IO 



GARDENING. 



Sept. 15, 



PUBLUHED THE 1ST AND 15TH OF EACH MONTH 

 BT 



THE GARDENING COMPANY, 



Monon Building, CHICAGO. 



Subscription Price, K.OOa Tear— 24 Numbers. Adver- 

 tising rates on application. 

 Entered at Chicago postofflce as second-class matter 

 Copyright, 18f7, by The Gardening Co. 



Address all communications to The Garden- 

 ing Co., Alonon Building, Chicago. 



GARDENING la gotten up for Its readers and In their 

 Interest, and It bebooveB you, one and all, to make It 

 Interesting. If It does not exactly suit your case, 

 please write and tell us what you want. It Is our 

 desire to help you. 



ASK ant Questions you please about plants, 

 Bowers, fruits, vegetables or other practical gardening 

 matters. We will take pleasure In answering them. 



8bnd us Notes of your experience In gardening in 

 any line: tell us of your successes that others may be 

 enlightened and encouraged, and of your failures, 

 perhaps we can help you. 



Send us Photographs or Sketches of your 

 flowers, gardens, greenhouses, fruits, vegetables, or 

 horticultural appliances that we may have them en- 

 graved for GARDENING. 



CONTENTS. 

 TREES and shrubs. 



Pine trees for the garden (illus.) 1 



Aralias 2 



An Italian garden (illus.) 2 



THE GREENHOUSE. 



Bulbs for winter flowers 2 



Soil for palms . •* 



The California violet 4 



THE FLOWER GARDEN. 



Detailed plan for flower garden (illus.) 4 



Notes on dahlias 5 



Herbaceous plant notes 6 



Clematis paniculata and moisture 6 



Hydrangeas for porch decoration (illus.) ... 7 



Goldenrods 7 



Lavender flowers . 8 



Dahlias— Platycodon 8 



Woodbine— Ferns 8 



WATER FALLS. 



Water tower and falls at Ravin-Oaks (2 illus.) . 8 



MUSHROOMS. 



Mushrooms .... 10 



THE VEGETABLE GARDEN. 



Vegetables in West Virginia 12 



THE FRUIT GARDEN. 



Planting peach trees 14 



The first annual convention of the 

 Amateur Florists' Association of Kansas 

 will be held at Topeka September 30 in the 

 statecapitol, on floral day offestival week. 



Circular No. 16 of U. S. D„-pt. of Agri- 

 culture, Division of Forestry, is an inter- 

 esting illustrated essay on the "Age of 

 trees and time of blazing determined bj r 

 annual rings." 



Messrs. Ell wanger & Barry, Rochester, 

 N. Y., have shipped a collection of 125 

 varieties of pears to be shown at the 

 International Horticultural Exposition 

 at Hamburg the latter part of this month. 



Grafting the apple. — Bulletin No. 65 

 of the Experiment Station at Manhattan, 

 Kansas, covers this subject in a compre- 

 hensive manner, and there are numerous 

 illustrations showing the results of vari- 

 ous methods of grafting the different 

 varieties of the apple. 



There is a new "everlasting label" 

 now on the market that promises to fill 

 the wants of amateurs in that line. It 

 may be described as a narrow flat glass 

 bottle open at the bottom and closed at 

 the top. The top extends above the 

 "neck," terminating in a rounded knob 

 wider than the neck. A copper wire en- 

 circles the neck, to be used in attaching 

 it to any plant. Two cards can be 

 slipped into the opening at the bottom 

 and the aperture then sealed with cement. 

 On one card or one side of a card, if only 

 one is used, may be written the botanical 

 name and date of planting, on the other 

 side the common name, etc. They cost 

 about $3 per 100. 



flNNUfU EXHIBITION OP THE MflSSGHU- 

 SETT5 HORTICULTURAL SOGIBTy. 



The annual plant and flower exhibition 

 of the Massachusetts Horticultural Soci- 

 ety was held in Boston, September 2 and 3. 

 It was, as most of the exhibitions of this 

 society now are, free to the public, and 

 the halls were crowded continuously. 



The upper hall was devoted exclusively 

 to the plants, which were arranged in 

 enormous groups with serpentine walks 

 among them, forming a very pretty effect 

 but necessarily crowded so that the beau- 

 ties of the gigantic and stately palms, 

 tropical foliaged plants and superb speci- 

 men ferns were but poorly displayed. No 

 better argument for a new hall is needed 

 than is presented in a visit to one of these 

 annual shows. 



Nothing finer in groups of foliage plants 

 has been staged here for a long time than 

 the collection shown by J. S. Bailey (Wm. 

 Donald, gardener), and that from John 

 L. Gardner (Wm. Thatcher, gardener) 

 was a close second. A beautiful specimen 

 of Alocasia Sanderiana in Mr. Donald's 

 group was awarded a silver medal for 

 superior culture. In the lesser sized 

 groups and in the palm classes J. H. 

 white (J. H. Wheeler, gardener). Dr. C. 

 G. Weld (K. Finlayson, gardener), John 

 L. Gardner and N. T. Kidder (Wm. Mar- 

 tin, gardener), competed, and rare and 

 beautiful specimens abounded. J. H. 

 White's Burya latifolia variegata was a 

 statelv example of this beautilul plant. 

 A certificate of merit went to Dr. Weld's 

 Heliconia illustris rubricaulis. Other per- 

 fect specimens in Dr. Weld's groups were 

 Dracsena. Doucetti, Acanthophccnix crin- 

 ita and Licuala grandis. The judges 

 were so pleased with a collection of 

 thirtv varieties of crotons from J. E. 

 Rothwell (J. Mutch, gardener) that thev 

 voted it a silver medal. 



Caladiums were grand. They came 

 principally from N. T Kidder and Dr. C. 

 G. Weld. Some of the best varieties were 

 La Perle du Brazil, Candidum, Leopold 

 Robarts, Triomphe de 1' Exposition, Ex- 

 cellent, Sir Walter Scott, Itique Reine 

 Marie de Portugal and Princess Alexan 

 dra. Harvard Botanic Gardens (Robt. 

 Cameron, gardener) contributed a large 

 group of decorative plants in which A/ar- 

 tinezia simplex, Geonotna serrata, Kentia 

 AlcArthurii, Myriocarpa stipitata, Ne- 

 phrolepis exaltata var. hirsutula and Ae- 

 phrolepis acuta were conspicuously fine. 

 A collection of Japanese plants and curi- 

 osities including dwarfed and contorted 

 ferns, cycads, bamboos, pines, maples, 

 etc., was shown by B. Muto and the odd 

 things attracted much attention from 

 visitors. 



Ferns were shown in good variety and 

 form by J. H. White, Dr. Weld, E. S. Con- 

 verse and John Jeffries, and lycopods by 

 Dr. Weld. A specimen of Nephrokpis 

 exaltata measuring eight to ten feet from 

 tip to tip of the drooping fronds came 

 from C. H. Souther. Begonia Rex from 

 E. S. Converse (D. F. Roy, gardener) and 

 las. L. Little were very good. The latter 

 showed a set of twelve splendid Rex hy- 

 brids, plants averaging three feet across, 

 and a good group also came from W. S. 

 Lincoln. There were fewer orchids shown 

 than usual. A group of ten cypripediums 

 from J. S. Rothwell included the beautiful 

 C. Corniogii. 



Flowering plants were more in evidence 

 than has generally been the case at these 

 annual plant exhibitions and these helped 

 out the crotons and caladiums in supply- 

 ing the necessary brilliancy where color 

 would otherwise have been badly missed. 

 J. H. White contributed a large number 

 of fuchsias and flowering begonias. Can- 



nas in bloom came from John Jeffries, J. 

 L. Little and J. W. Howard. Two speci- 

 mens of Begonia Haageana with massive 

 pendent clusters of flowers from Tas. L. 

 Little (Geo. P. Green, gardener) were 

 among the finest things shown and there 

 was an unusually well grown pyramidal 

 Clerodendron Balfourii from N. T. Kid- 

 der. Mr. Kidder also showed Chironia 

 exigua with an abundance of pretty pink 

 blossoms, and C. H. Souther had a fine 

 specimen of Anthurium Brownii. 



In the cut flower department which 

 was confined to the lower hall and corri- 

 dors there was a bewildering sea of color. 

 There were nasturtiums, marigolds, zin- 

 nias and other garden favorites in profu- 

 sion and dahlias fairly overwhelmed 

 everything else. There were dahlias 

 enough if well displayed to fill the lower 

 hall. Good judges pronounced the dahlia 

 show to be the best ever given in this 

 country. There were show, fancy, cactus, 

 liliputians and singles in endless variety 

 and the popular interest in the dahlia 

 was very evident. On genera! display 

 filling one hundred or more bottles the 

 prizes were awarded respectively to H F. 

 Burt, W. C. Winter and Lothro'p & Hig- 

 gins. John Endicott & Co., L. W. Snow 

 and John Parker divided with the above 

 exhibitors the premiums on the special 

 classes and large quantities were staged 

 by W. W. Rawson. There was considera- 

 ble confusion as to classification and 

 quite a number of disqualifications for 

 informality were noted in consequence. 

 The reviving importance of the dahlia as 

 an exhibition flower makes it imperative 

 that a standard classification be adopted 

 and well understood hereafter. 



The aquatic plants, of which there were 

 large tanks from Oakes Ames and L. W. 

 Goodell, were as usual greatly admired. 

 H. A. Dreer showed NympbseaDoogueana 

 and Nymphwa Gurneyana, two new seed- 

 lings, the former white with a soft pink 

 flush, the latter deep red. 



Interesting individual exhibits were 

 gladiolus "White Lady" from H. A. 

 Dreer, improved Drummond phlox and 

 verbenas 'rom L. W. Goodell, zonal gera- 

 niums from George Hollis, seedling cole- 

 uses from C. A. Perkins, Nymphxa Dev- 

 oniensis from W. B. Shaw, dahlia 

 "Seraph" from Edwin Davenport and 

 seedling canna "Sen, Geo. Peabody Wet- 

 more" from Robert Christie. 



There was a large display of foreign 

 grapes contributed by Miss E. J. Clark, 

 I. H. White, E. S. Converse and W. C. 

 Winter. 



Mushrooms. 



MUSHROOMS. 



The cultivation of mushrooms seems to 

 be a mystery to many people. Although 

 on many occasions practical instructions 

 in regard to growing mushrooms have 

 appeared in the pages of Gardening, 

 there is still a number of subscribers in 

 the dark, as it were, and who wish for 

 more explicit information. Some of them 

 ask if mushrooms will grow in any good 

 garden soil, showing their knowledge of 

 the business is not quite clear, and to 

 these amateurs who wish to try mush- 

 room growing we will endeavor in a sim- 

 ple way to tell them how to do it. 



Mushrooms will not grow in soil alone, 

 that is during winter. We have grown 

 them outdoors in summer with fair suc- 

 cess and now have a large patch planted 

 from which we hope to pick some mush- 

 rooms when the cool nights of September 



