Juw 10, 1809. ] 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AHJ> COTTAGE GARDENER, 



396 



enoonraged, good-shaped plants shonid be selected in due time, 

 liberal shifts given, a cboioe situation selected under protection 

 of some kind, such as frames or pits facing the north, or if in 

 other aspects they should be shaded in the warmost part of the 

 day. The luxuriant shoots must be kept pinched hack in due 

 time, in order to cause close sturdy grovfth. Never let any of 

 this pie'.ty family stand in a cold draught, or they will surely 

 wear a rusty brown or spotted, unhealthy appearance. Clean 

 and healthy pots should always be chosen, and they must bo 

 particularly v;ell drained, a good portion of charcoal being 

 used with the drainage, and then covering it with rough char- 

 coal. The soil to suit them best is a good rich fibrous heath 

 soil, as gritty as it possibly can be, selected in its natural state 

 from a well-drained situation in suitable weather, and kept in 

 a healthy condition until required for use ; it should then bo 

 broken up roughly, adding a liberal portion of coarse gritty 

 sand. The potting materials should not be jammed together 

 too firmly, but with a suitable pressing stick, so that tlie 

 whole mass may form a kindly and natural drainage, readily 

 admitting a circulation of air and water. When tlie plants are 

 making growth and the pots are full of roots, if it is not in- 

 tended to repot or shift them, applications of clear manure 

 water will very much improve their health and appearance, but 

 at no other times should liquid manure be applied to this 

 family of plants. 



STOVE. 



Very little fire heat is now required, although it is advisable 

 to continue a gentle fire in order to give air freely, and to be 

 enabled to continue a humid interior atmosphere, which will 

 greatly encourage a sturdy habit of growth free from canker, 

 mildeiv, and insects. Of course some attention must be given 

 to shading this house, and watering and syringing. Orchids 

 which are still in a growing state should be placed in the most 

 favourable positions, and encouraged by a suitable temperature 

 for ripening and hardening any growths which they may yet 

 make. In the case of stove plants and Orchids, let every en- 

 deavour he made to secure thorough freedom from insects, 

 which about this season are unusually active, and require con- 

 stant looking after. Dendrobium nobile and others of that 

 class sufficiently advanced shonkl also have a moderate and 

 steady temperature, abundance of air, and little water until 

 their stems are ripe and their flower buds formed. Orchids 

 pushed early into growth should ba removed forthwith to a 

 cool house, and care taken not to induce them to break again, 

 as a fresh start would interfere with their flowering next year. 

 — W. Keane. 



DOINGS OF THE LAST -WEEK. 



This has been a very busy week, more especially in the orna- 

 mental department. We rearranged the conservatory, corri- 

 dors, &c., and proceeded as weather would permit in planting 

 the bulk of the flower garden. This day, Saturday, was per- 

 haps the finest day we have had for the latter purpose, as the 

 bright sun warmed and pulverised the ground ; but we did but 

 little planting for two reasons — viz., putting the lawn in good 

 order for a particular purpose, and the rising barometer lead- 

 ing US to expect a bright, warm day on Sunday, when fresh- 

 planted subjects could receive but little attention. From press 

 of matter we shall content ourselves with a few words as re- 

 spects flower-garden routine. 



As respects Uiiggy sticks in Jlou-er beds, we have had several 

 letters, some thanking us for the hints given ; others telling 

 us that their plants and beds stand very well without such 

 great trouble and labour; others, agnin, telling us that when 

 not secure without, they prefer pegging-down instead of bush- 

 ing or twigging-up. It is quite right that every man should 

 adopt the plan he finds suit him best. We stated that in 

 many sheltered places the plants required nothing in the way 

 of securing. When exposed to strong winds, some mode of 

 securing is essential to the trim form of the beds. Before now 

 we have had fine plants of Calceolarias and Scarlet Pelargo- 

 niums not only bruised and broken, but actually torn up by 

 the roots, and sent careering over the park like so many 

 straws before the fury of the gale. We have a corridor about 

 10 feet wide, open to the south, with a semicircular roof 

 covered with sheets of zinc, as securely fastened as possible to 

 iron girders ; but so often has this roof been moved, that when 

 we have a very strong south wind, we can only keep it in its 

 place by putting heavy weights upon it. That the labour at 

 first is great in thus securing bedding plants is, of course, 

 quite true ; but there is little or no labour afierwards, and 



winds and rains will have little power to take them out of their 

 place, so that with us, at least, although we are much longer 

 in getting our work done, we economise future labour after 

 the plants are established. In the meantime the twigs give a 

 partial protection even from cold, help to sift the wind a little, 

 and prevent the plants, when swayed by their own weight, 

 making a hole round the stem, which swaying has always a 

 tendency to rupture some of the host and freshest fibres. 

 Even in sheltered places, if we used no securing twigs, we 

 should be inclined to plant thickly, if wu thinned out afterwards, 

 as then the numbers of the plants would keep the wind out 

 more. 



.\s io pcgging-doion, which some of our correspondents advise, 

 wo have no objection whatever, especially when the plants are 

 naturally of a trailing habit, as Verbenas, &o., though even in 

 their case, we havo had splendid beds by twigi^ing up instead 

 of pegging down, and in our case, after pegging down, we should 

 not be secure without twigging afterwards. The finest and the 

 most compact beds of Verbenas we ever had were pegged down ; 

 and then, as the young shoots pointed upwards, a piece of 

 netting was stretched and fastened securely over the bed, 2 to 

 fi inches lower than the flowers were expected to reach. The 

 young shoots came through the netting, and the blooms and 

 foliage in part stood above it, the net being wholly concealed ; 

 but no wind or storm could destroy the symmetry of the bed. 

 As to pegging down, as a general rule, plants that if left to them- 

 selves would grow upright, we consider the plan to be worse 

 than labour lost, and that labour, after all, is expended to 

 produce an appearance contrary to nature. Certainly we have 

 seen neat secure beds, only from 6 to 12 inches in height of 

 such plants as the tall Ageratum, Salvia fulgens, and Salvia 

 patens, in which there was little but the flower stems and upper 

 leaves above the green sward level. As to labour, we would 

 have twigged up half a score of such beds whilst a man was 

 laying down stem after stem, and these rather brittle, of such 

 strong-growing plants close to the ground, and after all most 

 likely for an effect far inferior to that which would have been 

 produced by allowing the plants to assume their natural pro- 

 portions. Few. things could be more striking than a large 

 circular- bed of the tall Ageratum, or the red or blue Salvias 

 referred to, as they formed with their flower-heads something 

 like two-thirds of a ball, the lower blooms kissing the lawn. All 

 the training and pegging down to a tame flat surface yielded but 

 a poor outline of the massively beautiful, compared with those 

 allowed to assume their natural growth and outline. When 

 dwarf beds are wanted , we think it better to choose dwarf plants, 

 instead of peggingdown what naturally grows tall. Of course, 

 there are cases when, for a defined combination, it will be ne- 

 cessary thus to dwarf the tallest ; but the plan should be 

 considered an exception from a generally desirable rule. 



Another matter which may be presented to the consideration 

 of the advocates of the pegging-dovra system, is the greater 

 risk of injury from frost in early planting. What seem to 

 have suffered in the frosty mornings are chiefly some Scarlet 

 Pelargoniums that, from being tall enough, had their stems 

 bent a little from the perpendicular, and a few Verbenas that 

 were pegged-down as soon as planted, watered, &c. We do 

 not believe they would have suffered in the least ifleft stand- 

 ing upright before the weather was warmer, and if they had 

 become more used to their new place. Left in their natural 

 position, the leaves and tops defend the stems from free radia- 

 tion. When the stems are laid slanting, or horizontal, or near 

 the ground, the stems in proportion to their size and juiciness 

 will suffer more than the twigs and leaves. Under such cir- 

 cumstances we have often had stems with their upper sides 

 blackened in May when thus exposed, while those standing 

 upright did not suffer at all. When planting-out early, therefore, 

 even as to plants that we intended to peg-down, we should leave 

 the pegging-down until the weather was safer, and less danger 

 would be experienced by free radiation from the freely-exposed 

 horizontal stems. The casif-st way to peg will take time and 

 labour. For amateurs, nothing is better than a quantity of 

 small wire, folded in pieces like hair pins, as they might take 

 the trouble of saving them, and looking after them for another 

 year. We generally use little straight sticks about the size of 

 crow quills, such as the winter prunings of Apples, Pears, and 

 even the summer prunings of these and Currants, cut shortly 

 after this. Bundles of these about t5 inches long aro very useful. 

 The piece is taken in your hand, cracked in the middle, which 

 generally leaves a little bit cf wood and bark on the lower side, 

 and the two ends are pushed into the ground over the shoot 

 to be kept down. Seme hundreds of these straight twigs can 



