POPULAR GARDENING 



AND FRUIT GROWING. 



"ACCUSE NOT NATURE, SHE HATH DONE HEB PART; DO THOU BUT TBINE."-Uiltoh. 



Vol. II. 



orxrisrE, 188*7. 



No. 9. 



June. 

 O month of verdaut beauty. 



Of Strawberries and leaves, 

 Of sentiuieut and Uoses, 



Of balmy moonlight eves, 

 Of Bobolinks and rosy haze, 

 Of careless mirth and easy ways, 

 O couldst thou stay forever 



And weave thy simple arts 

 There were no withered leaves then. 



Nor many withered hearts. 



— Siisali Hartley Stvett. 



With the early fruits coming in plentiful, 

 Rhubarb should have a rest from much cutting. 



The market grower is liable to make a 

 great mistake who overlooks the neighboring 

 home market, trusting to the large towns only. 



With great care to secure all the roots 

 possible, and not allowing them to dry during 

 the operation, trees and shrubs can, if necessary, 

 be re^et even in this month with fair success, 

 by first removing all the leaves. New leaves 

 will appear later. 



In hot dry weather Gladiolus wlU repay 

 the attention of a mulch of rotten manure over 

 the beds, and applj'ing water freely if thought 

 needful. Another thing, it is the right course 

 to place supports to the plants in the earliest 

 stages of the spikes, as the broad leaves are 

 much acted upon by gales of wind, and if the 

 roots get loosened the plants soon suffer. 



Those having spots about the home so shady 

 that grass will not grow may rely upon the 

 hardy Ferns for embellishing here. Wild 

 Ferns abound in all parts of the country in 

 woods and waste places, and can usually be had 

 for the digging. Even if one is obliged to 

 depend upon the nurseries, there can be nothing 

 serious in the case, for the best kinds are low- 

 priced, and they ship and grow readily. 



The fact that Grape-vine shoots so early 

 get into a tangle, by reason of their hook-like 

 tendrils getting a firm hold of each other, dirti- 

 cult to be displaced without injury, suggests 

 the need of early pinching away all needless 

 shoots and the proper direction of others. As 

 soon as the buds burst forth it is best to remove 

 at least every shoot which has not more than 

 one or two clusters. This will throw the 

 strength into the shoots having more fruit, 

 with the result of a better general yield. 



Shall we have an American Society of 

 Horticulture in every way worthy of our great 

 nation ; A large stride towards the solution of 

 this important question was made when, in 

 January, 188.5, the flourishing Mississippi Val- 

 ley Horticultural Society took the initiative, 

 and by an almost unanimous vote changed its 

 name to that of the American Horticultural 

 Society. It was a good move, and one which 

 meets with wide approval. But now that a 

 national society of the beloved art horticulture 

 is well under way, and olHcereJ by such able and 

 representative men as Parker Earle, president: 

 T. V. Munson, first vice-president; W. H. 

 Ragan, secretary, what is more than all else 

 needed for assuring to it a great and useful 

 future is a large increase of members. That 

 there is a growing sympathy among cultivators, 



a coming together of sections throughout the 

 country, is more and more apparent, and 

 in no way can this be better promoted for the 

 good of horticulture and the horticulturist 

 than in the better founding of this new society. 

 We have, it is true, a grand American Pom- 

 ological Society, and several flourishing 

 American Societies representing the nursery, 

 seed, and florists' trades, each with a clearly 

 defined mission of its own, but in this more 

 recent organization is set forth a general 

 society for alt horticulturists, and which should 

 be the most popular and influential association 

 of its kind in America. And there are, aside 

 from the mere fact of one's aiding a worthy 

 association, certain special inducements which 

 should lead all gardeners and fruit growers to 

 become supporters of the Society referred to. 

 The annual membership fee is ¥3.00, and this, 

 besides admitting members to all ordinary 

 privibges of the association, entitles each one 

 to a copy of the current edition of the published 

 transactions. This in each case is a fine cloth 

 bound volume of the proceedings of the last 

 general meeting of the society, and which, in 

 the two latest editions, has amounted to a book 

 of several hundred pages respectively. Than 

 the contents of such volumes, it may be said, 

 there can be no more valuable matter to 

 the horticulturist, consisting, as it does, of 

 essays and discussions by the ablest practical 

 horticulturists of America. We trust that this 

 statement made to our readers may lead 

 many of them to become enrolled as members 

 of the American Horticultural Society. It is 

 a society which should be pushed on to a great 

 success, and our readers should be foremost in 

 the good work. The secretarj', W. H. Ragan, 

 may be addressed at Greencastle, Indiana. 



The Strawberry not a True Fruit. 



That universal favorite of its season, the 

 Strawberry, presents in its fleshy part the 

 strange botanical anomaly of being no fruit 

 at all. The ordinary definition of a fruit is 

 the matured ovary (seed vessel) and all it 

 contains or it is a part of. Now while 

 this definition applies well to all common 

 fruits, such as the Apple, Pear, Peach, 

 Grape, Cherry, Blackberry, etc., in the 

 Strawberry is found a decided exception. 

 Here the fleshy edible portion, instead of 

 being in any true sense a part of the ovary, 

 is that part of the flower known as the 

 receptacle (the support of the essential floral 

 organs which develop into fruit), but which 

 here is monstrously developed. 



To carefully cut a Strawberry and 

 for example a Raspberry flower, through 

 crosswise of the centers, as is represented done 

 in the engraving, and this matter may be 

 better understood. In both figures — the 

 upper one being the Strawberry — the letters 

 AA indicate the ovaries of the flowers, 

 in other «ords. the undeveloped fruit, and 

 BB the receptacles which support the fruit. 

 It is at once seen that this part in the Rasp- 

 berry, as is the case with the generality of 

 fruits, has but its normal use and beyond 

 that proves worthless. In the Strawberry 

 this receptacle, supporting the true fruit, 

 in this case mere seeds, develops into the 



delicious edible part, but which cannot be 

 the fruit in a strict sense. 



Bearing in some measure upon this inter- 

 esting matter we have received from Mr. 

 Joseph II. Bourn, of Providence Co., R. I., ■ 

 a brief dissertation on the Strawberry and 

 its improvement, which we are, in this con- 

 nection, glad to lay before our readers, as 

 follows: 



Flowers of Strawberry aiid Raspberry Compared. 



"It is wonderful to reflect that the first 

 Strawberries had no ancestors; that they 

 came into existence liy spontaneous genera- 

 tion or special creation; and the question 

 still awaits solution. From what source do 

 the new series of development arise? Prom 

 seed production, the cause of their duration 

 is obscure; — by fertilizing the pistil of one 

 kind with the pollen of another novel results 

 are produced; and still further, the pistil of 

 a flower maj' sometimes be fertilized by the 

 pollen of one of a similar constitution, and 

 the fruits raised from the seeds combine the 

 properties and characteristics of both parents. 

 Those changes brought about in a plant by 

 the nature of its food and other external 

 conditions must not be confounded with 

 variation, for characters which may become 

 hereditary arise independently of the direct 

 influence of soil, locality, climate, or other 

 outward influences. Hybridism is so difli- 

 cult to effect between nearly related species 

 that hybrids rarely occur in nature; are 

 usually sterile and incapable of perpetuation 

 of seed, therefore different sets of hereditary 

 characters must be combined, even to pro- 

 duce a tendency towards a new formation. 



The knowledge of a century devoted to 

 structural investigation has thrown much 

 light upon the mystery of plant organization ; 

 but the origination of the improvements and 

 the successive adaptations to meet new con- 

 ditions still remain inexplicable, and suggest 

 the inquiry why so few new varieties of 

 Strawberries are worth growing, and why 

 do those that have good qualities so soon 

 loose them? Jlodern science, now reaching 

 out towards the new, mysterious and the 

 beautiful, will doubtless soon unravel many 

 hidden truths, and enable us to better inter- 

 pret and practically apply Nature's constant 

 or eccentric laws,now wondrous and abstruse 



