April 20, 1912.] 



THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE 



251 



THE 



crs'Cbronule 



No. 1,321— SAT UliDAY, April 20, 1912: 



CONTENTS. 



Agriculture, scholar- 

 ships in ... 



American Gooseberry- 

 mildew ... 



Arches, garden 



Birds and fruit buds ... 



Books, notices of 251, 



Bulgaria, botanising in 



Carbon-assimilation ... 



Carnation "Baroness de 



Brienen " 



Chesterfield, new public 



park for 



Conifers at Dropmore, 



damage to 



Edinburgh Spring Show 



Fairy rings 



Fernery, the 



Fish hatcheries in 



Canada ... 



Flower shows at Bir- 

 mingham 



Foreign correspon- 

 dence 



Forest, a submerged ... 



Forestry in Scotland ... 



French International 

 Horticultural Con- 

 gress 



Fruit crops, frost on ... 



Fungus rarasite, re- 

 markable effect of a 



Grass land, manures on 



Grieve, Mr James 



Hampton, Mr. A. J., 

 presentation to 



International Horticul- 

 tural Exhibit' on, the 



Irrigation, overhead ... 



Law note — 

 Failure of a market 

 gardener 



L.C.C. gardeners and 

 the R.H S. examina- 

 tion 



Leaks in pipes 



Manchester, horticul- 

 ture in 



Moraines, notes from 

 my 



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 255 



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 263 

 252 

 263 



254 



263 



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 262 

 263 

 257 



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262 



257 

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2'7 

 265 



264 

 263 

 262 



262 



262 

 264 



269 



262 

 263 



264 

 251 



Myrica gale, root 

 nodules on 



New invention — 

 A new flower pot 



Nova Scotia, govern- 

 ment help for settlers 

 in 



Nursery notes — 

 Sander & Sons 



Ob'tuary - 



Blacklock, James ... 

 Lawlor, Michael H.... 

 Lyall, John B. 

 McKenna, Patrick ... 

 Piper, George Wren... 



Orchid notes and glean- 

 ings- 

 Orchids at Belsize 

 Court, Hampstead 

 C oe I o gyne speciosa 



alba 



Dendrobium primu- 

 linum giganteum ... 



Plants, new or note- 

 worthy 



Plum rust 



Primrose, colour of 



Primula rosea 



Purdom, Mr. W. 



Rose, new, from For- 

 mosa — 



Russia, cut flowers in ... 



Salt and Sugar-Beet ... 



Societies — 



Cornwall Daffodil and 



Spring-flowering ... 



Manchester and North 



of England Orchid 



Royal Horticultural... 



Surveyors' Institution 



United Hort. Benev. 



and Provident 



Tobacco, home-grown, 

 for spraying purposes 



Tobacco, the effect of 

 manures on ... — 



Vines, red spider on ... 



Violas, a trial of 



Week's work, the 258, 



West African gardening 



262 

 265 



263 



You then fill up with one part of soil (vary the sections, and A. Mathilda?, failure with the high 



composition to your pleasure— one plot of limey Alpines ; Anemone baldensis a failure, no others 



loam, one of peaty humus, another of granite, tried; Antennaria, Anthemis, Artemisia, 



another of sand, and so on) to five parts of finely- Arenaria, Asperulas, Astragalus, Bellis, all do 



broken road metal about the size of one's top very well ; Campanulas all thrive brilliantly (not, 



finger joints, the blue Craven conglomerate being of course, the big herbaceous ones) ; C. excisa has 



the best, but almost any other road metal, failed here- in moraine, but succeeded elsewhere ; 



except flint, answering quite well. If your bank C. Morettiana, untried 



be steep, the successive slopes of moraine should Chrysanthemum, Draba, do well ; Dianthus all do 



be shored up with big breasts of rock, set very nobly, except, so far, D. neglectus and D. calli- 



deep and firm ; in flat places big stones should zonus (which thrive elsewhere) ; Dryas does well, 



be planted flush with the surface for stepping- so does Delphinium nudicaule ; Edraianthus are 

 stones. In very hot places or aspects a violent 



am 



all 



254 slope should be avoided, as the drainage may in moraine, but succeeds in other places; Ero- 



diums untried, but Geranium lancastriense grows 

 neat, E. chamaedryoides, (Reichardi) failed; 



_ Erysimum, Cheiranthus, Matthiola succeed; of 



wet moraines ; I have made dry moraines ; I the Gentians all are failures ; Globularia and 



269 

 269 

 269 

 269 

 269 



prove too rapid. 



In no circumstances is any cement bottom 

 either necessary or even desirable. I have made 



have made them in many counties and aspects 

 253 never have I had anything but perfect pleasure 



Geums do well, but G. reptans prefers open soil ; 



lcums 



254 



254 



252 

 263 

 264 

 265 

 262 



263 



263 

 262 



from them, made quite simply, as I describe. succeeded; Iberis and Thlaspi do splendidly, 



My experiments (in the beginning of things) with 



cement bottoms, on the contrary, were wholly 



disastrous. The essence of a moraine, even of 



the wettest, is its rapid drainage; a cement Lychnis is 



Linums 

 permums yet ; Flannel flower (Leontopodium) 

 and Linaria alpina are at home, of course; 



doubtful so far, but Silene 



bottom turns it into a slough. 



268 



268 

 265 

 262 



268 



260 



262 



256 

 960 

 259 

 256 



o __. Even where such Elizabeth* is wonderful; Mertensia primuloides 



an additional expense does no harm, it certainly brilliant ; Morisia doubtful, and so are Oxahs 



does no good, and is quite unnecessary. As for enneaphylla, and Ourisia ; Omphalodes Lucihffl 



moisture, one of my most successful creations does well, but 0. nitida 



was a very shallow, flat, and grilling moraine, Myosotis rupicola, glorious 



which I made for a cousin, Sir Reginald McLeod, Papaver alpinum, glorious and perennial, P. 



near Maidstone. And here, with no precautions, croceum and nudicaule also ; Phyteumas (the 



in fearful exposure to the sun. with indifferent alpine) have usually failed; Potentillas all do 



well, and some too well; Primulas, of these I 



seems a 

 and 



bog plant; 

 perennial ; 



poor 



all 



growing apace, ana tne Aizoon Saxifrages nour- 

 ishing higher and wider than anywhere else in 



ILLUCTRATlO^b. 



Achillea Kellereri 



Arches, garden ... 



Barr Memorial Cup, the 



Bulgaria, Mount Vitosha in... 

 Camellia cuspidata, a flowering shoot 

 Carnation "Baroness de Brienen" 

 Odontoglossum crispum Saga 



of 



252 

 255 

 266 

 253 

 261 



254 



267 



the' plants are a wonder, Primula glaucescens have not yet tried as many as I should. 



the Auriculas, spectabilis, glaucescens, mter- 



^ ^ m ^ media, &c, thrive most wonderfully ; Ranunculus, 



my taowl^ let no one be afraid /nor all the Alpines do well ; Saxifrage, all the Aizoons 



trouble about any further rules than those I (except florulenta), Englerias, Kabschias (many 



have suggested. The moraine, if properly built, dislike excess of sun), none of the Porphyrons ; 



has always a sufficiency of water, without any Sedum does well, not Sempervivum ; Silene and 



" fussment " of cement bottoms and underground Saponaria do brilliantly ; the alpine Senecios have 



_ * ^H^ -K- k_ — — ■ I ^^w I 



pleasa 



early all Veronicas prosper ; all 



luxury). Even in the extremest drought a few the alpine Valerians ; the high alpine Violas have 

 canfuis over the moraine go further, last longer, not yet properly justified my hope. 



bord 



— Q This lisfc > m x p lead > is ver y p artial > mers }y 



For moraines are by nature fitted to luxuriate betraying incomplete experiment in many of its 



most in the overhead watering of Heaven, though silences, and faulty experiment only in many of 



NOTES FROM MY MORAINES. in nature they a]so en joy the underground rills of its failures up to date. However, it may be a 



HAVE been asked by many people to give the the melting snow. In our climate this would keep guide and glory to other happier g^new and 



J J r r ° - • ■•• •• -1--1--J --j — g i ve k ac k to a ii their shaken confidence in Uie 



latest and most exhaustive news as to the 

 success of my moraines and their inhabitants. 

 I have also been asked to reassure the 

 timid who have (to my very great regret) been 



it too wet ; by its constitution, unhelped and un- 

 worried, it automatically retains exactly the 

 amount of moisture that its plants require. 



As to a record of successes and failures, this is 



good old simple moraine. Reginald Farrer 



terrified by Mr. Malby's elaborate preparations a much harder matter. I cannot possibly dog- NOTICES OF BOOKS. 



and precautions. Therefore let me briefly declare matise; one of the charms of the moraine is 

 my conviction and experience, that Mr. Malby's that, while a universal success, it is also a special 



and other formidable gamble. 



cement arrangements 



deterrents, while they spring from a 



You may suddenly succeed with a 



zeal plant which always dies in 



a 



neighbour's 



that can never be overpraised, are in them- 

 selves not only entirely unnecessary, but even 

 harmful. So important does this reassurance 

 seem to me, that I wish my words could be 

 echoed on into other periodicals which Mr. 

 Malby has lately been dazzling with his mag- 

 nificent but uncalled-for and extravagant pre- 

 cautions. The proclamation of these has fright- 

 ened many of the humble and earnest; they 

 write to 



notice? 



me asking. 



To which, with all the passion at my 

 command, I answer " No." Mr. Malby, like 

 every good sound gardener, has allowed himself 

 to stray into a multiplicity of carefulnesses that 

 are really wholly unnecessary 

 Bother about none of them. 



and 

 This 



deluding. 



moraine, and vice versa. Failure, again, may 

 be the fault of an ill-rooted specimen, trying 

 weather, inappropriate soil mixture, resurrec- 

 tionist birds ; and not of the moraine itself. Suc- 

 cess may reward your next attempt, and in one 

 county the moraine-success may be the failure 

 of another. In my own case I am certain of no 

 failure ; a few I have had, but I can never be 

 sure that the plant in question dislikes moraine 



• • And, 



again, there are numbers of things I have never 

 yet tried— from inattention in some cases, and 

 from stupid fear in others. Here, then, is a 

 partial and undogmatic list, to which, in the 

 cases of failure, the experience of other growers 



Must we take any in general, or only mine in particular. 



is 



make a moraine, the simplest, most successful, 

 and least expensive of all gardens : 



On some level strip, bank or steep slope, 

 you excavate to the depth of 2J> feet at the least. 



how to has already given the lie : 



Acantholimon, untried; Achillea, Aethionema, 



Anthemis, Andromeda, Arabis, beginner. 



Perpetual Carnations.* 



As with Sweet Peas and Roses, so with Carna- 

 tions, there seems to be no end to the books that 

 treat of their culture. The present volume is a 

 brief treatise of 100 pages, and in that space the 

 author, who is an expert, treats of everything 

 connected with Perpetual Carnations, and gives 

 as well a short chapter on Souvenir de la Mal- 

 maison varieties, and another on border Carna- 

 tions and Pinks. He expects to see " Borders " 

 give way to Perpetuals for out-of-door work, 

 and introduces a list of varieties which he 

 esteems the most suitable for that purpose. The 

 varieties for winter flowering are restricted to 

 34, and an index expurgatorius serves as a warn- 

 ing to the tyro against cultivating varieties which 

 have been superseded. The increasing custom of 

 growing on benches does not find in the author an 

 advocate for its extension, but, as a rule, the 

 book defines the various cultural practices on 

 popular lines. It is a useful handbook for the 



Alyssum, 



Aubrietia, all perfectly successful; Androsace, 

 complete success with the Indian and villosa- 



* Perpetual Carnations. By Laurence J. Cook. (Casseli 

 & Co., Ltd., London.) 1912. Price Is. and Is. 6d. net. 



