48 



THE NURSERY-MANUAL 



English advice 



The English gardener is known for his good training and 

 his care to details. The following advice is chosen from The 

 Garden (London) for April 14, 1917 : 



"The receptacles in which the seed is to be sown need to be selected 

 with some care. Boxes or pans 3 inches or rather more in depth are pre- 

 ferred by many ; but where only 

 a little seed of a kind is needed, 

 an ordinary flower-pot, 5 inches 

 or 6 inches in diameter at the top, 

 answers well, and does not take 

 up a lot of room. Whatever is 

 FIG. 28. Seed-box, with side removed to used must be scrupulously clean 



show the drainage and rough material in 

 the bottom and the fine soil on top. 



and have ample outlet at the 

 bottom for waste water; stag- 

 nant moisture in the soil kills more seedlings under cool conditions than 

 anything else. The boxes ought to have holes three-quarters of an inch 

 or 1 inch in diameter in their bottoms, five holes not being too much for a 

 box measuring 15 inches by 12 inches. Over these holes a layer of broken 

 pots, or crocks as they are termed, must be placed, then some rough 

 fibrous material, and, finally, the fine, sifted soil. Fig. 28 shows a box 

 with one side removed. Note the crocks and rough and fine soil. This 

 is a large box; consequently a dividing board is placed across the center 

 so that two kinds of seed may 

 be sown in it, one at each end. 

 "The soil for seed-sowing is 

 quite as important as the 

 drainage. For the majority of 

 the seedlings that the average 

 beginner is likely to want to 



raise, the following mixture 



will answer well : Good turfy FlG . 29> The sowing in the see d-box (Fig. 

 loam, well chopped and passed 28). Large seeds may be placed separately, 

 through a 1-inch meshed sieve, as shown at the right. The small ones may 

 two parts; leaf-soil, well de- be mixed with dry sand and firmed into the 



earth by means of the press-block. 

 cayed and sifted through the 



same sieve, half a part ; and coarse sand, half a part. Retain the coarse 

 material that is left in the sieve for placing over the drainage. In some 



