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10 



The Weekly Florists' Review. 



JANOARV 19, 1911. 



STIGMONQSE. 



You will find enclosed some foliage 

 from my carnations, wHich are affected 

 with some sort of disease. "Will you 

 please tell me what is the cause of it 

 and what I can do to remedy it? 



L. F. 



The leaves forwarded were full of 

 stigmonose, a disease which you will 

 find diflScult, though not impossible, to 

 work out of your stock. Outside of 

 good culture, your only remedy lies in 

 careful selection of cuttings. Select 

 those which seem free from the disease 

 each season, and in the course of three 

 or four years, if the variety is not too 

 far down the toboggan, your stock may 

 ue quite clean. 



The introduction of the disease being 

 through the punctures of insects, it is 

 therefore essential that you keep your 

 plants free from these pests. Picking 

 off these spotted leaves will, of course, 

 help the appearance of the plants, 

 though I doubt whether it will help 

 much to eradicate the trouble. Do not 

 overfeed the plants, as that, or anj'- 

 thing else which tends toward softness 

 of growth, will aggravate the trouble. 



A. F. J. B. 



WEAK, THIN STEMS. 



I shall be greatly obliged to you if 

 you will tell me what is the trouble 

 with my carnations. They seem to be 

 perfectly healthy and the stems are 

 rather longer tnan the average. The 

 flowers are good sized ones, but the 

 stems are weak and thin and hardly 

 able to bear the weight of the flowers. 



I have two varieties, Enchantress 

 and White Perfection. I keep a night 

 temperature of 48 to 50 degrees and 

 give them as much air as possible in 

 the day time. I have always kept 

 them rather on the dry side and have 

 fed them every ten or twelve days with 

 light liquid cow manure. I have used 

 a good fibrous loam and cow manure as 

 compost. The plants are planted eight 

 inches apart. I believe the cuttings 

 came from plants that had been over- 

 propagated, as they show slight signs 

 of stigmonose. Do you believe that a 

 top-dressing of soot would help to 

 strengthen the stems? L. M. 



Weakened constitution and close 

 planting may be at the bottom of your 

 troubles. Your temperature and ven- 

 tilation seem to be about right and 

 should have a tendency to produce 

 strong stems. Eight inches is certainly 

 not enough space for any kind of En- 

 chantress plant, and if you had good 

 plants of White Perfection they should 

 have more space too. Enchantress needs 

 at least 108 square inches of space, or 

 9x12 inches. White Perfection can get 

 along with ninety square inches, or 9x10 

 inches, unless the plants are unusually 

 large for that variety. 



Your soil may also be deficient in 



lime, and I would advise you to give 

 the beds a light sprinkling of air- 

 slaked lime or wood ashes every two 

 weeks, giving three applications. If 

 you can get wood ashes, I should prefer 

 them to the lime. Use about a 3-inch 

 potful of wood ashes 'to each row of 

 plants halfway across a 5-foot bench. 

 Of the lime, use about half that amount. 

 Water in well, after scratching the sur- 

 face of the soil slightly. In about two 

 weeks you will see a decided stiffening 

 of the growth. Do not go to extremes, 

 on the supposition that if an ounce is 

 good, a pound must be better. Too 

 much will make the stems brittle at the 

 joints, so that they will snap off in 

 handling. We have seen them so brit- 

 tle that the blooms would snap off the 

 stems with their weight while standing 

 in a vase. 



Propagate only from plants along the 

 edge of the bench, as these will likely 

 have more substance. A. F. J. B. 



CHLORIDE OF LIME IN WATEB. 



Referring to the discussion in re- 

 cent issues of The Review, E. M., who 

 asked the original query as to the 



effect of the use of water in which 

 chloride of lime has been used for dis- 

 infecting, says: "Water with chloride 

 of lime in quantities necessary for de- 

 struction of typhoid germs has been 

 used in the entire plant for the last 

 four or five months, with, we think, un- 

 favorable results. Carnations are ap- 

 parently healthy but do not have that 

 robust, strong growth they should have 

 and are slow of growth. Cuttings in 

 the sand are slow to root and the loss 

 is more than it should be. All this 

 under the most favorable condition to 

 produce the best results. Rose plants 

 benched last spring were growing 

 strong and healthy until about the 

 time, as near as I can remember, when 

 the water was treated with chloride 

 of lime. The leaves turned yellow and 

 became thin and weak and growth al- 

 most stopped. The roses so remain at 

 the present time. This condition is 

 most noticeable on the latest set plants. 

 The only other cause for the trouble 

 would be the use of some hog 

 manure. ' ' 



NAME OF CARNATION. 



Please state what is the name of the 

 enclosed carnation. J. E. M. 



The bloom forwarded was too badly 

 wilted to permit a positive opinion 

 about the variety. The stem and calyx 

 had the appearance of Lawson. There 

 are, however, several deep pink varie- 

 ties on the market now, many of them 

 descendants from Lawson and some- 

 what similar in growth. A. F. J. B. 



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RIVOIRE AND DE BULOARIE. 



I noted with interest the discussion 

 of the two roses, Antoine Rivoire and 

 Prince de Bulgarie, in The Review of 

 January 12, page 8. I have both varie- 

 ties in my collection of 220 kinds, and 

 both were irtiported directly from the 

 originator and introducer, Fernet- 

 Ducher. I quote his descriptions ver- 

 batim from his latest catalogue: 



"Antoine Rivoire (Pernet-Ducher), 

 large, full flower, camellia shaped; 

 color, rosy flesh, shaded and edged with 

 deep carmine; base of petals yellow; 

 very free flowering and vigorous; a 

 most beautiful rose, excellent for all 

 purposes. 



"Prince de Bulgarie (Pernet-Ducher), 

 very vigorous grower, with large, bright 

 green foliage; fine, long, graceful buds; 

 very large flowers, full and of elongated, 

 cupped form, with large petals; color, 

 silvery flesh, deeper in the center, deli- 

 cately shaded salmon and saffron yel- 



low; exceedingly free flowering. This 

 grand, magnificent rose is highly ap- 

 preciated on account of the exquisite 

 beauty of its flowers, borne on long 

 stems, making it particularly valuable 

 for bedding, pot culture and forcing 

 purposes." 



The plants, as grown in the open here, 

 are true to these color descriptions. 

 Grown side by side, they are so distinct 

 that there is scarcely a possibility of 

 confusing them. The colors are even 

 more distinct than the descriptions 

 would seem to indicate. A lady here 

 once described Prince de Bulgarie as 

 white with an orange-sherbet center, 

 which is rather apt. There is a marked 

 difference in the shape of the blossoms 

 and also in the growth of the plants, 

 Antoine Rivoire being upright and 

 Prince de Bulgarie rather low and 

 spreading. Personally, I should not de- 

 scribe either as "very vigorous," 

 though both are good growers when 

 budded on strong roots. Both stand our 

 hot Kansas summers well, becoming 

 much lighter in color in July and 

 August. Prince de Bulgarie is one of 

 the most delicately beautiful roses I 

 have ever seen. W. A. Harshbarger. 



