APRIL] 



FLOWER GARDEN. 



3U 



GERANIUMS, MYRTLES, BALM OF GILEAD, ETC. 



For the methods of cultivating the above, and other green-house 

 plants, see the article green-house, in this month, and in March. 



TRANSPLANTERS. 



Dibbers and trowels are well-known instruments for the removal 

 of plants of various kinds. In using the pointed or semicircular 

 trowel, the young plants may be taken up with a considerable ball of 

 earth attached to the roots, while they suffer no injury by the pro- 

 cess. A more perfect mode of transplanting by the use of the 

 trowel, is that by taking two of these, one in each hand, thrusting 

 them down on opposite sides of the plant, at the same time drawing 

 the handles slightly outwards ; the faces of the trowels are thus made 

 to collapse so much as to press the soil about the roots, and enable 

 the operator to take the plant, with ball entire, from the seed-bed to 

 its destination, and to place it in its new abode without the least 

 check to its growth. We have figured several transplanters, which 

 have been employed for such plants as the brassicse, &c. Fig. 35 

 is called Saul's transplanter. It may be thus described : the blades 



Fig. 35, 



Fig. 36. 



Fig. 37. 



Fig. 38. 



are opened by pressing the lever a toward the handle, when they 

 open outwards, and in this state are thrust into the ground, having 

 the plant within them ; a counter-pressure causes them to collapse 

 and embrace the ball firmly, and, in this state, the instrument being 

 drawn upwards, brings with it the plant and ball entire ; it is then 

 taken to its new place, when the handle is again pressed inwards, 



