636 



The Weekly Florists^ Review^ 



January 23, 1906. 



DARLINGTON ON CALIFORNIA, 



[The continuation of a paper by E. B. Darling- 

 ton, trial Kround superintendent for W. Atlee 

 Burpee & Co., read before the Florists' Club of 

 Philadelphia, January 2, 1006. The first Install- 

 ment was i)ubllshed January 18.] 



Fine Harvest Season. 



It is the climate, combined with the 

 fertility of the soil, which makes Califor- 

 nia so desirable for seed growing, as 

 during the harvest season there is an 

 entire absence of rain. Seed heads de- 

 velop and ripen and the harvest proceeds 

 steadily, yet without rush or hurry ; 

 vines or seed heads are cut lield by field 

 and spread on large sheets to dry and 

 when all have been harvested, the 

 thresher goes from block to block, fol- 

 lowed by the cleaners and the sacks of 

 seeds are stacked in the open air until 

 they are hauled to the warehouses in the 

 fall. There is no anxious watching for 

 passing showers or a heavy downpour, 

 as with us, and no need for any shelters 

 in which to dry and thresh the seed. 



Next to the seed ranches the most in- 

 teresting feature of the Santa Clara 

 valley are the miles and miles of prune 

 orchards, and in handling this crop the 

 prunes are allowed to ripen fully and 

 drop to the cultivated soil beneath, they 

 are then gathered from the ground, 

 dipped in lye to remove the bloom and 

 are spread out on slatted crates, such as 

 we use for onion sets, to dry. The 

 past year the prune crop, like nearly all 

 other crops, was cut short by the in- 

 tensely hot weather in July, but the price 

 was good and growers were having bet- 

 ter returns than from the very large 

 crop of the preceding seasons. 



Below Santa Clara I visited the 

 "slews" of Watsonville, where the soil 

 is a black, fibrous peat, similar to that 

 of the Jersey swamps, and here were 

 crops of cauliflower in all stages, from 

 the freshly set young plants to those in 

 head and seeding. In these valleys there 

 were clear streams of water running in 

 the drains and it seemed entirely prac- 

 ticable to grow all moisture-loving crops 

 at any season of the year, but it is not 

 suited for general seed raising on ac- 

 count of the heavy fogs which come in 

 from the sea. The hills surrounding 

 these valleys are devoted to dairy farm- 

 ing and apple orchards and the country 

 had more of a home-like appearance 

 than any part of California I visited. 



In the South. 



Going still further south, I stopped at 

 Lompoc, where the chief crops are mus- 

 tard seed and commercial or soup beans, 

 alid still further south to Ventura was 

 the lima bean country. Try to imagine 

 from fifty to seventy-five miles of travel 

 through narrow but level coast lands 

 where the principal crop was lima beans, 

 interspersed with orchards of English or 

 more properly Persian walnuts. This 

 portion of California was to me the most 

 interesting, for here were the evidences 

 of the early Spanish settlers: Fan 

 palms sixty feet or more in height, 

 araucarias forty to fifty feet high, and 

 a grape vine with a trunk over a foot 

 in diameter and the branches covering 

 a trellis which extended over a half an 

 acre of ground. This vine is at Car- 

 penteria and coming on it unexpectedly, 

 I at once recognized it from the illustra- 

 tions in our gardening publications. The 

 vine is in perfect health and vigor and 

 could easily be made to cover a much 

 larger area. On the other side of the 

 trellis hung immense clusters of fruit, 

 a single cluster of bunches being large 



enough to fill a good-size wash-tub, but 

 owing to a lack of water the grapes were 

 poorly developed and only fitted for the 

 wine press. 



Here also we visited a small ranch in 

 a little valley where three generations 

 of a Scotch family had a small fruit 

 ranch, which was a feast to delight a 

 gardener. Here in adjoining rows and 

 blocks were strawberries, raspberries, 

 blackberries, loganberries, purple guavas, 

 figs, an extensive assortment of our finer 

 hot-house grapes, lemons, oranges and 

 grape-fruit, some in full bearing and 

 others with occasional clusters of ripe 

 fruits, according to their season. Here 

 were trained gardeners of the old school 

 raising in the open ground all the fruits 

 which they had been accustomed to 

 grow under glass in their old home. 



An incident of Carpenteria was a 

 large Magnolia grandiflora, with ca- 

 melia-like blossoms a foot in diameter 

 and on my commenting on its flowering 

 at that season of the year, I was told 

 that it was * ' a continuous performance ' ' 

 and that it flowered throughout the whole 

 ye;ar. 



Mrs. Shepherd's Place. 



From the windows of my room in the 

 Hotel Rose, Ventura, I could look down 

 into the flower garden of Mrs. Theodosia 

 B. Shepherd, which occupies an entire 

 square in the center of the town. 

 Here was a most interesting and varied 

 collection of flowering plants, many of 

 them old acquaintances of my appren- 

 ticeship days, which have now disap- 

 peared from our commercial greenhouses, 

 as these in recent years have been turned 

 into cut-flower factories or palm nur- 

 series, to the detriment of a varied plant 

 collection. In one corner there were 

 small glass houses heavily whitewashed 

 for propagating purposes, while along 

 the central walk were lath shades filled 

 with begonias and creepers, and at in- 

 tervals were ornamental summer houses 

 or pagodas artistically decorated with 

 the leaf -stalks of the fan palm. Quite a 

 large section of the grounds was laid 

 out in rock work and devoted to cacti 

 and other succulents, and the whole was 

 a most interesting treat for any flower 

 loving gardener. 



A noticeable feature here as elsewhere 

 in California, was the immense size of 

 the individual florets on the geraniums, 

 all varieties appearing to have much 

 larger and more brightly colored flowers 

 than with us. Near the hotel there is a 

 rubber tree which has the size and de- 

 velopment of a twenty-five-year-old Nor- 

 way maple, and at the Mission there is 

 an araucaria fully fifty feet in height, 

 but a peculiar feature of the araucaria 

 was that instead of being flatly spread, 

 the side branches turned upwards In a 

 V-like form, possibly owing to the dry 

 season. 



(To be continued.) 



POINSETTIAS. 



Will you please tell me how to store 

 poinsettias after they have finished 

 blooming? Does the poinsettia bear 

 more than one scarlet bract in a season? 



K. C. C. 



I will answer the last question first. 

 The poinsettia does not bear but one 

 crop of flowers in a season, and the 

 bracts are an essential part of the flower. 

 Nature did not endow the plant with 

 these brilliant bracts to please the human 

 eye, or for usefulness to the florist. They 



evolved because the economy of the plant 

 needed them to attract tropical insects 

 to their nectar cups, and so hasten the 

 chief function of all plants, to bear seed 

 and reproduce its kind. 



As soon as you have cut the stalk and 

 have a foot or less of stem left, lay the 

 plants on their sides beneath the driest 

 and warmest bench you have, and let 

 them rest there perfectly dry till the 

 first of May. This is for plants grown 

 in pots. If lifted from a bench, and all 

 the soil has fallen from the roots, then 

 pack them in flats and pack some dry 

 soil among the roots, but still keep the 

 flats in a dry, warm place. W. S. 



FORCING CHERRY BLOSSOMS. 



How long does it take to force apple 

 blossoms, cherry blo'">oras, etc., into 

 bloom, by taking dormant twigs and plac- 

 ing same in water? I should like to have 

 some in bloom for Easter if I can do it. 



A. C. S. 



I would advise you to cut the branches 

 or shoots of the apple and cherry at once, 

 and place them in moist soil, and keep in 

 a cool house or cellar till it is time to 

 force. Allow five or six weeks from time 

 of giving them light and heat. The last 

 two weeks give them 10 degrees higher 

 than you started them in. W. S. 



HYDRANGEA OTAKSA. 



I would like to know how to propagate 

 Hydrangea Otaksa and when is the best 

 time. Can I store them away in a cool 

 basement in the fall and leave them 

 there until forcing time and could I 

 store roses there in pots in the same 

 way? Will you tell me what are the best 

 roses for pot plants in the spring? I 

 have a large cool basement 26x50 feet. 

 What other use can I make of it? 



F. J. R. 



Hydrangea Otaksa propagates most 

 readily from soft wood cuttings which 

 may be rooted at almost any time, but 

 preferably in the late winter or early 

 spring months. Given a bottom heat they 

 root as quickly as carnations or gerani- 

 ums. Cuttings taken in late summer or 

 early fall make nice single head plants 

 in 5-inch or 6-inch pots the next spring. 



If the basement is dry and frost-proof 

 the plants will keep finely in it. A light 

 frost, of course, would not hurt them, but 

 if it can be kept at from 34 degrees to 40 

 degrees it will hold them nicely. Roses 

 in pots or boxes will keep well in such 

 a place. Of course they and all other 

 plants prefer a light location, which we 

 suppose this is. Fuchsias, wistarias, 

 azaleas, acacias, ericas and many other 

 plants might be wintered in such quar- 

 ters. Of course, azaleas, etc., would need 

 watering, while the hydrangeas need to 

 be kept on the dry side. 



Shelves in such a basement would do 

 admirably for storing gladioli, galtonia 

 and other bulbs. It would be excellent 

 for storing bulbs in pans or pots of 

 Dutch stock, Easter liles, etc., until well 

 started, or to retard them at flowering 

 times. The uses that such a place can 

 be put to are manifold. 



Some good pot roses are Ulrich Brun- 

 ner, Magna Charta, Frau Karl Drusehki, 

 Mme. Gabriel Luizet, Gen. Jacqueminot 

 and Mrs. John Laing. In ramblers,. 

 Crimson Rambler, Dorothy Perkins, Far- 

 quhar, Hiawatha, Wedding Bells and 

 Philadelphia Rambler. The Baby Ram- 



