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12 



The Weekly Florists^ Review* 



Januabt 13, 191.0. 



looked fine when benched and sent up a 

 fine crop of buds, and no trouble was 

 apparent until about the middle or latter 

 part of November. There is no sign of 

 spot on the plants. 



I have grown carnations for nine years 

 and have never had any trouble from dis- 

 ease of any kind until last year, when the 

 plants showed in the late fall this dying 

 at the ends of the leaves, but they seemed 

 to grow out of this and there was no 

 withering of the buds. I gave them care- 

 ful cultivation and was careful in the 

 selection of cuttings for this year. Is 

 this year's tr')uble a continuation of last 

 year's by using cuttings from those 

 plants, or is it some deficiency in the soil? 

 My soil was made up in the fall of 1908, 

 of garden loam, manure (mostly cow 

 manure), ashes and lime in the usual 

 proportions. Will it be safe to propa- 

 gate -from these plants for next year? 

 I.L. 



The specimens forwarded were in such 

 a frozen condition that they disclosed 

 nothing from which one could form any 

 opinion regarding your trouble. From 

 your letter, however, I would judge your 

 trouble to be fairy ring or a kindred dis- 

 ease. The dried ends of the petals of 

 the blooms may be caused by thrips, but 

 they would not cause the ends of the 

 leaves to dry up as you describe. 



For the thrips I would suggest spray- 

 ing regularly with one of the nicotine ex- 

 tracts two or three times each week 

 until you get the upper hand. After that, 

 once each week will be enough to keep 

 them in check. 



For the other disease, you should spray 



CROP COMES SLOWLY, 



"Will you kindly tell me why my carna- 

 tions do not bloom? The variety is Day- 

 break. The temperature is kept as near 

 50 to 55 degrees as possible. The soil 

 is fresh compost, composed of one-half 

 rotted manure and one-half loamy sod, 

 rotted. They are on raised benches with- 

 out much bottom heat. I have fed with 

 liquid manure, and at last have top- 

 dressed with fiiie manure. The plants are 

 all healthy in looks and loaded with big 

 buds, showing color, but that is all. They 

 seem to have stood still for about three 

 weeks. I spray a little each morning, 

 just to keep the soil moist. C. A. S. 



Your carnations' failure to come along 

 as rapidly as might be desired might pos- 

 sibly be attributed to a natural decrepi- 

 tude resultant from old age. It is now 

 just about nineteen years since Daybreak 

 was disseminated, and we thought it had 

 died a natural death some six or eight 

 years ago. It is at least that long since 

 it has passed out of the wholesale mar- 

 kets, to give way to Enchantress and a 

 few other, varieties of the same color. 



But to the point. With your plants in 

 the condition you describe, I can hardly 

 suggest any method by which you might 

 hurry them along, without danger of 

 causing splitting, etc. It frequently hap- 

 pens that a grower becomes impatient for 

 a crop to come on, especially when blooms 

 are in big demand. At such times it does 

 seem as though the plants stood still, al- 

 though they may be developing quite nat- 

 urally. Cloudy weather, after prolonged 

 bright weather, will sometimes cause slow 



Stand of G. & J. W. Ludwij;, in Allegheny Market« Pittsburg. 



with Bordeaux mixture about once each 

 week until the trouble disappears. You 

 can buy this mixture in gallon lots ready 

 for use, from your supply house. It does 

 not pay the average grower to bother 

 with preparing his own, when he can get 

 it so conveniently. 



You need not hesitate to use cuttings 

 from these plants for propagating, pro- 

 viding they do not show any sign of the 

 disease. A. F. J. B. 



I FIND the Review a cheer-up when 

 one has the blues. — George Schubert, 

 West Hoboken, N. J. 



development until the plants adjust them- 

 selves to the weather conditions. If the 

 soil happens to be dry at the bottom the 

 same trouble will result. A. F. J. B. 



LUDWIG^ STAND. 



Next to the French market in New Or- 

 leans, Allegheny market, at Pittsburg, 

 Pa., is probably the most famous insti- 

 tution of its kind in the country. It is 

 here that Gustave & J. W. Ludwig do 

 business in retailing cut flowers. The 

 accompanying illustration shows their 

 stand, photographed about Christmas 



time. They do an extremely large busi- 

 ness at all seasons, but at the holidays 

 this year it was the heaviest on record. 



SUPERPHOSPHATE OF LIME. 



Kindly let me know the everyday name 

 for superphosphate of lime and where I 

 can purchase it. I understand it is good 

 for sweet peas. R. G. 



I do not know of any other name for 

 superphosphate of lime, although it may 

 have some local appellation. 



This is the formula for its maxiufac- 

 ture: One pound of bone dust, twelve 

 ounces of sulphuric acid (oil of vitriol) 

 and twelve ounces of water, if mixed and 

 left to act upon each other for t'wenty- 

 four hours, form superphosphate of lime. 

 Applied as a top-dressing, mixed with 

 half its weight of charcoal dust, it is 

 quite beneficial to sweet peas. It should 

 be applied at the rate of six pounds to 

 the square rod. Superphosphate of lime 

 should be procurable from dealers in agri- 

 cultural and horticultural fertilizers. 

 ^ RiBES. 



BAD EFFECTS OF T'-AB FUMES. 



We are having some serious trouble in 

 a greenhouse which we built last summer. 

 The house is 16x140. One side wall is 

 seven feet high, with four feet of glass; 

 the other is four feet high, with sixteen 

 inches of glass. The house is benched 

 and we used considerable coal tar on the 

 boards, to prevent rotting. These boards 

 were quite well dried before the house 

 was closed in. The trouble is that the 

 blooms fade on the plants as soon as they 

 begin to open. The plants grown here 

 are cyclamens. Primula obconica and 

 Chinese primroses. Of these the -worst 

 affected are the obconicas, and next the 

 Chinese primroses, while the cyclamens 

 stand it best and a considerable percent- 

 age of them are unaffected. Recently 

 we shifted a nice batch of geraniums into 

 this house from a slightly higher tem- 

 perature, and all the fine blooms faded 

 at once. 



Could you tell us the reason? We blame 

 the fumes from 1;he tar and are proceed- 

 ing to give all the exposed tar a coat of 

 whitewash, made of fresh lime. Do you 

 think this advisable or could you suggest 

 something else? We shall t>e grateful for 

 any help in the matter. J. S. Ss S. 



From the fact that coal tar was used 

 upon the bench lumber, it is practically 

 certain that this is the cause of all the 

 trouble, especially as the behavior of the 

 plants is similar to what has been ob- 

 served in many houses where tar has been 

 used. 



I have never seen a house in which coal 

 tar has been used to any extent, either 

 upon the heating pipes or benches, in 

 which it was possible to grow plants suc- 

 cessfully, whatever pains might be taken 

 to correct the difSculty. Scraping, paint- 

 ing and coating with cement and other 

 materials seem to have little or no effect 

 in getting rid of the trouble, and even 

 when the effort has been kept up for 

 years it has not been possible to grow 

 plants that would be creditable. 



The best thing to do is to take out 

 everything about the house that has coal 

 tar upon it. While tar can be burned off 

 from iron, this remedy would nofe give 

 satisfaction when upon wood. 



Stoneham, Mass. — James H. Dela,y 

 has filed a petition in bankruptcy. His 

 liabilities are $3,590; assets, uncertain. 



