46 



POPULAR GARDENING. 



December, 



Tl>e Peach Tomato gives us a handsome enough 

 fruit, and one, that notwithstanding its softness, 

 is a most excellent keeper. Yet we have no 

 practical use for it, and shall not again plant 

 it. The same we can sa.v of the New Zealand 

 Fig Tomato, well-grown specimens of which 

 resemble a Yellow (iage Plum in size and color, 

 and are borne in clusters of from ten to fourteen 

 each. They are handsome, soft, but if kept in h 

 dry place, will keep for a long time, as they are 

 inclined to shrivel rather than rot. The only 

 culinary use that might be made of them, is for 

 preserving or pickling. 



There is still another class of Tomatoes that 

 was well represented on our grounds, and which 

 is of especial interest to gardeners who desire to 

 get their crop into the market in advance of the 

 rush, and while high prices are yet ruling. Of 

 these earliest varieties we will speak in Jan- 

 uary number. 



The Ring-leaved Willow. Perhaps no one 

 other tree here has called forth more expressions 

 of surprise and admiration from visitors, than 

 has our King-leaved Willow, a faithful represen- 

 tation of a twig of which is shown on page 50. 

 It is a well fixed sport from the common Weep- 

 ing Willow, and is known technically as S. Baby- 

 lonica var. annularis. It is not a new tree, the 

 writer has known it for a dozen years or more, 

 but it seems to have been disseminated scarcely 

 at all. Its peculiarity indicated by the name, 

 and shown in the engraving, is that the leaves 

 over the entire tree curl into pretty ringlets, in 

 a way to excite the curiosity of every beholder. 

 The tree is a vigorous and handsome grower, 

 but of small size, suiting it to small grounds. It 

 is well worthy of a place in every considerable 

 collection of trees and shrubs. 



The Shrubby Cinquefoil. It is sometimes 

 asked, who wants to plant woody growths and 

 wait long for bloom. We set out half a dozen 

 small plants of this shrub {PotentiUn cinquefoil) 

 last May, and during the past September they 

 were loaded with very bright sulphur-yellow 

 flowers. This is a plant to be recommended for 

 diy or exposed situations. It is a mountain 

 plant, having been brought from the Himalayas. 

 It is very suitable as a rockery shrub. Its growth 

 is dense and compact, with pinnate leaflets often 

 silky, and the abundance of golden-yellow 

 flowers are always welcome. 



Garden Intruders. Once only during the 

 past season did we notice signs of unlawful 

 trespassers on our grounds, and that was in the 

 Melon season But one of our neighbors, with a 

 fine vineyard neaj* the highwa.v, was considerably 

 annoyed by a gang of young rowdies, stealing 

 and destroying his fruit. In one instance a gun 

 in the hands of a watcher accidently went off 

 with the I'esult that some of the stray shots 

 peppered the cheek of one of the lads. All boys 

 must know that to enter a person's property for 

 the purpose of pilfering is an illegal deed to 

 which a none too heavy penalty is attached. 

 The law of New York is very clear on this point, 

 as follows: "A person who willfully enters, with- 

 out consent of the owner or occupant, any 

 orchard, fruit-garden, vineyard, or ground 

 whereon is cultivated any fruit, with Intent to 

 take, in.iure or destroy anything there growing, 

 or grown, is punishable by imprisonment not ex- 

 ceeding six months, or a fine not exceeding 8250, 

 or both." 



Money in Special Crops. 



M, CRAWFORD, CUYAHOGA FALLS, OHIO. 



Nearly every horticulturist has opportu- 

 nities to make large profits on comparatively 

 small areas. Some of the most protttable 

 crops, however, are hard to sell, and so are 

 available only to the few who have build 

 up a trade. I have grown crops that bought 

 a dollar to the square toot on a small area 

 but even these might have yielded no profit 

 to a beginner. 



A person might raise over two hundred 

 dollars' worth of Browuii Lily bulbs on a 

 square rod, but the cost of the product and 

 the difficulty of selling it would render it 

 decidedly tinprofltuble to ninety-nine per 

 cent, of the readei's of Popular Gardening. 



Crops that can be produced and sold by 

 almost any one rarely give large gains. 

 This applies to nearly all products that can 

 be grown with little mental labor. It cosis 

 an effort to do e.\traordinary work, and 

 most people are unwilling to put forth the 



necessary exertion. There are not a few 

 gardeners who work very hard with their 

 hands, and yet fail for want of good plan- 

 ning. Some have great advantages; as 

 nearness to market, very rich land, cheap 

 labor, or a chance to irrigate or to procure 

 fertilizers at little expense. There are crops, 

 however, that may be grown at a good profit 

 almost anywhere, without the advantages 

 named, if one will only do thorough work. 



Suppose a person has control of one-fourth 

 of an acre of rather poor land, but well 

 drained, in a farming community, distant 

 from town, and with no opportunity to buy 

 manure. Surely this is not an extra chance. 

 What could be done under such circum- 

 stances ? I would adopt this course: I 

 should want, to begin with, six hundred 

 pounds of some good fertilizer, such as 

 Mapes' Potato phosphate, 3,700 Strawberry 

 plants, and about two bushels of small 

 Onion sets. The plants and sets can be 

 grown at small cost. .lust as early in the 

 spring as the ground is dry enough it should 

 be plowed, after which four hundred pounds 

 of the phosphate should be sown on the sur- 

 face, and very thoroughly harrowed in. 



The plot should then be raked with a steel 

 rake, and all stones and lumps removed, 

 after which it should be marked out in rows 

 sixteen inches apart. Every third row is to 

 be planted to Strawberries a foot apart, and 

 the others to Onions sets two inches apart. 

 Every blossom is to be cut off from the 

 plants, and runners are to be served in the 

 same way as soon as they appear. Weeds 

 must not be allowed to show themselves, 

 and the entire surface should be stirred 

 often enough to keep it loose, especially as 

 soon as possible after every rain. 



This treatment should be continued until 

 the Onions are nearly ripe. Towards the 

 last of May the other two hundred pounds 

 of phosphate should be sown, on a day when 

 the leaves are dry and there is no wind. As 

 soon as the Onions are ripe they should be 

 removetl, and the four-foot spaces loosened 

 up with hoe or cultivator. Each plant may 

 then be allowed to send out two runners, 

 one of which is to root on each side of the 

 old plant, ten or twelve inches distant. AIJ 

 other runners must be cut off as before, and 

 frequent and shallow cultivation given un- 

 til quite late in the fall, by which time little 

 if any bare ground will be visible except 

 the strip between the rows, assuming that 

 there are no white grubs in the soil. 



Early in winter the whole bed should be 

 covered with straw, deep enough to hide 

 the plants, and when growth commences in 

 the spring, most of the covering should be 

 raked into the paths. No spring cultivation 

 will be needed, as the surface will be shaded. 



The Onions should be sold as soon as 

 possible after they are ripe, and there should 

 be from fifty to eighty bushels of them. 

 The berries may be sold to farmers in the 

 neighborhood. This may be done by deliv- 

 ering them at a fair, uniform price for the 

 season, or by letting it be known that they 

 can be had at the bed. I know a man who 

 sold over three hundred btishel in one season 

 by the latter method, and farmers bought 

 them all. A neighbor of his sold sixty 

 bushels the same season in the same way. 

 It is not a good plan to have them picked on 

 shares. A quarter of an acre, grown as 

 directed, may be expected to yield from 

 fifty to seventy-five bushels of the finest 

 fruit. A grower in Wisconsin raised one 

 hundred and eleven aud one half bushels on 

 a measured plot of this size. 



.Just as soon as the berries are picked the 

 patch should be plowed, and planted to some 

 crop that will yield a good profit in that 

 locality. It may be Celery, Turnips, late 

 Cabbages, Sweet Corn, or fodder Corn. If, 

 however, there is no new plantation coming 

 on, it may be best to keep the bed another 



year, or even two. In that case it should be 

 mown, dried, and burned over. In a few 

 days new leaves will start, after which the 

 patch is to be thoroughly stirred with the 

 cultivator, and the plants managed precise- 

 ly as they were the fall before, no runner 

 whatever being allowed to grow, unless 

 vacancies occur, in which case fill them. 



The Onion is not the only crop that can be 

 grown with the Strawberry. In many in- 

 stances early Potatoes would pay better. 

 Early Beets, early Sweet Corn, or any other 

 crop that can be removed in time without 

 too much tramping of the ground, may be 

 used. It would be unwise to grow anything 

 that could not be sold; but on the other 

 hand, no one who has not tried it knows 

 how soon a demand for any good horticul- 

 tural product will spring up. 



Chestnuts for Profit and Pleasure. 



The Chestnut— the good, sweet, reliable 

 American Chestnut — may safely be con- 

 sidered the most promising of all nuts stat- 

 able for orchard culture. All we will have 

 to do is to plant seed for stock in orchard 

 rows, then look up some of the largest and 

 finest varieties, known to be good bearers, 

 and graft them upon the seedlings. This 

 would give us a valuable orchard after a 

 while, and perhaps as profitable, as if we 

 planted Numbo, Paragon, or any other. 



Mr. A, S. Fuller, in a recent contribution 

 to New York Tribune calls attention to the 

 dwarf Chinquapin Chestnut, as a variety 

 for the fruit garden, and for the children's 

 pleasure. Whether it could be depended 

 upon as a source of revenue, or not, certain- 

 ly it will prove to be an object of interest, 

 and well worthy of a place on the lawn or 

 in the garden. 



The Chinquapin Chestnut (Castaneapum- 

 ila) gives little promise of ever yielding var- 

 ieties of large size says Mr. Fuller, still it 

 deserves to be better known in cultivation. 

 The nuts are small, globular or slightly ob- 

 long, and produce singly, or only one in 

 each bur, but the burs are borne on long 

 fruit-stalks, sometimes a dozen on each ; 

 consequently the increase in number makes 

 up in part for diminutive size. The nuts are 

 sweet and tender, even more delicate than 

 our common Chestnut. 



The Chinquapin is most abundant in the 

 South, although found sparingly on the 

 sandy ridges of Pennsylvania and southern 

 Ohio. In the more northern localities, as 

 well as in the richer soils of the South, this 

 species grows thirty or forty feet high, 

 while on the poor sandy soils of the South 

 it is a mere bush, often not more than three 

 or four feet high, even when it is old and 

 the plants are matured. 



Taken as a whole, this species appears to 

 be more variable than our common sweet 

 Chestnut, and this lends to it its greatest 

 value in cultivation. By selecting the very 

 dwarf varieties we may cultivate them in 

 rows as we do Gooseberries or Currants; 

 or they may be planted among ordinary low- 

 growing shrubs about the lawn and garden, 

 and where the children can have the fun of 

 picking Chestnuts from the tree without 

 climbing or waiting for nuts to fall. 



Several years ago I raised a number of 

 Chinquapins from the nuts ; some came in- 

 to bearing when only three years old, and 

 all when not more than four or five. The 

 variation in form, color and size of leaf and 

 habit of growth seems to be almost endless, 

 for no two are alike. One has leaves nearly 

 as large as the European Chestnut, and on 

 another they are small, slightly oblong, and 

 green on both sides, instead of hoary tomen- 

 tose underneath, as usual in this species. 



In productiveness there is as great a dif- 

 ference as in other characteristics, but all 

 are curious and interesting. The nuts from 

 which these seedlings were raised came 



