J 706 



The Weekly Florists^ Review. 



May 3, 1906. 



An Unparalleled Situation. 



Such a condition of affairs has prob- 

 ably never before been experienced in 

 the utter demoralization of trade in 

 such a large area of country, and signs 

 for any improvement for a long time to 

 come are at present not apparent. The 

 public has absolutely no use for flowers. 

 Everyone is interested in getting a place 

 to sleep, and it will be a long time be- 

 fore anything in the way of luxuries is 

 aimed at. 



All the undertakers in San Francisco 

 are burned out, all the public halls, most 

 of the churches. Over 250,000 people 

 have left the town and are located in 

 various parts of the state, so that the 

 chances for funeral work are very slim. 

 Most of the hearses and carriages have 

 gone to the flames. Funerals are con- 

 ducted very quietly. There are but few 

 caskets in town, and the friends are so 

 widely distributed when a death occurs 

 that there is no chance for the florist. 



Quantities and Prices. 



A low estimate of the carnations that 

 should be marketed at this time is 

 about a million blooms per week, and 

 about half a million rose buds in the 

 same length of time. It is safe to say 

 that not over five per cent are shipped 

 to outside points, and when this was 

 done direct rrom the wholesalers there 

 has been little change. The retail 

 dealers have in many instances turhea 

 their out-of-town regular customers over 

 to the growers, and in this way tue 

 stores in other localities will not be in- 

 convenienced. 



Quotations of various flowers are not 

 worth making. The finest carnations 

 ever seen can be had at 50 cents per 



hundred, and American Beauties with 

 4-foot stems at a few cents per dozen. 

 Other stock is sold by tue basKet, and it 

 is only a waste of time to pretend to 

 quote on it. 



How long this condition of affairs 

 will last, or how it will turn in a few 

 weeks, I am at a loss to conjecture. 

 Some of the growers are trying to get a 

 market for their goods in other towns, 

 but large cities are scarce on this coast, 

 and the chances are not very bright to 

 use much stock in that way. 



However, something brighter may 

 loom up in the luture to relieve the 

 conditions somewhat, but at the present 

 writing they are at the lowest point 

 ever reached in this locality. G. 



FIRST AND BEST. 



The Eeview, containing the very full 

 and splendid description of the losses 

 of the brother florists in that sadly 

 stricken California city of San Fran- 

 cisco, as well as other points, came to 

 hand in due season Thursday afternoon. 

 I glory in the enterprise that has brought 

 about such things in so short a time. 



The catastrophe makes our trouble in 

 1871, in the burning of Chicago, look 

 small, although as I read from day to 

 day the accounts in the daily papers, 

 many of the experiences there given were 

 similar to those with us. The feeding of 

 the hungry was one of those things that 

 I, as a public officer at the time, had a 

 hand in, in the early stages of the work. 



I was also, you may be sure, glad to 

 find that our old friend, Mr. Grant, al- 

 though shaken, is all right. What an 

 experience in one's lifetime. 



Edgar Sanders. 



Popular Nephrolepis. 



Everyone must have noticed the won- 

 derful popularity of the nephrolepis 

 fern the past winter. Most of the large 

 growers were sold out long before Eas- 

 ter. The grower of bedding plants will 

 have his benches too full for another 

 three or four weeks, but as soon as any 

 can be spared, four or five inches of 

 good, fresh loam should be put on them 

 and the young ferns planted out one 

 foot apart. I believe four inches of 

 soil is quite as good as six inches, and 

 that saves a lot of labor and material. 

 A third of well-decayed animal manure 

 should be mixed with the soil. 



There are now so many varieties of 

 nephrolepis that it is venturesome to 

 say much about the merits of any par- 

 ticular variety. 



Bostoniensis was a great improve- 

 ment on old N. exaltata, and a well 

 grown Boston will fill the bill with most 

 people. 



Scottii is a most valuable variety and 

 makes such a compact plant, even when 

 quite small, that it sells the best of all, 

 and you should have a large proportion 

 of your stock of Scottii. 



The still more beautiful forms, Pier- 

 soni and Elegantissima, and still later 



Barrowsii, and now Whitmani, are beau- 

 tiful as specimen plants, and as they 

 are only sports or variations of the Bos- 

 ton form there is no reason why they 

 should be more difficult to grow or less 

 useful plants for the dwelling house. 



The Basfpipe Fern. 



Whitmani is the latest and seems to 

 us the most beautiful of these many 

 different forms, yet I would say let 

 the great majority of your stock be the 

 old Bostoniensis and Scottii. If the 

 latter is well grown, you will have not 

 only a beautiful fern, but you will no- 

 tice at break of day that it resembles 

 a full-dressed Scottish warrior clad in 

 kilts with filibeg and tartan plaid. 

 The bagpipes are not visible because 

 when in full blast it is seldom that 

 either the animal or vegetable kingdom 

 can stand the bagpipes. They tried to 

 introduce the pipes into Illinois, but it 

 was a failure. To be appreciated a 

 hilly country is required, the music be- 

 ing on one side of the hill and the audi- 

 ence on the other. After this brief al- 

 lusion to the prehistoric windbag of old 

 Scotia, I will repeat, grow all you can 

 of this most useful class of ferns. It 

 wUl pay you better than chrysanthe- 

 mums. 



Herbaceous Plants. 



Many florists are asked to supply 

 shrubs and herbaceous plants. Now is 

 the time to transplant both. All of 

 the latter move with safety now. While 

 I am a great believer in division of 

 labor, and more and more under our 

 civilization is it the order of the day, 

 yet there are many cases where our good 

 customers have been sadly deceived by 

 the ignorant tree peddler and his col- 

 ored pictures, and they turn to the resi- 

 dent florist for their wants or advice, 

 i have little to say about herbaceous 

 plants, except that the spot where they 

 are planted should be dug deeply and 

 plenty of manure worked in. 



Planting Deciduous Stock. 



Deciduous shrubs transplant with 

 safety any time before they are in full 

 leaf, but much better before the leaf 

 buds have started. All shrubs and 

 trees have lost more or less roots in 

 transplanting and must be pruned in 

 proportion to the loss of roots, so that 

 the inactive or mutilated roots will have 

 to supply less sap. Generally the 

 smaller the shrub the less pruning is 

 necessary. Your customers are likely 

 to make a face and think you are com- 

 mitting murder when they see you using 

 the knife freely, but tell them, with the 

 look of a sage and an air of authority, 

 that it is the salvation of the shrub, 

 and long before fall the growth will 

 have far outstripped the shrub that was 

 unpruned. 



Hardy Roses. 



Thousands of hybrid perpetual roses 

 are planted every spring, and the great 

 majority are disappointing. Florists or 

 tree peddlers tell their customers, "Oh, 

 yes, ma'm, they will flower this sum- 

 mer." This is deception. They will 

 have a few abortive flowers at the ends 

 of the shoots and make no wood to 

 flower the next year. Tell your cus- 

 tomers not to expect flowers the first 

 year, and that they must be cut back to 

 within a few eyes when first planted. 

 Then they will make strong growth and 

 next year will give an abundance of 

 splendid blooms, and for years to come, 

 if properly pruned. 



Pruning Shrubs. 



You will just now daily be asked to 

 send a man "to prune my shrubs," 

 and difficult it is to get a man who 

 knows the difference between those 

 which should be pruned now and those 

 which should not be pruned ,until after 

 they have flowered. 



An instance of the ignorance of this 

 was called to my attention in the shrub- 

 bery surrounding one of our large pub- 

 lic schools in the case of a lot of for- 

 sythia, the beautiful early-flowering 

 yellow blossom. . If that is cut back 

 hard in early spring, or before flower- 

 ing time, you get no flowers. Broadly 

 the rule is this: Shrubs that set their 

 flower buds the previous summer, like 

 the lilac, the forsythia, cydonia, tam- 

 arix and all our fruit trees, must not 

 be touched until they have flowered. 

 Then prune and they make a growth 

 and form flower buds for the following 

 year. The hybrid roses. Hydrangea 

 paniculata grandiflora, the althaea and 

 many others flower only on the current 

 year's growth, and these should be cut 

 back before growth starts in the 

 spring. 



It would be a long chapter to tell you 

 about all the different flowering shrubs, 



