136 
THE GARDENERS’ 
condemned and destroyed. Besides these, numerous 
animals which have proved very destructive to fruit 
ia Australia were found on board, and killed. 
flying-fox, that has proved 
to fruit-culture there, that all 
80 f e n employed for its 
— but as pet without avail. 
conventions na have devoted much time 
and cultivation of fruit. hese 
m po e 
abundance, at question forcon.ideration at 
present is, how best to dispose of it; and our con- 
vention will devote much of its time, not neglecting 
matters, to this branch. 
The first carload of fruit shipped from California 
u ider the new process of preservation by carbonic 
id gas instead of refrigeration was di of 
tie market in October last, The car was shipped 
om Sacramento on the 13th, and owing to numerous 
accidents en route did not reach Chicago until mid- 
nght of the 2lst, Even then it was subjected to 
firther delay in the eset aad did not reach the 
consignees’ warehouse until the night of the 22ad. 
ontained tno air-tight NN out of 
e air w 
the car was partially derailed, and one compartment 
sprung in such a manner permit a leakage of 
When the 
admission of air, while the fruit from the other was 
in as peaa condition as the day it was loaded, 
The price it a aa was as high as any on the 
in the new experiment 
were delighted with the success of this initial trip, 
and assert pa are that fos settles 1 a doubt 
the utility and value ir plan of preservation as 
compared with the 
An experimental shipment hoa Sacramento to 
New Orleans was recently made, The sides of the car 
were packed in pressed and dried tule (Mexican for a 
Bulrusb, Scirpus lacustris), which proved entirely 
air-tight, The substitution of this cheap Californian 
material for cork, charcoal, ap mineral wool lessens 
the weight of each car from Ib, and 
will result in the saving of ne. dol. for i ice demanded 
he ordinary refrigerator- cars. In 
the case of the car sent to New Orleans com pressed 
air was used, but it is said that carbolic gas can be 
used equally well with the tule lining. 
THE 5 G 8 
OF NY 
QveDLINBURG AND THE T foul —The old 
town of Quedlinbarg, on the ri 
residence of the 
A glance at its geo position 
that the district is well adapted to the cultivation a 
seeds, which branch of agriculture no 
the chief industry. It is shelt 
ii as b ie Harte 
congenial soil, and as the n has been se 
oa for many years, a warm a uctive cae a 
gradu dly formed, and the il i 
3 e subsoil is dry, and 
All these causes combine to anz the cultivation 
Quedlinburg, as flower-seeds have on nly 
on a bet scale for the last fifty years. 
other cause is, that in the eighteenth century, 
Quedlinbur g had a flourishing trade in brewing an 
distilling, possessing no fewer than 150 distilleries, 
and brewing annually 40,000 casks of beer. 
doused distilleries form excellent drying places, and 
= 
with ove- e dvantages, 
Qaedlinb o be on an equality with Erfurt, 
altho ough the ae place had the start, and 
and seed-culture, 
The seed-growers of ä possens large 
tracts of land as far as Westerhausen and Hal- 
berstadt ; this enables them to grow 12 various sorts 
far apart, and each thereby retains its own pure 
quality, for it is known that varieties when 8 fe in 
close Le ox imity impr egnate ons another The 
varieties, experienced men being php to remove 
rogues,” To these endeavours may be attributed 
the success of growing of seeds at e ere The 
largest 3 however, is done in Sugar- Beet 
seeds, and the annual pr 3 8808 to the 
report of the Clearing- house a t Halberstadt, is about 
50 entners (1 centner = 1102322 lb.). The 
tant excepted, are Russia 
tria. are also about 10000 or 
12000 centners of Fodder-Beet seeds produced 
5 Prot the abundance of the vegetable seeds 
may 
be from the following figures :— Carrots, 
4500 ; Le ek and Lettuce (Cos), 1300; Lettuce 
(Cabbage), 800; Cabbage, 500; Peas (superior varie- 
ties), 9000 ; eans, 7000; ohi Rabi , 600 ; Cacum- 
ber, 300; 3 900 — &c. 
Of no less importance 
seeds, 
s the growing of flower 
Of . Fossia odorata, 500 to 
and of Nemophila 
ren Many of those sorts are exported to other 
coun 
The nite of seeds from Stocks and Asters 
forms a separate branch, an attracts people from 
all parts of the world. There are also numbers of 
rarer flowers grown, as a wae through the conser- 
vatories of ee Dippe Bros, H, Mette, and 
other firms will show. 
Tue following figures give some idea of e extent in 
hectares of the seed growing : Sugar-Beets, 300 to 
820; Cabbages, Lettuces, . and Cos Lettuces, 50 
to 60; Peas, 95 to 100 hectar res, = 
flowers are also grown; 23 hecta 
E 
300, s, 25,000 a utumn and 
winter Stocks, 36.0.0 Walldowers, 15,000 Cineraria, 
3 = pa peregi and Dianthus; ; 80, 
rim chinensis, 000 of h P. 
Begonia, Cyclamen e &e, * 
by steam, to 
There are fo: orges and workshops, 
of workmen for re epairing the machin nery on the pre- 
mises, as well as a laboratory for analysing ‘tee 
Sugar- Beets 
In the winte 
sent a buy — preety on the packing-rooms pre- 
orders being e 
daily with a promptitude and —— — 
almost incredible, Ernst Sarsson 
CHRONICLE. 
[Frsevary 2, 1895, r 
FORESTRY, 
| 
QUALITY OF BRITISH. GROW 
CONIFEROUS TIMBERS, 
Wirn the object of testing the quality of the | 
timber of the various species of Coniferous trees 
tivated in this country, I have lost noo op 
during the past ade two years either of collecting 
specimens or conducting experiments, This, I need 
hardly add, has been attended with — 
difficulties, and it has not been easy to procure home 
grown specimens of a suitable age and size to rende 
kind 
friend in procuring specimens that would not other — 
wise have been obtainable. : 
As will be seen ers measurements given through. 3 
out the following notes, probably the largest ani — 
oldest specimens in this country of Pinus Laricio, 
P. austriaca, P. ponderosa, P. Pinaster, P. Stroba, 
P. muri 
quality. 
One or two instances mij 
be cited as ex . : In thinning a p 
composed of Pseudotsuga Douglasii, Pinus gran 
and Picea Morinda, fifty-three out of seventpant 
specimens of P. Strobus were pumped or rotten i 
the core, and utterly unfitted for use in any Wi) 
had been 
aa 
planted 
average 25 fee 
trees of the same ene on various other q i 
of soil, and found the timber — und, dedu q 
tions will not be difficult t make, A still more 
A large number of fencing poles, Larch and 1 
Fir, were being cut from tw n ing n 
tions of the same age and size, but 1 f 
Scotch Fir timber from the peaty 
carrying the poles to the hard road adj z 
plantation, had not the We i 9 bet 
from which wood the particular poles 
brought, that from the arii soil * f. i f 
ring like metal when thrown from Jull thn 
whilst that grown on pea! a soft | — 
Larch timber grown on gravelly soil 18 
‘pumped,” or rotten at the heart, and in & l. 
able 1 with which I had to deal, 1 
had to be removed from a large mixed p? 2 
e Fi oath. growing on soil geant, si 
tion. Such as these ar de ning 
show how careful we mast be in conden the 
care 
uality 
. en tree, when judged from the * of % | 
W. as produced on any pariona : ot 
and that, with peter species at | 
tended over a fairly ach wide pa 2 
ful to weit 
In the following notes I have been ien dhe lade 
not only the age of the tree e a 5 ey 
ncut, but also the qe of 40 add that ib 
it was grown; and it may be w 
