GARDENING UNDER GLASS 355 



ground in the South because the plants sent them are long-shanked and look 

 like roses that were budded too high. This is caused by making the cuttings 

 too long and leaving a part above the ground. If the cuttings are of mod- 

 erate length and are inserted their whole length in the earth, the plants will 

 branch from the ground in a symmetrical way. Others have objected that the 

 plants that have been sent North from the coast country of South Georgia 

 have long, ropy roots and fail on being potted. This arises from growing 

 the plants in a sandy soil and too far South, where the wood does not get so 

 well ripened by the coming of frost. Roses need a clay loam in which to make 

 the most compact root growth suitable for potting when sent North. It will 

 be but a short time when all the larger dealers North will have their roses 

 grown in the South, on contract, just as they now have tuberoses and other 

 bulbs grown there. Propagation of roses on a large scale necessarily involves 

 a considerable investment in glass and pots and land, for nothing but the best 

 soil is fit for the purpose. A propagating house 100 feet long and twenty 

 feet wide will require 1,000 sashes on the frames. The house will cost $2,000 

 and the frames $1,500, three acres of stock plants will be needed for cuttings, 

 and twenty acres of land for the summer planting. Pots and freight will cost 

 about $1,000, and such an outfit in the hands of a skilled man with plenty of 

 labor at hand, should turn out 250,000 plants annually. The tea roses will 

 go into the field in March, and during the winter the propagating house can 

 be used for growing other plants, and in spring for starting tomato and egg 

 plants, which, in March can be transferred to the frames after the roses have 

 gone out, and, and an immense number of plants be had for sale to planters, 

 or planted in one's own land for the growth of the fruit. Or if the business 

 grows as it should the house can be partly planted with stock plants of roses 

 and the propagation kept up during the winter from wood grown inside. 

 This will involve the use of more greenhouses for the establishing of the 

 winter plants. 



PROPAGATING HARDY ROSES IN FRAMES NORTH. 



The hybrid roses that are so easily propagated from cuttings in the open 

 air in the South, are equally easy to propagate in colder latitudes by the use 

 of the simple cold frame. In this case the cuttings should be made of about 

 four eyes and set in three-inch pots, in a good compost of sods and manure 

 suitable for the potting of roses. These pots are then plunged over their 

 rims, in a bed of sifted coal ashes in the frames, and careful attention paid to 

 watering, airing and protection during the winter. They will have formed 

 roots by the time planting time comes in the spring, and can then be trans- 

 ferred to the open ground in nursery rows for the summer. 



