1848 



GENESEE FARMER. 



135 



planted right, will not show more than two or 

 three inches of the top above ground ; the branch- 

 es a!) spread at equal distances, just touching, 

 forming a close, connected even line. 



Don't fail, among annuals, to get Phlox Drum- 

 mondi — beautiful, and a long bloomer — and the 

 Poriulaccas, that are finest when the weather is 

 scorching everything else. The Sedum Sicboldi 

 is another beautiful succulent plant, perennial, 

 that loves the hot sun. It is a most desirable, 

 though rare, border plant. 



How to Raise Pear SeedliDgs. 



Nurserymen and others who have attempted 

 to raise pear seedlings, are well aware of the ob- 

 stacles which present themselves. The first is, the 

 ditliculty of obtaining seeds, and the second and 

 chief one, is a leaf blight that completely divests 

 the plants of their foliage in summer, (about the 

 month of August,) and stops their growth. The 

 next is their liability to be drawn out in winter 

 by severe frosts, from the lack of sufficient fibres 

 to hold them firmly in the ground. The usual 

 practice to avoid the drawing out by frost is to 

 take up the plants, and either lay them in trench- 

 es in dry soil out of doors, or in a cellar. 



Mr. Nelson, a very intelligent gardener of 

 Newburyport, Mass., says, in the Horticulturist, 

 he succeeds well by sowing the seed in the fall, 

 and as soon in the spring as the plants have four 

 leaves he takes them up, cuts off the tap roots, 

 and transplants them into nursery rows in good 

 soil, and thus they form sufficient fibres to hold 

 them in the ground during winter without pro- 

 tection, and may be budded the next season. — 

 We saw last August, in Bloorpfield, a small bed 

 of a few hundred that had been managed precise- 

 ly in this way. They were then all budded and 

 the buds had taken, and the plants were stout, 

 short jointed, and finely clothed with healthy fo- 

 liage. We therefore think well of this method. 

 The labor can be no obipction whatever. The 

 transplanting should be done on a dark day, be- 

 fore rain. 



We copy the following article from the Mass. 

 Ploughman., which may furnish useful hints, giv- 

 ing, as it appears, the detail of a very successful 

 practice — regardless of the leaf blight: 



Mk. Editor : — Dear sir, I can not agree witli your cor- 

 respondents on the subject of raising seedling pear stocks. 

 I have had some experience in the business for the last six 

 years, and have planted from one to three hundred bushels 

 of them, and have raised from fifteen to thirty thousand 

 seetliings a year. I Isave tried thera on diiferent soils, and 

 the very best I have ever raised were planted upon a hiU 

 of very hard strong lund ; the land was broken up and 

 pluulei), some of it one year and some of it two with pota- 

 toes. Tlie ground was plowed in November and furrowed 

 out into rows of two and a half feet apart, so as to use the 

 cuhivator liclween the rows. Manure was put into the 

 rows and the pomace sowed upon it and covered very light- 

 ly, laking care to keep ihem free from weeds, and they 

 grew finely unlil the fire blight, so called, caused the leaves 

 to drop and the growth to slop, but they had made a wood 

 of about ten to fourteen inches and very stocky, and I do 



not consider this much injury to them as the growth is 

 stopped and the wood ripens hard, and they stand the win- 

 ter much better, the roots branch out and they have very 

 little top compared with those that are planted upon a very 

 deep rich loam. Some of them will have a lap root of from 

 ten to twelve inches long and be as bare of fibrous roots as 

 a pipe stem. Upon such soils they generally make a second 

 growth and the wood does not ripen and they are very 

 green and tender and very likely to die in winter. The 

 growth upou such a soil as one of your correspondents says 

 from eighteen to twenty-four inches, would be very great, 

 and taken from such a seed bed as that and set out into nur- 

 sery rows, three-fourths of them would die the first year, 

 as but a very few nurserymen can obtain such a soil, and 

 if they were put into a poorer one they could not be expect- 

 ed to start and grow very readily. I think there is some- 

 thing more to be looked to than getting a large growth the 

 first year. When I set them into nursery rows in spring I 

 think the most important item is to see that they are well 

 taken care of in the fall, by putting salt hay or coarse ma- 

 nure into the rows and have it well spread and trod down 

 so as to keep the frost from heaving them out. If they are 

 not well protected in the fall of the year in which they are 

 set out it is sure death to three-fourths of them. When I 

 want them to stand in the pomace where they are sowed 

 until they are two or three years old, I plant them with 

 apple pomace, about half of each, and they will stand the 

 winter without being protected at all, as the apple roots are 

 much stronger than the pear, and there is no danger of 

 their being thrown out by the frost. I broke up one acre of 

 hard, strong land last spring, and planted it with potatoes. 

 In November I plowed it again, furrowed it out into rows, 

 and plantedone-half of it wiihone hundred bushels of pears 

 ground into pomace and the same quantity of apple pomace, 

 mixed together. These are intended to stand upon the 

 ground until they are two or three years old. I have now 

 six quarts on hand which I have cut and taken from the 

 pears with a knife. I selected such kinds of winter pears 

 as would yield from eight to ten good plump seed and put 

 them into my cellar in the fall, taking care to select such 

 kinds as would keep well from rotting and cut them eve- 

 nings and such leisure hours as I could get, and put the 

 seed into a box, mixed a little earth with them, and set them 

 out upon the ground and let them remain there until spring, 

 as I can not get them up until they have had the action of 

 the frost upon them, and as soon as the ground is in good 

 order in the spring I plant them. Last year I planted them 

 in the spring as above described, and they were much bet- 

 ter than those that were planted in the fall, the ground be- 

 ing newly plowed and in better order in the spring. But I 

 am obliged to plant all such kinds as the common spring 

 pear, as they will not keep. The pears after the seed is cut 

 from them are not lost ; I have kept my store pigs upon 

 them until now, by boiling them and mixing with shorts, 

 and they have grown well upon them. 



Yours, W. G. Lake. 



Topsfield, Feb. 14, 1848. 



A " Miscellaneous" Tree — A gentleman 

 ofGolnitz, in Altenburgh, carried the art of en- 

 grafting various kinds of fruit into a native tree 

 so far that it contained 300 samples. This we 

 believe, has never been surpassed. It was a 

 work of love with him. He appended a piece 

 of board to each engraftment which gave the tree 

 an appearance the most amusing. The Russians 

 who once bivouacked in the vicinity, refrained 

 from harming it, although they cut down all its 

 companions for firewood. 



Fruit Trees in this vicinity, says the Ohio 

 (Columbus) Cultivator, of April 15, are now in 

 full bloom, and present a promising appearance, 

 excepting peaches in exposed and wet situations. 

 From nearly all parts of the State we observe 

 favorable notices of the prospects for fruit ; the* 

 in the southern counties many of the peach trees 

 have lost their buds by the winter. 



