18 



The Florists' Review 



MA.HCH 2, 1916. 



of them as when you leave them crowd- 

 ed. Give supports in good season. 

 Mulch with old manure, straw, grass 

 or meadow hay when the flowering sea- 

 son starts. Keep the flowers picked 

 clean and remove all seed pods. If 

 aphis appears, spray at once with a nic- 

 otine or soapy spray. Syringing over- 

 head on the evenings of hot days is re- 

 freshing and abundant waterings, 

 where they can be given, are of great 

 value. It may not be possible to do 

 all these things, but they are the es- 

 sentials of successful open air culture 

 of sweet peas. 



STARTINQ AN OUTDOOR CROP. 



Sowing and Planting. 



The best outdoor sweet peas are pro- 

 duced when special trenches have been 

 prepared for them the previous fall. 

 Where such work has not been done, a 

 special effort should be made to either 

 trench or spade deeply and enrich the 

 ground, working in plenty of well de- 

 cayed cow or stable manure, with some 

 fine bone and wood ashes added. 



Now is a good time to sow sweet peas 

 under glass, to be planted out from 

 April 10 to May 1, according to lati- 

 tude. The sowing can be made in 3- 

 inch pots, allowing two seeds to a pot, 

 later thinning out to one, or, better 

 still, in flats or pans of sand, from 

 which the seedlings can be potted sin- 

 gly, kept in a greenhouse for a time and 

 later transferred to a coldframe, 

 where they can be gradually hardened. 

 At planting-out time allow twelve 

 inches between the plants. This may 

 seem wide apart at first, but remember 

 that sweet peas, if given sufficient space 

 for development, are bushy in habit 

 and will soon fill the rows with a dense 

 growth. 



Single Stems. 



For purely exhibition purposes plants 

 are now trained to single stems and 

 even side shoots removed. With all the 

 strength thrown into a single growth, 

 stems and flowers of wonderful size are 

 produced; they would bring fancy 

 prices in the markets. However, it is 

 doubtful if it would be a paying propo- 

 sition to many florists unless they had 

 customers willing to pay high prices 

 for such flowers. For supports for 

 growing specimen 4)looms, bamboos 

 often are used, with wires run length- 

 wise to keep them erect. For ordinary 

 flowers, birch, wild cherry and other 

 forms of brush are excellent. Where 

 these are unobtainable, wire netting of 

 a somewhat coarse mesh can be utilized. 



A Selection of Varieties. 



' The following is a selection of excel- 

 lent sweet peas of moderate price: 

 White, Nora Unwin or White Spencer; 

 orange pink, Helen Lewis; cream pink, 

 Mrs. Hugh Dickson or Mrs. Routzahn; 

 blush, Elfrida Pearson; deep pink. 

 Countess Spencer; scarlet, Thomas 

 Stevenson or Scarlet Emperor; picotee 

 edged, Martha Washingfton or Mrs. C. 

 W. Breadmore; lavender, Florence 

 Nightingale; mauve, Asta Ohn; blue, 

 Captain of the Blues. Of these the best 

 selling colors are deep pink, white, lav- 

 ender, orange, pink and scarlet, in this 

 order. 



Where some of the newer varieties 

 are wanted for a trial, I would suggest 

 the following. These, in nearly all 

 cases, show an advance over the older 



varieties: White, Constance Hinton; 

 orange scarlet. The President; deep 

 pink, Hercules, which is a glorified 

 Countess Spencer; scarlet, Fiery Cross; 

 salmon orange, Bobert Sydenham; self 

 blue, Wedgwood; rosy mauve. The 

 Lady Eveline; salmon rose, Edith 

 Taylor; clear lavender, Margaret Madi- 

 son. 



The Essentials. 



A few points to remember about 

 sweet pea culture outdoors are: The 

 ground must be well manured and the 

 more deeply it can be plowed or spaded 

 the better. In sowing seed outside, do 

 it as soon as possible after the frost 

 has left the ground and it has become 

 workable. Cover the seeds about two 

 inches and leave the tops of the rows 

 somewhat hollowed out. Do not fill in 

 about the plants as they grow, as is 

 often recommended, unless you want 

 stem-rot to clear out many of your 

 plants. Sow thinly, or, if the plants 

 come up thickly, thin out to an average 

 of four inches apart. This will give 

 you far better flowers and just as many 



SWEXST PEAS DYING. 



Why do some of my sweet peas 

 planted in a solid bench diet I limed 

 one bench and planted snapdragons be- 

 tween the rows of peas. The sweet 

 peas appear all right one day, but the 

 next day I find the tops dried and 

 withered. The stalks under the ground 

 seem hard and woody. Would dark 

 weather do this? R. N. P. — Mass. 



Perhaps your plants stand too closely 

 in the rows. They ought not to be less 

 than four inches apart. Have you 

 made the common error of hilling them 

 up while they are youngf This is ac- 

 countable for many failures in sweet 

 pea culture. I imagine your soil is not 

 right for the peas. It should be deep, 

 well enriched with old cow manure and 

 possessing good drainage. Keep as 

 even a temperature as you can; 45 to 

 48 degrees at night before flowering 

 and 50 degrees at night after the flow- 

 ers open, with a rise to 58 degrees on 

 dark days and 65 to 70 degrees on 

 sunny days. C. W. 



S. A. NUTT OEBANIUM. 



In The Review of February 24 a sub- 

 scriber asks for the history of the S. A. 

 Nutt geranium. This variety was 

 originated by "Uncle John" Thorpe, 

 pioneer florist and first president of the 

 S. A. F., who died at Chicago in 1909. 

 S. A. Nutt was awarded a certificate 

 of merit by the New York Horticul- 

 tural Society in 1884 or 1885, and was 

 distributed through cataloguies as a 

 novelty in 1886. It was one of a group 

 of five, consisting of Marvel, Mary 

 Hill, pink; Thomas McMurray, cerise; 

 Golden Dawn, orange-scarlet, and S. A. 

 Nutt. All of these originally were 

 grown by Mr. Thorpe. S. A. Hill. 



Simmons, who was distributing a num- 

 ber of new geraniums in 1883 or 1884. 

 The so-called S. A. Nutt now is badly 

 mixed with other varieties. 



Oust. Maknquist. 



DISEASED GERANIUM FOLIAGE. 



I am sending you, under separate 

 cover, samples of diseased geranium 

 leaves. They seem to be affected in 

 two different ways. On some plants 

 the edges of the leaves are affected 

 and on others a small spot appears on 

 the lower side of the leaves. We have 

 noticed this trouble for the last two 

 weeks. Will you kindly tell us what to 

 do? C. K.— N. Y. 



NUTT GERANIUM IN MINNESOTA. 



In response to the inquiry for the his- 

 tory of the S. A. Nutt geranium, I will 

 give its history in Minnesota. The first 

 S. A. Nutt geraniums grown in Minne- 

 sota were bought by me from Albert 

 Williams, of Sharon, Pa., in 1887. Mr. 

 Williams had received this variety 

 among a number of others from Mr. 



Pick off the affected leaves. Give the 

 plants a spraying with Fungine at the 

 strength recommended on the can. Do 

 not syringe your plants overhead when 

 watering or damping down with the 

 hose. Keep the plants a little on the 

 dry side. Let them dry out tolerably 

 well between the waterings. A temper- 

 ature of not over 50 degrees at night, 

 a comparatively dry atmosphere, abun- 



