. 



OS 



THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE. 



[February 17, 1912. 



a darker green colour, shorter joints, and a more 

 vigorous habit. The actual amount of the 

 shortening of the stem depends on the plant; it 

 is not noticeable on Tomatos, but is very distinct 

 in some of the other cases. 



In spite of the extra growth on the steamed 

 soils the plant is not rank or coarse, a result 

 attributed to the nature of the food it was now 

 taking up. It gives a larger quantity of fruit 

 for every 100 parts of leaf and stem, so that the 

 total amount of fruit is considerably in excess of 

 that on the plants on the untreated soils. Fur- 

 ther, as fig. 44 shows, the Tomatos grown oa 

 heated soil yielded a heavier and better crop 

 than those grown on ordinary soil. E. J. Russell. 



(To be continued.) 



something has to go, and as a rule it is the 

 buried log; out it comes. It is then sawn into 

 15-feet lengths and rafted down the river to 

 the mill. 



light 



Pig 



a big fire : 

 with it 



get clay and 



(or a portion), 



cover the 

 just like 



paste, then put it in front of the fire, and with 



a. tin hillv kpen wpftlnor fho /VUir ^ «•!.•_ v__ 



I 



th 



came across trie most delightful lake ; 

 hardly anyone goes near it. The bottom is white 

 glass sand, i.e., a sand that the best glass can 

 be made of, and the water absolutely clear. In it 

 were trout 12 lbs. to 15 lbs. ; the lake is 40 feet 

 deep in places. Up to the present only a stray 

 bushman catches the fish. The trout were put 



letting the 



tin billy keep wetting the clay, ending by 



clay bake hard ; then tap off the 

 clay, which comes away with the pig's skin. 

 The white meat then is excellent, A Maori 

 showed me the dodcre. 



" I saw a huge piece of Kauri gum, weighing 

 243 lbs., dug out by some Australians. I never 

 saw a larger bit. I advised them not to break it 



NEW ZEALAND. 



I think perhaps some readers of the Gar- 

 deners' Chronicle may find interest in the fol- 

 lowing extracts from a letter I have received 

 from a friend, who has just been appointed to 

 the Woods and Forest Department in the North 

 Island. He writes, dated November 11, 1911, 

 Auckland, New Zealand : — 



M Nothing but gales of wind and rain here, 

 and it has been pretty bad travelling in the 

 northern forests, where I have been. I think it 

 better to keep clear of the bush until the dry 

 weather sets in. I find that the Kauri forests on 

 the west coast have an old buried forest of Kauri 

 Underneath them in places; it seems incredible 

 that trees, roughly estimated as 2,000 years old, 

 should have similar buried trees right under- 



The hearts of the buried trunks 



■ 





B 



Fig. 44. — TOMATOS PROM plants in partially-sterilised soil 



(a) Soil heated to 200° Fahr, (b) Untreated soil, (c) Soil heated to 130 y Fahr. 



air, 



neath them. 



are, to all appearances, sound timber 



I expected that the timber would 



pieces after exposure to the 



saw-millers say it does not 5 



pay thousands of pounds to 



ber out. The sap wood goes to dust at once with 



the bark, but the centre is being milled. It is 



rather fun watching the logs being dug out and a 



wire cable being put on to them. They then start 



the winding engine, everybody stands del 



anyway, 

 get the 



still. 



go to 



but the 



they 



tim- 



there as fry many years ago by an enterprising 

 man. It is a wild, sparsely-populated district, 

 very pretty My duties now take me to these 

 wild, out-of-the-way places. It is rather rough 

 work, but, as long as one has a dry camp and 

 one s own food— which one knows is clean— the 

 life is all right. When I get to know all the 

 spots and how to get at them things will be easy. 

 Ihe low-lying hills were yellow with Pomaderris 

 in flower, but, beyond that and white Manuka, 

 there was nothing in the way of flowers to interest 

 me. The undergrowth in the bush is so dense that 

 the traveller can only follow cattle tracks. There 

 were a good many wild pigs, and, if fairly young 

 ones are taken, the meat is excellent when they 

 have been feeding on the Fern. It is pre- 

 pared in a simple way : get the pig down to a 

 creek with a good clay bank ; as a rule they run 

 to a creek where they bail up. After it is, killed, 





up, but to trade it off to some museum, but I be- 

 lieve they hung it on a pole and so got it out of 

 the bush into a town and sold it to a gum buyer, 

 wrm broke it up. I was asked by a settler to call 1 

 at his place and see a Waratah (Telopea speciosis- 

 sima)* in flower. You know the Australian shrub. 

 I had seen many before, 

 was the most showy thing 

 It was about 40 feet high, 

 shoot a glorious scarlet flower, 

 arrived at the place I saw it. The settler knew 

 Tasmania, and he and others told me this tree 

 was supposed to be one of the finest specimens 

 known. It lasts in flower for weeks. If it had 

 been near a town I am certain thev would have 

 run an excursion to see it. It was the glorious 

 scarlet in a mass that appealed to me. My last 

 plant of Oleaiia semi-dentatat is dead ; it can- 

 not stand this sub-tropical climate (Auckland). "" 

 A. T. Z?., Ludf/van, Cornwall. 



but this one- 



I had seen. 



and on every 



Miles before I 



THE ALPINE GARDEN 







PRIMULA AMCENA. 



Regarding the note on this Primula (see p. 33), 

 I may say that it is a plant which I grew a good 

 number of years ago, after having been at- 

 tracted to it by Mr. Robinson's description, just 

 as Mr. Farrer seems to have been. It was then, 

 as now, rather difficult to obtain, but I secured 

 some plants from a correspondent at Broussa, 

 and I established, as I thought, a few of 

 these. They were afterwards lost in a severe 

 winter 16 or 18 years ago. The plant has long 

 borne a reputation for tenderness, which makes 

 me doubt its being the parent of the double-lilac 

 Primrose, which is the freest and best of the 

 flowers of its class. Primula amcena is a 

 delightful plant, which I would gladly possess 

 again, notwithstanding my doubts of its hardi- 

 ness. We have made some advance in the culti- 

 vation of the Primulas, and it is possible that we 

 did not give the plant the best conditions. I 

 grew it under the shade of trees and in a shel- 

 tered position. S. Arnott, Dumfries. 







B 



■ 



Fig. 43—irooTs of tomato plants grown in partially-sterilised soil 



tcsick soil heated to 180° Fahr. (b) Some of the same soil untreated ft* TK. iu 



mreated - < c ) The same soil heated to 200 



o * T E «?^ EA spect °sissima (Waratah), a native of New 

 South Wales— is still a rare plant in this country. I have 

 had it out for two winters and it seems to be thriving well ; 

 it has not yet, however, had a severe winter to contend 

 against. If it succeeds it will be a beautiful adjunct to 

 Cornish gardens where so many fine shrubs thrive so well, 

 t Olearia sf.mi-dentata.— Native of Chatham Islands, 

 N.Z., was introduced into British gardens by Capt. A. A. 

 £°TT r o n ; Smith ,n 1909. There is a good plate of it in the 

 R.H.S. Journal, October, 1911. It is early days to say how 

 it will succeed here, but so far it is flourishing well in a 

 moist situation protected from the mid-day sun ; in fact, one 

 is led to believe that what it resents is excessive heat rather 

 than excessive cold. I have no doubt that there will be - 

 great demand for this plant when it is put on the maikeU 



