chap, in.] 



ITS USES. 



45 



FIG. 4. 



Some of these, such as balsams, send out roots 

 from the stem above the collar; and these 

 plants are always very much improved by 

 transplanting". Others, the fibrous 

 roots of which are lono- and de- 

 scending, such as hyacinths, bear 

 transplanting very ill, and when it 

 is absolutely necessary to remove 

 them, it should be done with an 

 instrument called a transplanter 

 (fig. 4.); which may be purchased 

 in any ironmonger's shop, and the 

 use of which is to take up a suffi- 

 cient quantity of earth with the 

 plant to remove it without disturb- 



TRAXSPLANTER. ' m <y \\\Q TOOtS. 



The uses of transplanting are various. When 

 seeds are sown, and the young plants from them 

 beo-iu to make their appearance, they will ge- 

 nerally be found to be much too thick ; and 

 thev will require thinning, either by drawing 

 some of them out and throwing them away, or 

 by removing them to another bed by trans- 

 planting. This, in the case of annuals, is called 

 by the oardeners pricking out. The young- 

 plants are taken up with a small trowel, and 

 replaced in a hole made for them, and the earth 

 pressed round them with the same trowel ; the 

 onlv care necessary being to make them firm 

 at the root, and yet to avoid injurino- the tender 

 sponcrioles. Gardeners do this with a dibber, 

 which they hold in the right hand, and after 

 putting in the young plant with the left hand, 

 they press the earth round it with the dibber in 

 a manner that I never could manage to imitate. 



