February 14, 1867. ] 



JOURNAIi OP HORTICOLTDEE AND COTTAGE GARDENEE. 



117 



WEEKLY CALENDAR. 



Month 



14 

 15 

 16 

 17 

 IS 

 19 

 20 



°o? 



Week. 



Th 



F 



S 



Son 



BI 



Tn 



W 



FEBRUARY 14-20, 1867. 



Cliimonanthns fragrans. 

 Gnidia iraberbis. 

 Hovea purpnrea. 

 Septcagesima StmDAY. 

 Piinelea decusaata. 

 Arum ciTnitnm. 

 Lily of the Valley. 



From obgervjitioDB taken near London during the last forty yeare, the average day temporaturo of the week ig 45.3^; and its nipTil 

 temperature 30.7-*. The greatest heat was 59^ on the 16th, 18rl."J; and the lowest cold 2-', on tho 17th, 1355. The greatest fall of rain was 

 0.51 inch. N.B. — The Calendar contains the names of plants flowering in the greenhouse. 



TRANSPLANTING LARGE FRUIT TREES. 



SHORT time ago, in reading 

 that excellent little book, 

 Brehaut's " Modern Peach- 

 Pruner," I found in pages 40- 

 41 the remark that, " when- 

 ever large fruit trees are 

 transplanted, men of great experience in such matters teU 

 us that the success of the operation depends mainly on the 

 quantity of earth removed with the roots." Now, what I 

 ask is tills : Is it possible in removing fruit trees, such 

 as Peaches, Phmis, Cherries, &c., to do so witli any con- 

 siderable quantity of soU at the roots ? and, again, it' pos- 

 sible, is it necessary to attempt it, if care is taken to 

 preserve the roots without mutilating or injiu'ing them ':" 



About five years ago I was living in the gardens at 

 Oakley Hall, in Hampshire ; great alterations were going 

 on at that time, and the mansion was nearly rebuilt ; the 

 offices belonging to it have been replaced by a grand south 

 front, and close to this, instead of a pond and lumber- 

 yard, there is now a beautiful flower garden. About 

 80 yards fi-om the south front stood the kitchen garden, 

 and it was thought necessary to do away -nith it altogether. 

 and turn it into the pleasure groimds. The place selected 

 for the new garden was a meadow, about ;tOO yards west- 

 ward, and the materials of the old walls were to be 

 employed in building the walls for the new garden. Ac- 

 cordingly, about May or June, 1861, we began unuailing 

 the trees, and tjdng them to stakes as far back as possible, 

 to save them from being injured in taldng the wall away. 

 In the following October the new walls were so far com- 

 pleted, and the borders prepared to receive the trees. Mr. 

 Robins, the late head gardener, intended planting all the 

 trees from the old garden. They were large, iine trees, 

 and I remember Mr. Robins teUing me he found the Peach 

 trees planted when lie first went to Oakley HaU, about 

 fifteen years pre^dously ; but as the borders had not been 

 properly prepared, he had had the trees taken up, the bor- 

 ders made, and the trees replanted. They were then young. 

 and I should fancy, by the appearance of the Plums and 

 Chemes, they must have been all of about the same age. 



In making the border great care had been taken to 

 secure good drainage, and a firm bottom ; a good layer of 

 stones, about 8 feet square, with coal ashes on the top, was 

 the foundation for each of the trees, which were then 

 planted in good loam. 



_We begau rcmo\'ing the trees by opening a trench, 2 feet 

 wide, at .j feet from tlie stem, till we came to the founda- 

 tion ; with steel forks we kept working the soil from the 

 roots, taking great care to avoid injuring these in any way. 

 The soil crumbled away from the roots as we gently ran 

 the forks in, and we kept an open trench by tlirowing it 

 No. 807.- Vol. XIL, Kew Skubb. 



ont with shovels : it was in splendid condition, neither wet 

 nor dry, caused, I suppose, by llie good drainage beneath. 

 As fast as we came to the roots we laid them up gently out 

 of the way until we had traced them all out : then, one 

 man taking the stem on his shoulders, and two or three 

 supporting the branches, every tree, with the exception of 

 the Pear trees, was taken to the new garden, the roots laid 

 in tlie soil, spread out regularly, and a thin layer of leaf 

 mould placed over them. The roots were all on one level, 

 no tiers, and so evenly were tliey laid out that they might 

 have been trained on the wall with as great regularity as the 

 branches. Three very large Apricots were moved in the same 

 way; one, I should imagine, was upwards of thirty years old. 



The Pear trees were larger, and most of them of such 

 size tliat men could not conveniently carry them, so we 

 drew some of them to their destuiations on low trucks. 

 The old borders for the Pear trees had not been prepared 

 in the same way as for the Peach trees : the soil was a 

 rather retentive loam, and the roots liad penetrated to 

 various depths. Two years prc\-ious to the removal of the 

 trees Mr. Robins had given them a good root-pruning, and 

 where each root had been pruned there was a mass of 

 small fibrous roots. 



All I have to add is that out of all the trees (from sixty 

 to seventy, I believe), not one failed, or looked ia the least 

 tlie worse for the transplanting. Most of them, with the 

 exception of Apricots, bore fine crops of fruit in the first 

 season. In this case, had we tried to have taken the trees 

 up with soil we should have found it next to impossible. 

 I daresay Mr. Robins could state the exact age and all 

 particulars, as he had the sole management of them, I 

 being then a yoimgster under him. — T. P. I. 



VINE-GROWING. 



In these remarks I do not intend to take up a position 

 superior to those who have already stated their opinions, 

 and to arrogate to myself the tone of a judge who has 

 lieard the counsel for both side.?, and proceeds to sum up 

 for the jury, but onlj' to put on paper what I have for 

 years been in the habit of doing for my own benefit — first 

 reading with care what appears in your pages, and then 

 maldng a comparison between what I then read and what 

 lias gone before, or, what is the same tiling in the end, 

 any other information I may have on the same subject ; 

 and I liope if my deductions are made in error some one 

 else will explain to me where I go wrong. 



In the first place, then, I consider the letters written on 

 this subject are intended for one or other of two classes, and 

 that this is the maiu reason why Mr. AVills and " A Gau- 

 dener" on the one side diti'er from " H. S." and " Vms" 

 on the other. I call the system Mr. Wills advocates the 

 " show system," where cost, connnercially speaking, is not 

 thought of, in the desire that wlien his bunches do come 

 he ^vlll be able successfully to compete for the prizes at 

 the London shows with even Mr. Meredith himself : where- 

 as " H. S." and " Vixis " would. I think, be satisfied with 

 a commercial success if they never took a London prize. 

 By this term commercial success I mean a success equal 

 No, 959.— Vol. XXSVIL, Old SEBJxa, 



