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The Florists' Review 



APBIL 24, 1918. 



DISEASED OEBANIUM FOLIAGE. 



I am sending you, under separate 

 cover, ,a sample of diseased geraniums. 

 Can you tell me what the disease is 

 and how to treat it. J. M. D. 



The digease on your .geranium foliage 

 is not'at all uncommon. I do not know 

 any special name for it, however. The 

 probable causes are too rich soil, pro- 

 ducing a soft, sappy growth; insufficient 

 ventilation, spraying over the foliage 

 and not ^keeping the plants spaced 

 apart And picked over regularly. 



Give., the ,plants the f liUest sunshine. 

 Do not feed them with rank, liquid 

 manures. If they need any stimulating, 

 give .them a surfacing of fine bone. 

 Do not 'hose the foliage over. Keep 

 the plants spaced apart so that they 

 are not crowded. Pick oflf any dead 

 and decaying leaves and remove any 

 weeds. TJie night temperature of the 

 house should be 45 to 50 degrees, and 

 should not exceed the latter figure. 

 The atmosphere sliould be dry. Keep 

 up this treatment and your plants 

 should soon show an improvement. 

 C. W. 



POOE GROWTH OF GEBAIHUMS. 



We are having trouble with our 

 geraniums. Part of the soil we are 

 using was taken out of a mum bench. 

 We used about one-half of this soil 

 and one-half new sod soil, with the 

 right proportion of sand. These gera- 

 niums were potted into 4-inch pots. 

 Some of the leaves are turning red- 

 dish brown, some of the plants seem to 

 be drying up at the ends of the leaves 

 and a good many have lost quite a num- 

 ber of leaves toward the bottom of the 

 plants. Do you suppose the soil is not 

 rich enough, or what ails themt They 

 do not seem to make growth as they 

 should. F. & F. 



You do not say whether you added 

 any fine bone or well decayed manure 

 to the geranium compost. Sand was 

 not needed. The plants are undoubtedly 

 suffering from starvation at the root. 

 Exhausted mum soil mixed with fresh 

 loam and sand does not contain the 

 plant food required by a geranium or, 

 for that matter, by any other soft- 

 wooded plant. If you had added one- 

 fourth well decayed cow manure or 

 old hotbed manure, or even a 3-inch 

 pot of fine bone to each bushel of soil, 

 your plants would now be in better 

 shape. 



To improve them, apply liquid cow 

 or sheep manure once in four days. A 

 weak dose of nitrate of soda water 

 will soon improve them, but do not keep 

 on applying it, or it will make the 

 plants 86ft and they will not flower. 

 A top-dressing of fine bone, lightly 

 scratching the soil after applying it, 

 or an application of Clay's fertilizer, 

 will soon change the appearance of the 

 plants, but do not make the mistake of 



giving too strong doses. Better make 

 the applications light and more fre- 

 quent. C. W. 



GEBANIUM FOLIAGE DYING. 



About a month ago I found the 

 leaves on my geraniums turning brown 

 and spotted. This was something I had 

 never seen before, and I want to ask 

 you about it. Under separate cover I 

 send the leaves showing the trouble. 

 My worst plants are Poiteyine. I have 

 kept them a little on the dry side, in 

 full sun, and in watering I have been 

 careful not to wet the foliage. The 

 soil was made last year, being mostly 

 cow jaanure and good loam, and in 

 p.otting I used two-thirds loam to one- 

 third compost and a little bone meal. 

 I use lake water, which is cold, and 

 the water company puts chlorine in it, 

 which sometimes is exceedingly strong. 

 Would that have this effect on the 

 plants? The draught in the j:bimney is 

 poor and when a*fird'is started it smokes 

 and fills' the house, but the plants in 



other parts of the house are not af- 

 fected. These plants stand on about an 

 inch of gravel, while my other beiiches 

 are filled with soil. Would that i^ake 

 any difference! L. C. p. 



The geranium leaves are certainly 

 badly afiected. This is quite unliko the 

 leaf-spot and other geranium disi^ases 

 with which I am acquainted. The 

 plants standing on gravel would natu- 

 rally dry out more than those on the 

 loam; the latter would root through 

 and have greater vigor. Possibly you 

 are keeping them too dry at this season. 

 Pick off the bad leaves, water more 

 freely and if potbound^ give a little 

 shift. It you do not care to repot them, 

 give a watering with nitrate of soda 

 water to inject a little life into them. 

 Do not useiover a pound to fifty gal- 

 lons of water, however. 



Poitevine is naturally a vigorous 

 geranium and it is strange that it 

 should go off in this way. Possibly the 

 smoke and fumes are partly responsi- 

 ble for the condition they are in. Try 

 the effect of using loam below them and 

 also of watering more freely, in some 

 other part of the house. If they im- 

 prove there and not at their present 

 stand, the trouble is probably partly 

 due to the fumes. Do not use too rich 

 soil for your plants. Let any manure 

 be well decayed. One-fourth old hotbed 

 manure or the same proportion of old 

 cow manure is sufficiently strong. The 

 manure they relish is one which readily 

 crumbles in the hand. 0. W. 



Where Some 



Growers Stumble 



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A COMMISSION MAN'S VIEW. 



[A paper read by Samuel S. Pennock before the 

 Lancaster Florists' Club, Lancaster, Pa.. April 

 17.] 



When your president wrote and asked 

 me to read a paper before your club, I 

 felt considerable hesitancy in accepting 

 the invitation, as it is rather a delicate 

 thing to do — to point out the faults of 

 the other man's way of conducting his 

 business. It is human nature to criti- 

 cise; in fact, it is an easy habit to fall 

 into and if one is not careful it soon 

 becomes chronic. 



But you have asked me to tell you 

 of your faults as we see them, of the 

 things that help to make or mar the 

 sales of your stock, and I am going to 

 pay you the compliment of believing 

 that you want what you have asked 

 for; so I will try to give you my honest 

 criticisms, and hope you will accept 

 them as well meant advice and not as 

 though they were given in a spirit of 

 finding fault with your own individual 

 ideas and methods. 



To begin with, I do not think that we 

 try to help one another enough with a 

 word of encouragement here and there, 

 as we go along the path of life, which 

 is of infinitely more benefit than a word 

 of condemnation, not only to the one 

 who may justly deserve it, but to the 

 one giving it as well. We are all glad 



to be praised when we do something 

 which we think is good. How often do 

 we hear from a grower when we are 

 able to make him good returns? But 

 when his returns are not satisfactory, 

 we hear from him quickly and there is 

 not much time wasted in telling us 

 about it. It is an easy matter to kick, 

 sometimes too easy; in fact, we get far 

 more kicks than we should and not 

 enough praise when lots of times we 

 really deserve it. By this I do not mean 

 to say that the growers are the only 

 ones who do not give praise when praise 

 is due. The retailers and the wholesalers 

 are just as negligent in this respect as 

 anyone; probably they do not really c in- 

 sider the other fellow as much as he 

 grower does. 



For Better Understanding. 



On a dull market, oftentimes the re- 

 turns are so low that we are disgusted 

 with them and hate to send them out, 

 but we have no alternative. We hnve 

 no wish to send out low returns any 

 more than our growers care to receive 

 them, and it is through no wish of onrs 

 that the stock brings low prices, as it is 

 certainly to our advantage to get all 

 w© possibly can out of the stock and 

 get as high prices as possible for every 

 flower that comes in to us. It is cer- 

 tainly as hard on us as on the growers 



