HORTICULTURE 



Vol. XXXI 



FEBRUARY 7, 1920 



No. 6 



THE TALK OF THE TRADE 



The awarding of the Gertrude M. 

 Hubbard gold medal to Mr. E. G. Hill 

 for the Rose Columbia must have 

 been a piece of work that caused the 

 Executive Committee of the American 

 Rose Society some serious thought. 

 The Hubbard medal is awarded to the 

 best rose of American origin. Now 

 that is pretty tough when it is neces- 

 sary to grant an award which covers 

 the rambler, all of the various types 

 of outdoor roses as well as indoor 

 roses. There is such a wide range 

 that it is almost impossible to decide 

 Intelligently. It doesn't seem that any 

 committee should be called upon to 

 decide without having some further 

 instructions. Why wouldn't a scale 

 of points be valuable, meaning of 

 course, what would be considered the 

 most important; for instance, so 

 many points for outdoor and so many 

 for indoor roses. It hardly seems rea- 

 sonable to believe that this medal 

 could ever be awarded to any rose 

 which is not suitable for outdoor pur- 

 poses, regardless of how good it is. 

 My remarks on this matter are not 

 Intended as a criticism of the Ameri- 

 can Rose Society Executive Commit- 

 tee. I believe they awarded this 

 medal to the right rose and I under- 

 stand that it was practically a unani- 

 mous opinion. It is interesting to 

 note in connection with Columbia that 

 It heads the list at the Portland, Ore- 

 gon, Rose Test Garden, with 98.66 

 points, and the American Rose So- 

 ciety has had a number of other re- 

 ports from various other sections of 

 the United States along the same 

 line. Columbia is a strong, vigorous 

 grower, the foliage is exceptionally 

 good, and resists black spot and mil- 

 dew. It has now been on the market 

 long enough to prove that it does well 

 out of doors in almost any section of 

 the country, so I think there will be 

 but very little criticism of this 

 award. 



L. J. Renter reports that on his trip 

 to Chicago he had the opportunity of 

 visiting a few places which were par- 

 ticularly interesting to him; for in- 

 stance, the Poehlmann ranges which 

 are now all working. What particu- 

 larly interested him at Plant A was a 



wonderful lot of palms, principally 

 Kentia Belmoreana and K. Forstere- 

 ana. They have them in all sizes 

 and one large block of many thou- 

 sands of plants in made up Forstere- 

 ana will be very welcome indeed to 

 the storeman next fall. They stand 

 now betv/een 3% and 4 feet, and the 

 Poehlmanns are holding these to 

 grow into larger sizes for the coming 

 season. 



It seems to me that America is 

 going to handle the palm situation in 

 fine shape, as not only the Poehl- 

 manns but a large number of other 

 places had large stocks coming 

 along, and I believe we will be able 

 to get along without the foreign 

 imports much better than we thought. 



Mr. Renter also reports that the 

 Poehlmanns- will grow heavily of the 

 Rose Premier the coming season, ap- 

 proximately one hundred tliousand. 

 They think very highly of it, as is 

 evidenced by this planting, also will 

 go heavily into Columbia. 



At the E. G. Hill Company and 

 Joseph H. Hill Co. ranges in Rich- 

 mond, Ind., everything was in the pink 

 of condition, particularly Premier and 

 Butterfly. Mr. Renter thinks it would 

 be hard for any grower to do Premier 

 better than at the Joseph Hill place. 

 There are a number of seedlings on 

 trial which look very promising, and 



it would seem now that Mr. E. G. Hill 

 is going to continue his good work by 

 giving us more new roses. 



At the Fred H. Lemon greenhouses, 

 a fine lot of white malacoides was 

 found, and Mr. Renter thinks this is 

 destined to become a standard com- 

 mercial pot plant. It is double in 

 form, has larger flowers than any of 

 the malacoides, unless possibly he 

 would except Townsendii. Mr. Lemon 

 also has a vei-y fine geranium called 

 Alice Lemon, which he says is par- 

 ticularly valuable for pot plant pur- 

 poses. It is single, apple blossom 

 shade, with a dark eye, and very at- 

 tractive. 



It seems to me that the New York 

 florists are to be congratulated, at 

 least those of the 28th street fellows 

 who are moving to the old Greenhut 

 building, the ground floor of which 

 has been vacant for such a long time, 

 excepting during the time when the 

 U. S. Government had it in use. 

 There seems to be decided advan- 

 tages coming to these commission 

 men in making this move, and it cer- 

 tainly will be an advantage to the 

 buyers. It took a lot of courage to 

 undertake and carry this out, and it 

 is very much to the credit of these 

 men that they had the back bone and 

 the good judgment to go through with 

 it 



ROSE COLUMBIA 



No new move made by any of the 

 florists of the country strikes me as 

 being as important as the formation 

 of the Growers' Association. There 

 is all the chance in the world for 

 great good to come to the growers 

 through this Association, and when 

 our past president, J. Fred Ammann, 

 brought this before the convention at 

 Chicago, there was no hesitation 

 whatever shown by any of those 

 present to take hold of his plan and 

 go through it with a rush. As has 

 been stated before in HoRTicuLTirRE, 

 the result of this meeting was the 

 formation of a temporary association 

 with the election of P. C. W. Brown 

 of Cleveland as president, J. Fred 

 Ammann of Edwardsville, 111., secre- 

 tary, and C. E. Gullett, Lincoln, 111., 

 Wallace R. Pierson, Cromwell, Ct, 

 and Robert C. Kerr, Houston, Tex., as 

 directors. The next important move 

 will come at the S. A. F. annual con- 



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