PROPAGATING SOFT-WOODED PLANTS. 131 



known was absurd ; but, above all, the operation was to 

 be performed in July ! He might have got the sharpest 

 knife that was ever made, and the purest silver sand that 

 ever lay on the seashore, but he would have most likely 

 failed in our climate, if he attempted the work in July. 

 This is only one of scores of such absurd selections as we 

 see yearly in some of our horticultural journals. If the 

 conductors of such have not original matter to fill up with, 

 better far that they leave their pages blank than to show 

 their utter ignorance of what is suitable to our climate. 



CHAPTER XXYI. 

 PROPAGATING SOFT-WOODED PLANTS IN SUMMER. 



Every one who has attempted the propagation of plants 

 by cuttings during the high temperature we have in the 

 months of July and August, is aware of the great diffi- 

 culty experienced in doing so, no matter what system or 

 process is resorted to. In those months, plants of a suc- 

 culent nature, such as Carnations, Geraniums, Petunias, 

 etc., etc., grow rapidly, and the shoots formed are in 

 consequence watery and soft, so that, when detached from 

 the plant and used for propagation at that hot season of 

 the year, when the thermometer will average seventy-five 

 or eighty degrees in the shade, the chances are that few 

 will root, but will, as gardeners term it, "damp off" in 

 a few days after being put in as cuttings. In ordinary 

 cases, with those having the means of propagating plants, 

 this difficulty of rooting cuttings during the summer 

 months is not of much importance, as florists usually re- 

 serve stock enough to enable them to produce all the cut- 

 tings they require at the proper season for propagating^ 



