114 



POPULAR GARDENING. 



April, 



Robin's Return. 



Robin on the tilting bough. 

 Red-breast rover, tell rae how 

 You the weary time have passed 

 Since we saw and heard you last. 



"In a green and pleasant land. 

 By a summer sea-breeze fanned, 

 Orange trees with fruit are bent: 

 There the weary time I've spent." 

 Robin rover, there, no doubt. 

 Your best music you've poured out. 

 Piping to a stranger's ear, 

 You forgot your lovers here. 



"Little lady, on my word, 

 You do wrong a true-heart bird ! 

 Not one ditty would I sing. 

 'Mong the leaves or on the wing, 

 In the sun or in the rain; 

 Stranger's ear would list in vain. 

 If I ever tried a note. 

 Something rose within my throat. 



" Twas because my heart was true 

 To the North and spring time new; 



" My mind's eye a nest could see 

 In yon old, forked Apple tree!" 



—Edith M Thomas. 



If Mother Nature patches 



The leaves of tree and vine, 

 I'm sure she does her darning 



With needles of the Pine! 

 They are so long and slender; 



And sometimes, in full view, 

 They have their thread of cobwebs, 



And thimbles made of dew I 



—St. Nicholas. 



'* Firstling of spring" the ancients called 



Our modest Primrose dear. 

 For first among the woodland flowers 



It braves th* awakening year. 



Boll the lawn. 



Lilies need deep planting. 



Early seed raisers— the hens. 



A flower girl-Rhoda Dendron. 



"We should say try an Eaton Grape. 



Manure directly against the root, kills. 



The Chinese begin to appreciate lawn mowers. 



Light soil for Onions ~ heavy soil for Onion seed. 



The weed croi> comes in where there is no other. 



Zebra-Striped Zinnias are among this year's nov- 

 elties. 



For a novelty, plant the Red flowering Horse- 

 chestnut. 



Many a person would join our family this month 

 if invited. 



Cabbage seed beds, in the midst of buildings, es- 

 cape the tlea. 



Genesis. The first man was the first horticultur- 

 ist.— />r. Gillett. 



"We like and recommend the Barberry for a low 

 ornameulal hedge 



Let the back yard also be kept tidy, and adorned 

 with ornamental growths. 



Lawn mowers were invented in 1830, by Edward 

 Budding of Gloucester, England. 



This year's Florida Oranges are inferior. The 

 frosts of recent years are blamed. 



The garden should be twice as long as wide, that 

 horses may be employed to advantage. 



Garden seeds kept by the corner grocer are not 

 good enough for Popular Gardening readers. 



Tbe Mezeron Pink heads the procession of 

 Flowering Shrubs, coming some weeks ahead of 

 Forsythia. 



A good April task for each one of our readers 

 would be the securing of one or more new subscrib- 

 ers to this journal. 



Count upon Phlox Drummondii. well doubled, 

 among the flowers of the near future. Semi-doub- 

 les have been out for some time. 



Ten-week Stocks, sown in the house in April, 

 with me begin blooming in June, and give a long 

 season of beauty and fragrance.— i'lrfer's Wife. 



Sponges kept continually within the tops of 

 Camellias or similar plants that enjoy a moist at- 

 mosphere are of value in properly promoting this 

 condition 



In the orcharding, as well as the farming of the 

 future, what is going to count better than the buy- 

 ing of more land, is the taking better care of what 

 is possessed. 



A Lesson from the Flowers. A deaf and dumb 

 person being asked to give his idea of forgiveness, 

 took his pencil and wrote: "It is the sweetness 

 which flowers yield when trampled upon," 



Red Spider. What do some of our aged read- 

 ers say to this proposition by our friend Mrs. G. 

 W. H.: "If our grandmothers were plagued with 

 these little pests they made no record of it." 



** Uncle Sam." This is the name of a new Carna- 

 tion we have lately seen grown by Messrs. L. Tem- 

 plin & Sons, Calla, Ohio. It is a scarlet of the 

 striped section, and is of fine form and good size. 



Moist Fingers for Bug-killing. In killing in- 

 sects with the thumb and finger, take a basin of 

 tepid water to dip the fingers in. as the little pests 

 are more easily caught with moist hands.— .B. 

 Preston. 



No doubt there are old, soiled berry baskets 

 about the place. They are not fit for fruit again, 

 but all such answer well for starting plants of 

 early Cucumbers, Squashes, etc., in, and later 

 setting them out basket and all. 



Farfugium Grande. Of the many house plants 

 we have, the yellow spotted Farfugium has, dur- 

 ing the past winter, stood at the head of all others 

 for vigor and beauty. I would place it first on my 

 list of fine, easily managed plants.- Jod;e. 



That fine manure for crops is more valuable 

 than coarse admits of no argument. Hens can 

 break up manure better perhaps than any one 

 of the machines invented for the purpose. Scatter 

 some wheat over the pile and turn them on. 



One of our Wild Grapes deserving of more at- 

 tention as an ornamental vine is Vitis riparia, a 

 variety of the Frost Grape. It is a luxuriant 

 grower with broad cut^lobed leaves that are ex- 

 tremely handsome, as well as of a most refreshing 

 green throughout the summer. 



Potatoes in Barrels. Mr. E S. Goff, of the New 

 York Experimental Station, has raised Potatoes in 

 half barrels filled with sand and fed with water, to 

 which fertilizers had been added. The result was 

 Potatoes simply perfect in shape— that is, they were 

 perfect specimens of the variety grown. 



Herman De Vry. The death of this gentleman at 

 Chicago February 25, at the age of 3S years, re- 

 moves one of the most talented landscape garden- 

 ers this country has ever known. The magnificence 

 of the bedding in Lincoln Park, Chicago, in late 

 years, is to be attributed most largely to his efforts. 



Ask and It Shall be Given. No one can fairly 

 say that Popular Gardening is without a depart- 

 ment for him or her, as the case maj- 

 be, when the Inquiry Department stands 

 open to meet the special wants of every 

 reader. What any other part may lack 

 this one should make up to the exact 

 need of every subscriber, whose wants 

 are stated. 



To raise large Pansies one must not 

 have too many flowers on each plant. 

 Leaving three or four shoots to a plant, 

 and these with but a few flowers each, 

 is about right. The application of 

 manure water, as has before been sug- 

 gested in these columns, is also one of 

 the essentials. By observing these 

 points the work is open to great possi- 

 bilities. 



Trenching or sub-soiling, so benefi- 

 cial to nearly all crops, finds an excep- 

 tion in the case of heat-loving vegetables 

 like Corn, Tomatoes and Lima Beans, the roots of 

 which should be encouraged to keep near the 

 surface. A very deep soil invites them downward 

 into the cooler stratum, the temperature of which 

 is not conducive to the best development.— OM 

 Gardener. 



Evidently They " Knew Beans." " Locomo- 

 tive " writes as follows: " I plant Beans among my 

 CabV)ages, and since beginning they have never 

 been infested with caterpillars. The White Butter- 

 fly passes over them, hence I have a clean crop. 

 In use the plan has three recommendations— it is 

 clean, it costs nothing, it saves many an hour's 

 fighting of caterpillars." 



All plants will not bear the fumes of Tobacco 

 with an equal degree of impunity. The Heliotrope, 

 Salvia, and some Begonias are among the first to 



suffer. By syringing or else dipping such in water, 

 to have the leaves coated with moisture, previous 

 to subjecting the collection to smoke, even these 

 will not suffer. Light fumigating, and often, is 

 better than heavy smudges. 



A Bird's Appetite. Dr. Wood, an authority on 

 such matters, says, that if a man could eat as 

 much in proportion as a bird, he would consume a 

 whole round of beef for his dinner. The redbreast 

 is a most voracious bird. It has been calculated 

 that to keep a redbreast up to its normal weight, 

 an amount of animal food is required daily, equal 

 to an earthworm fourteen feet in length. 



A Handsome Picture. All lovers of the Chrys- 

 anthemum will be interested in a large colored pic- 

 ture of 18 varieties of this popular flower, recently 

 issued by Beatty & Co., of New York. Its size is 

 21 X 27 inches, being a reproduction of a costly oil- 

 painting. It is not a mere fancy sketch, but faith- 

 fully delineates one of the more striking named 

 varieties in cultivation in a way that enables one to 

 recognize them at sight. It is a pictiu-e worthy of 

 a place in every home and offlce. 



It Might Do for Some Other Things, Also. Our 



sprightly correspondent, " Sister Gracious," tells of 

 an eccentric chap living in a crowded city street, 

 and with a back yard only fifteen feet square, who 

 was determined to raise Strawbeiries of his own. 

 He bored holes into the sides of a hogshead and 

 filled it with rich earth, then put his plants in the 

 holes and on top. They rooted and grew finely. 

 The second year he picked twenty-five quarts. He 

 says: " It is not back-aching work to pick straw- 

 berries from my bed." 



A Moss Garden, A good idea is brought to the 

 attention of the Popular Gardening family by one 

 of the members, Ephraim Preston, Berks Co., Pa., 

 on this subject, as follows: "Tell your readers 

 they can make a very pretty bed in any design they 

 wish, of two or more shades of moss— light and 

 dark grays, etc., that are to be found in most of the 

 chestnut and some other woods where the soil is 

 thin. Make the bed in a half shaded place, where 

 the grass or weeds will not grow readily. The 

 moss is easiest moved when damp. 



A neighbor who formerly thought that *' Straw- 

 berries were Strawberries," and that any kind 

 would of its own accord produce fruit, set out quite 

 a patch of a famous kind but never got a berry. 

 An examination by an expert soon revealed the 

 cause: they were pistillate or female plants, which 

 require another pollen bearing variety planted near 

 by for their fertilization. He did not know this, 

 but now he knows. Since coming to this knowledge 

 he has, by proper improvement, gotten in the way 

 of securing a plenty of fruit from his well tilled 

 patch. 



Neatness and Taste. In Brimner's work on Cot- 

 tages he says: "It has been claimed that pretty 

 and comfortable homes exert a decided moral in- 

 fluence. Be this as it may, we are all interested in 

 making our homes attractive. And there is no 

 reason why they should not 

 be so. We are apt to think 

 that costly things must be 

 beautiful; but this is by no 

 means true, nor is it true that 

 inexpensive objects must be 

 ugly. The same materials 



LAWN EDGER— COMPANION iMPLEMtNT TO THE LAWN MOWER, 

 used in the construction and decoration of an ugly 

 apartment might, with the exercise of taste, be 

 so employed that a graceful combination would 

 result. 



Strawberry Culture. In preparing to plant 

 strawberries, take good land if you can get it; if 

 not, take poor. For commercial purposes the con- 

 ditions must be decidedly favorable. Plow well in 

 the fall, plow well in the spring. Do not fool money 

 away in trenching. Plant in the spring: not in the 

 fall, not in the summer. Mark the ground: trim 

 the plants; dip them in water, and place in a pail; 

 thrust in the spade before you at forty-five degrees; 

 a boy puts the plant in while you withdraw the 

 spade and press the earth firmly with your foot. A 

 man and a boy will thus put in 4,000 plants in a 

 day,— Parfcer Earle. 



