General J^^jtices. 301 



Hybridizing Plants. — In hybridizing plants, care should be taken 

 to save seed from those flowerd which have the best shape, for I 

 believe the form of the future flower is much more dependent on the 

 kind from which the seed is saved, than upon that which furnishes 

 the pollen: the pollen generally gives the color. It is also highly 

 desirable that the flower from which the pollen is taken should be 

 darker than that producing the seed: for I have found, in such cases, 

 the seedlings have been much more beautiful, (being frequently 

 spotted or striped.) than when I have reversed the process. 1 have 

 Been this occur in so marked a manner in ranunculuses, that I have 

 adopted it as a principle, never to take pollen from a lighter colored 

 flower. I remember, many years ago, crossing a black ranunculus 

 with one quite white; the produce from which, instead of being 

 what I wished it, came an inditferent gray, the white having merged 

 into the black, without producing any definite character. — H. Groom, 

 in Gard. Chron. 



Pruning the roots of pears. — Xo. 9 of the Proceedings of the 

 London Horticultural Society has been published, and contains 

 many excellent papers read before the Society at its several meet- 

 ings. One, by Mr. Rivers, of Sawbridgeworth, on the advantages 

 of pruning the roots of pears, is well worthy of perusal; the sub- 

 stance of it is as follows: — It appears that in consequence of the 

 confusion in the names of pears, the author was induced to plant 

 specimen trees of all the varieties he then possessed; but fearing 

 that much ground would be wasted in the experiment, he endeavor- 

 ed to discover some means of arresting their superabundant growth, 

 and inducing early fruitfulness. Having previously remarked that ap- 

 ple trees, growing in a firm loamy soil in his nursery, if removed one 

 or two years consecutively, acquired a stunted and prolific habit, it oc- 

 curred to him, that if he could keep the roots of his pear trees in the 

 same state by frequent removals, he should make them also acquire 

 the habit he had so long observed in apples. But, in attempting to 

 remove his pear trees, the author considered that it would be less 

 trouble to dig a trench round them, and cut all their roots at a cer- 

 tain distance from the stem; and in this respect, his anticipations 

 were completely fulfilled. 



The best description of trees, for the purpose of forming what 

 Mr. Rivers calls garden orchards, are half standards, with round, 

 well formed headsr or plants trained en quenouiUe, or dwarfs in the 

 usual bush fashion. For immediate efiect, these should be prepared 

 by annual root pruning for one, two, or three years, in the nursery, 

 and afterwards they are to have their roots annually reduced, by 

 digging a trench round the trees, and removing all large roots by 

 means of a sharp spade. In the course of years, a perfect ball of 

 fibrous roots will be formed, which will only require the occasional 

 operation of a trench being dug and the balls pared down, to ascer- 

 tain whether large feeders are making their escape from it. But as 

 this circular mass of soil will in a few years be exhausted, there is 

 left round each tree a slight depression in the soil, or, in other words, 

 the trench is not quite filled in, and this circular furrow is filled with 

 liquid manure ; or common dun<r may be laid round each tree in the 

 autumn, and suifcred to be washed by the rains of winter, or drawn 



