May, 1909 



THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST 



101 



A Season's Experience in Alberta 



D. W. Spice, Lacombe 



FOR my first season with flowers in 

 Alberta, I chose only those annuals 

 whose culture I was familiar with, 

 such as asters, sweet peas, stocks. Phlox 



long days of July and August, the 

 growth and wealth of bloom was really 

 wonderful. 



I have also tried dahlias, German iris. 



A Westera Home that Has Flowers in Abundance 



Residence of Mr. D. W. Spice, Lacombe, Alta. Flower beds on each side of lawn and on three sides of house 

 containing dahlias, phlox, bleeding heart, irie, poppies, asters, stocks and nasturtiums. 



Drummondii, Shirley poppies, lupines, 

 candytuft, alyssum, nasturtiums, go- 

 detias, and so forth. The results were 

 a very pleasant surprise to me, as so 

 many wise ones had told me how foolish 

 I was to try to grow flowers in Alberta. 

 Friends from Ontario who visited us were 

 greatly surprised at the wonderful growth 

 and profusion of bloom, especially so 

 with the asters, phlox, sweet peas and 

 stocks. 



Owing to our short summer season, I 

 found it much better to start most of my 

 annuals in a hotbed early in April, and 

 transplant the first week of June, just 

 in time to catch the rains. During the 



bleeding heart, gladioli, hollyhocks and 

 pasonies with splendid success. The hol- 

 lyhocks and gladioli I started in the hot- 

 bed in empty fruit baskets, the kind we 

 get plums and peaches in. They were 

 soon up and doing. I gradually harden- 

 ed them off'. When they were ready for 

 their permanent bed, I sunk box and all 

 in the bed ; by this means the roots were 

 not disturbed and soon the plants were 

 in full bloom, the wonder of many who 

 had tried these without success. 



In perennials, pansies head the list. 

 Alberta's climate just suits them. My 

 sixty-five-foot bed was a bewildering 

 mass of blossoms from May until the 



real hard frosts came. I tried also lark- 

 spurs, sweet William, pinks, columbines, 

 and found them to do splendidly. Last 

 July, I sowed seeds of over twenty dif- 

 ferent perennials as an experiment. They 

 went into their winter quarters strong, 

 husky plants. 



Buying vs. Saving Aster Seeds 



Charles James Fox, Sooth London, Oot. 



The article in the March issue of 

 The Canadian Horticulturist, entitled 

 "How an Amateur Grows Asters," by 

 W. Norman, of Elmira, will be read by 

 many thousands. I think that the latter 

 part of the article, if carried out, would 

 prove a failure. For over sixty years 1 

 have grown asters, and if I want to 

 "own the best in my neighborhood" I 

 should not grow them from seed of my 

 own saving. How many amateur grow- 

 ers are there who do not begin to pick the 

 first and best flowers for their own use, 

 also for the benefit of their neighbors 

 who have no gardens? 



Last year I bought seven packets in 

 seven different colors, and each packet 

 produced eighty per cent, of plants true 

 to the color named on the packet. Mr. 

 Norman must know that the seeds in 

 those packets that could not be grown "by 

 the acre like flax." It is only by a 

 large amount of labor and great care in 

 selection that such are produced. Each 

 color is grown -separately. Every plant 

 showing the slightest signs of a wrong 

 color is destroyed. 



Such seed demands a fair price. It is 

 far better to buy fifty seeds for twenty- 

 five cents and grow, say, forty first-class 

 aster plants, than to pay five cents for a 

 packet containing 200 seeds and, after 

 all the labor in transplanting two or three 

 times, to find hardly a decent aster in 

 the whole lot. 



Five years ago a friend sent me a few 

 seeds that he had raised from a plant of 

 a lovely light shade of lavender. He 

 picked off all side shoots, and saved the 

 seed from four perfect flowers. I raised 

 eighteen plants, ten of which gave white 

 flowers, five red and pink shades, and 

 the balance dark shades of lavender. My 

 friend grew about sixty plants with about 

 the same results, not one plant of the 

 color from which the seed was produced. 

 Why? Because alongside of the parent 

 plant there was a bed of white ones, and 

 the bees did the trick for him. 



If good asters are wanted, buy the 

 best seed from good and reliable seeds- 

 men, and such seed cannot be sold at 

 five cents a packet. It is those men who 

 have for years made a study of the grow- 

 ing of seeds, that we have to thank for 

 the great improvement of our asters dur- 

 ing the last twenty years. 



Vegetable and Small Fruit Garden in Alberta, Oae Year from Unbroken Prairie 



At rear of house shown in companion illustration. Around the lot are tWo rows of Manitoba Maples that made 

 from four to seven feet of (jrowth in two summers. 



For the edges of borders, walks and 

 drives, use an edging knife. Seedsmen 

 .sell them. 



