifolia are included, the 

 majority are of the annual varieties like BondiiclU, yellow, 

 and the mauve, white and primrose colored forms of 

 s'wuata. S. Sirworroz^i succeeds much better in pots than 

 outdoors and can be flowered from Christmas until the 

 end of June, by starting seeds at intervals. It makes a 

 very nice pot plant and is of remarkably easy culture in 

 a cool house. There is a white as well as a colored form 

 of this statice, which is a native of Western Turkestan. 

 S. profitsnm, a greenhouse hybrid is a sub-shrub, some- 

 times seen 3 to 4 feet high and S to 6 feet across when 

 grown into specimen size abroad, this is blue-purple m 



color, with a yellowish corolla. The grand specimens of 

 this variety will be very well remembered by many mem- 

 bers of the craft. 



I read with^much interest in one of our English con- 

 temporary magazines of the fortnightly meeting and ex- 

 hibition of the Royal Horticultural Society in London on 

 August 9, these meetings always bring out numerous ex- 

 hibits and are largeU' attended by the garden loving pub- 

 lic. I was more especially interested in the bestowal of an 

 awar'l of merit to what is described as "an elegant-lady 

 fern, has pale green arching fronds which are crested at 

 the apex, and also at the end of each of the pinnK." The 

 plant thus described was shown by Amos Perry, a noted 

 hardy plantsman under the name of Athyrium filix-fccm- 

 hia angnstatuui uiediodccipicns corymbifenim. . The Brit- 

 ish ferns are a most interesting class, but years ago when 

 helping to handle a large collection, I was always glad that 

 Latin had been included in my school curriculum, yet 

 nowadays students in college horticultural courses are not 

 asked to take Latin at all, or have a choice of French or 

 German. A knowledge of the several ancient and mod- 

 ern languages may not be necessary to make a man a suc- 

 cessful gardener, and one who can produce good plants, 

 but I have always insisted that it would be a great asset 

 for a young man planning to follow floriculture or the 

 broader field of horticulture as a profession to acquire a 

 knowledge of Latin, as it would be of inestimable value to 

 him in pronouncing and knowing the meaning of plant 

 names. Xext to a command of English I would place 

 Latin as the most valuable language for a gardener to 

 have a fair knowledge of. 



HOW OUR WILD FLOWERS CAN BE 

 PRESERVED 



THE ultimate fate of the varieties of wild-flowers 

 which are threatened with extermination lies with 

 the motorists. Other causes combine to hasten this process 

 near the centers of population, including the picking by 

 school children and holiday makers ; but the motorist alone 

 goes far afield to the natural reservoirs where enough 

 seeds might still be grown and disseminated to counteract 

 the diminution of the supply near the cities. In the remoter 

 country districts the flowers are in small danger of be- 

 ing intensively picked by the rural population. But the 

 motors bring countless pickers, of every grade of science, 

 eager to seize every rarity they see. The complete dis- 

 appearance of conspicuous varieties from the more trav- 

 eled highways is proof sufficient of the crying need of 

 a better understanding of conditions by the motorists. 

 There are flowers to be picked and others not to be 

 lacked, and only study can differentiate between them. 

 .Another reason for the disappearance of some of the 

 favorite American plants from the haunts where they 

 used to be most plentiful is the use of great quantities 

 of evergreen species for winter decoration, especially at 

 Christmas time. The picking of the Christmas fern and 

 of ground pine is on a very large scale in many places, 

 but most harmful of all is the unrestricted winter picking 

 of laurel. Laurel makes its leaf growth after flowering 

 in June, so that picking the flower branches is onlv 

 temporarily harmful, if it is not done on too wholesale 

 a scale. When one realizes the twenty years' growth of 

 a laurel plant is used in every yard of laurel rope one ap- 

 preciates the destruction caused by the Christmas church 

 decorations. There are plenty of excellent substitutes. 

 Beautiful decorative effects are possible with pine 

 branches. 



