196 



HENDERSON'S HANDBOOK OF PLANTS. 



ROS 



(white-) James Sprunt, (crimson;) Gloire de 

 Dijon, (salmon yellow ;) and Red Gloire de Dijon, 

 (carmine, ) are the best. Another class of Roses, 

 the Hybrid Perpetuate, particularly the variety 

 known as General Jacqueminot, are now grown 

 in immense quantities. These, we think, will 

 soon be supplanted by a newer class, known as 

 " Hybrid Teas," of which Duchess of Edin- 

 burgh, (bright crimson,) La France, (light 

 pink,) Duke of Connaught, (crimson scarlet,) 

 Duchess of Connaught, (deep carmine,) Co- 

 quette de Alps, (white,) are at present types. 

 These require an entirely different treatment 

 from the Tea Roses proper, as they are not 

 evergreens, but drop their leaves in fall; and 

 hence, like all deciduous plants, require a 

 rest of at least two months, either by drying or 

 by a low temperature, before they can be forced 

 into flower. To get the Hybrid Perpetual and 

 the Hybrid Tea classes early (say during Janu- 

 ary) requires special skill and care, but well re- 

 pays it, as this class of Roses now bring an 

 average of $50 per hundred buds at wholesale, 

 from the 15th of December to January 15th. 

 The method found to be necessary is to grow 

 these Roses on in pots exactly as recommended 

 for the Evergreen or Tea Roses, except that, as 

 they have a tendency to grow tall, the center 

 should be pinched out of the leading shoots, 

 so that from five to six shoots run up, and thus 

 not only make the plant bushy, but, what is of 

 more importance, these slimmer shoots are less 

 pithy and ripen off harder, thus insuring with 

 more certainty a greater production of buds. 

 The plants, if started from cuttings any time 

 from September to January, which is the season 

 we prefer to root them in, will, if properly grown, 

 by August 1st (or at less than one year old) have 

 filled a seven or eight inch pot with roots. Now is 

 the critical point. The plants must be ripened 

 off and rested if a crop of buds is wanted by 

 January and February; so to do that at a season 

 as early as the 1st of September, the plants must 

 be gradually dried off sufficient to make them 

 drop their leaves, though not to so violently wilt 

 them as to shrivel the 'shoots. This we find 



as outside the rains start them to grow. A rest 

 of two months is necessary, so that the plants 

 begun to be dried off by the 1st of August may 

 be started slowly by the 1st of October, and 

 those begun to be dried oft' by the 1st of Septem- 

 ber may be started, also at as low a temperature 

 as possible, by the 1st of November. One of 

 the Rose-growers of Madison, N. J., had, about 

 the middle of December, 1880, over one thousand 

 plants of General Jacqueminot Rose showing 

 color, averaging eight buds to a plant, for which 

 he averaged seventy-five cents per each bud. So 

 it will be seen, that when this method of forcing 

 this fine class of Roses is a success, it is very 

 profitable. Why it is profitable is from the 

 fact of unusual care and skill being required to 

 have the plants in the proper condition. We 

 may here state, that many failures have resulted 

 in the attempt to grow the Hybrid Tea Roses 

 without resting, notably the Duchess of Edinburgh 

 Rose, which was sent out from England some 

 five or six years ago as a "Crimson Tea." The 

 misleading name of "Tea "induced hundreds 

 of florists to attempt its growth under the same 

 con litions as the Safrano or Ron Silene class, 

 and the consequence was in every case almost 

 complete failure. This type evidently partakes 

 more of the Hybrid Perpetual than of the Tea 



ROS 



class, and as they are hardy and deciduous, re- 

 fuse to bloom in midwinter unless given the 

 rest that their nature demands. Roses, when 

 grown under glass with proper attention to tem- 

 perature and moisture, are not usually attacked 

 by mildew; but as a preventive it is well to 

 paint the hot-water pipes once every two or 

 three weeks with a mixture of sulphur and lime 

 or sulphur and guano, made of the.consistency of 

 whitewash ; (the guano or lime is merely to make 

 the sulphur stick better to the pipes.) The fumes 

 of sulphur, as radiated by the heated pipes, is a 

 never-failing means of destroying the germs of 

 mildew, or any other fungoid growth, and also 

 holds in check, to some extent, the Red Spider 

 insect, often so troublesome to the Rose. For 

 the Rose Bug, so destructive to success in Rose 

 growing under glass, there seems no remedy ex- 

 cept the slow and unsatisfactory one of catching 

 and killing the insect as soon as it is seen on 

 the leaves. It is not easily observed, as it gets 

 under the leaves and close to the shoots of the 

 plants. Its presence is known by the bitten 

 leaves showing where it is feeding ; but even 

 with the greatest diligence enough will usually 

 escape to deposit their eggs in the soil, which, 

 when hatched out to the grub or pupa state, 

 rapidly begin the work of destruction by feed- 

 ing on the roots. In this stage, all attempts to 

 destroy them have thus far, we believe, failed. 

 The only safety, when the Rose Bug is known to 

 be present in sufficient numbers to injure, is to 

 throw out the plants and start with young ones. 

 We have for two years past adopted this plan 

 exclusively, growing the plants only one year 

 old from cuttings rooted during the fall or 

 winter months, and have since then had no 

 trouble whatever from the ravages of this 

 insect. We know, of course, that there are many 

 Rose houses that are even nine to ten years old 

 that never fail to produce abundant crops, par- 

 ticularly such as Marshal Neil and other climbers ; 

 but in such cases it seems to be that the Roses 

 planted either had escaped the visitation of the 

 Rose Bug altogether, or had got so deeply and 

 strongly rooted before being attacked that they 

 could not injure the plants. There is some dif- 

 ference of opinion as to the propriety of shad- 

 ing Rose houses during the hot summer months. 

 We believe that a slight shading is beneficial, 

 and for that purpose use naphtha mixed with a 

 little white lead, just enough to give it the ap- 

 pearance of thin milk. This we throw on the 

 outside of the glass with a syringe. It costs 

 only about twenty-five cents for every thousand 

 square feet. This shading is the best we have 

 ever used; it is just enough to take the glare of 

 sunlight off, without much lessening the light; 

 and though it will hold on tenaciously during 

 the summer, is easily rubbed off in fall. 



GARDEN CT7LTDBE OF THE EOSB. 



But little need be said on this branch of the 

 subject, all that is wanted being a deep, rich soil, 

 in an unshaded position. For the dry climate of 

 the United States a class of Roses should be 

 grown very different from those grown in Eng- 

 land. There the "Remontants" or "Hybrid 

 Perpetuals," in their' humid atmosphere, with 

 few exceptions, flower nearly as freely as the 

 ' ' Monthly" Roses do here ; but with us experience 

 has shown that, after the first bloom in June, 

 no full crop of flowers is again obtained, unless 

 with the comparatively new class known as the 

 Hybrid Teas, of wLich "La France" and 



