THE FLORISTS' MANUAL. 



37 



Dutch Hyacinths. 



themselves or in combination with 

 roses, violets or carnations. 



If you want tulips or Von Sions, 

 Paper white narcissus or Roman hya- 

 cinths at the earliest possible date 

 they can be got in flower you should 

 not delay a day in getting a portion 

 of your shipment into the flats, and 

 they should be well watered and cov- 

 ered at once. The Romans arrive in 

 August, the Paper White a little later 

 and the tulips, hyacinths and Von 

 Sions along in September. As I re- 

 marked about the soil for the beds, 

 the soil, providing it is of a loose tex- 

 ture and easily handled, is of little 

 consequence. Heat and water force 

 out the flower spike and that is the 

 last you care about the bulb. We 

 generally use the soil that has done 

 duty the previous year on the carna- 

 tion benches. 



I found out many years ago that 

 boxes and flats of every size and 

 shape for forcing bulbs was a poor 

 plan, however cheap, and for years 

 have made boxes of one pattern, which 

 is 24 inches long, 12 inches wide and 



3 inches deep, all inside measure. I 

 buy strips 16 feet long (any length 

 will do, but you don't want waste), 3 

 inches wide and half an inch thick, 

 and some strips 3 inches wide and 1 

 inch thick. Four of the thin strips 

 make the bottom with a little space 

 between them, two of them make the 

 sides and the 1 inclt thick strips make 

 the ends. They are nailed together 

 with 6-penny nails, and two or three 

 boys will make 150 of them in a few 

 hours. These boxes will last several 

 years if cleaned out and piled with 

 their bottoms up, but not if allowed 

 to lay around the yard half full of 

 soil till the following fall, or run over 

 by the wagon, or when used to carry 

 plants to a bedding job to be left 

 there and not called for. 



Oh, florists, I am not immaculate 

 myself in this respect, but how many 

 dollars you do waste in letting your 

 boxes, pots, flats, tools and imple- 

 ments lie around in disorder. You 

 are about as bad as the slovenly farm- 

 ers in a poor, poverty stricken farm- 

 ing district which is always to be 



found without going very far. It is 

 well known, and admitted by the man- 

 ufacturer,- that if the American farmer 

 took good care of his agricultural im- 

 plements and tools half the factories 

 could and would close down. The 

 scythe is hung in the apple tree, the 

 plow is thrown out at the end of the 

 last furrow to bleach and rot in the 

 sun and rain, the harrow may be dig- 

 nified by being tilted up against the 

 fence, and the costly reaper lies out 

 in the yard for the children and chick- 

 ens to perch on. There is no time to 

 clean and put things away. The gos- 

 sip of the village smithy or rural 

 post-office must be attended to. The 

 prosperous farmer's place is all con- 

 trary to this, and as the florist is 

 farming on a high grade and costly 

 plan where the outlay and receipts to 

 the acre are enormous, it behooves 

 him to take care of all his implements 

 and have them ship shape and in place 

 where they are always ready to his 

 hand. j ,| 



Some men can do twice as much 

 on an acre as another. It is order, 

 system and cleanliness that enables 

 him to do it. "Dirt is matter out of 

 place." That is a true definition. I 

 once found fault with a man, who was 

 then a partner, that his rubbish pile 

 contained everything from decent pot- 

 ting soil to broken glass, hoop iron 

 and empty beer bottles. He rather 

 peevishly replied that he had no tim? 

 to spare and was glad to get rid of 

 the stuff out of the greenhouses. That 

 "time" excuse is the worst of all, and 

 the man who lets his wagon stand out 

 in the sun till the hubs are cracked 

 has always the most time to spin a 

 yarn, or see how much old Bill Jones' 

 cows bring at the auction. If my 

 friend had had a pile for stuff that 

 was purely rubbish and another for 

 old soil and plants and vegetable 

 matter that would come useful some 

 day it would have been much time 

 saved in the end and some money. 



With this diversion we will return 

 to the bulbs. The flats as described 

 will hold 60 Romans, 50 Paper White, 

 and from 60 to 72 tulips, according to 

 the size. Yellow Prince is a large 

 bulb, La Reine is a small one. I be- 

 lieve, as Mr. Ernst Asmus said at Chi- 

 cago years ago, that it makes little 

 difference in the flowering how close 

 the bulbs are. Even if touching they 

 will flower all right, and save room. 



We always do our bulb boxing out- 

 side on a temporary bench where the 

 soil can be brought to the men by 

 the cart load. We fill the flats nearly 

 full, very loosely, and squeeze the 

 bulb into the soil till the top of the 

 bulb is even with the edge of the box. 

 A few handfuls of soil fill up between 

 the bulbs and the jo'b is done. All this 

 is a very quick operation. A good 

 man will box 8,000 to 10,000 a day if 

 supplied with boxes and soil and an- 

 other man to take the boxes away 

 when filled. 



Bulb houses have been spoken of, 

 but I never saw the need of them. 

 We once tried our earliest tulips un- 



