JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ July 6, 1876 



time last year, although there are many older than that worth 

 mentioning. Scarlet : John Gibbona, very bright and large 

 truBses, single blooms often measure more than 2 inches 

 across ; Rev. F. Atkinson is the finest scarlet of last year's 

 introduction; it is superb in every way, and it has a good 

 companion in this season's lot in David Thomson. With us 

 there is little difference between the flowerB, but the leaves 

 of the latter are perfectly green, while those of the former 

 are deeply zonaled. Pink : Lady Byron, very fine indeed ; 

 Lucy Bosworth; Lady Sheffield, best of all this class; Mrs. 

 Rogers, Sybil Holden, scarlet and crimson, with white eye; 

 Mrs. Whiteley, Earl Manvers, Dora Charlton, A. Henderson 

 (very dark crimson), Charles Smith, E. Daviea, Sir H. S. 

 Stanhope, scarlets, in the way of Corsair and Vesuvius, but 

 much better; Wordsworth, Havelock, Lord Zetland. Other 

 beautiful varieties : Mrs. Mellish, rose ; Mrs. Leacroft, red, 

 fine white eye ; Ellen and Mrs. Jacoby, salmon ; Frederick 

 William, rosy plum colour, extra fine ; Mrs. Lancaster, clear 

 bright pink ; Louisa Smith, vivid crimson ; John Fellows, 

 cerise ; Mary Pearson, rose ; Mrs. Mellish and Evelyn Mellish, 

 light rose. Many more good varieties might be named, but 

 these are very seleot. All those which are fine and free summer 

 bloomers are generally the same in the winter time. — J. Mum. 



FRUIT APPEARANCES AND PROSPECTS. 



Duking the early part of May, with frost every night, the 

 chance of a crop of fruit of any kind looked a very poor one 

 indeed. Matters have considerably improved since then, and 

 we may now fairly expect to retain such fruit as we have. Pears 

 are almost a total failure, and Apples are partially so. Late- 

 flowering kinds are generally supposed to be the least liable to 

 injury from frost, but they have not escaped this season so 

 well as the early-flowering kinds. Irish Peach and Oslin, which 

 were flowering in the middle of April, have a good crop on 

 them; while Margaret, and others which did not flower till a 

 month later when the frost was more severe, have next to 

 no fruit. Some trees of various sorts shaded on the east side 

 by timber trees from the early sun have also a good crop. 



Plums on the west walls are abundant, especially Early Fa- 

 vourite, Cooper's Large, Mirabelle, Purple Gage, and Green 

 Gage ; those on the east side have only a thin crop. There was 

 abundance of bloom every where, which appeared to set, but only 

 a very small portion of fruit swelled off. Standards do not pay 

 for growing here, as, owing to the soil and climate being rather 

 ungenial, they get covered with insects, and there is no chance 

 to wage war against them as there is with trees on a wall. 

 Many of the wall trees, especially Golden Drop Plums, have much 

 bare wood. I am in the habit of nailing-in some young wood 

 every season to take the place of that which is weak or dis- 

 figured ; it sometimes bears a few Plums the year after laying- 

 in, and always forms quantities of spurs for fruiting in future 

 seasons. Last year, owing, I suppose, to the unfavourable 

 weather, many of these spurs formed only fruit buds — no wood 

 buds at all, and now the frost has taken the fruit the branches 

 are bare. Cooper's Large, or La Delieieuse, is a valuable Plum, 

 it always bears, and is good for all purposes ; it is better than 

 Washington in all respects but appearance. Washington with 

 me is a shy bearer — a very handsome fruit, but only second- 

 rate in quality. 



My fan-trained Peach trees are similar to a lady's fan when 

 it has had too much wear and shows rather more framework 

 than is desirable, but still there is some fruit on them and no 

 blister. They had a wooden coping over them a foot wide, and 

 were covered every night with frigi domo from the 9 th of 

 March to the beginning of Jane. Another wall with the trees 

 trained cordon fashion has an abundant crop of fruit ; this, 

 however, had the benefit of being sheltered from the sharpest 

 "frosts in winter, as I did not consider the wood sufficiently 

 ripe to bear much frost. None of the trees covered at night 

 with frigi domo have a blistered leaf on them, and this in- 

 cludes somo maiden trees planted in November. Other maiden 

 trees of the same batch, and treated exactly Birnilar-, excepting 

 that they had no frigi domo over them, though they had the 

 same sort of coping-boards, are now quite worthless, every one 

 of them being blistered, deformed, and stunted, and some 

 actually dead. To succeed wiih Peach trees at all I find I 

 ■must cover them from their infancy whether they have fruit 

 on them or not. Herring nets, tiffany, and such-like slight 

 covering have been tried and found wanting ; they will not 

 keep out 8° or 10° of frost on two successive nights if the inter- 

 vening clay happens a'so to have a low temperature, and on 



two or three occasions this spring the mercury did not rise 

 above 35° any time during the day. A covering like a blanket 

 is needed to keep out such weather. 



Although I have such abundance of fruit on my cordon trees, 

 and the plan proves much more profitable here than fan- 

 training, I do not mean to train any more this way, as many 

 of the trees are gumming badly, and plainly show they do not 

 like so much restriction. I think the best plan will be one 

 which is more natural than any of the systems in ordinary use 

 — viz., to plant maiden trees upright, and fasten the laterals 

 on each side to form main branches, making a tree something 

 of the shape of a horizontal-trained Pear, excepting that the 

 branches instead of being horizontal should have an incline of 

 30° or 35°, and the bearing wood instead of being spurred 

 should be laid-in on each side of the main branches. 



There is little or no winter pruning necessary to carry out 

 this plan. A novice can see easier what there is to do to a 

 tree than he can with a fan-trained tree (unless that fan- 

 trained tree would keep as perfect as it does on paper, which 

 somehow or other it never does), and when the sap all flows 

 through one main to branches having all the same elevation 

 instead of five or seven mains at different angles, to supply 

 branches varying in elevation from 0° to 90°, there is a greater 

 chance of having a continuous unchecked flow. There is no 

 need to cut maiden trees down, as is usually done if the wood 

 is ripe, and the laterals generally thought useless are as good 

 as any to train-in for a permanency. Those not required 

 should be kept pinched-back till midsummer, and then be re- 

 moved with the knife, but most of them can with advantage 

 be left on and kept pinched-back to shade the stems. 



Light-coloured walls are far preferable to those of a dark 

 colour, the changes of temperature being less violent. 



Cherries on walls, including Morellos, are a fair crop. There 

 are none on standards and bushes. Currants are a partial 

 crop and will not be fine. Gooseberries, Strawberries, and 

 Raspberries are very abundant. 



We have had a long period of dry weather, and although 

 our heavy soil is quite moist enough 6 inches below the sur- 

 face, the surface itself had become dry and was cracking. I 

 therefore thought it advisable to slightly mulch all fruit trees 

 and some of the vegetables. — William Taylok. 



AURICULAS. 



I should find it difficult to say how much my old love for 

 Auriculas has been stimulated and refreshed by the pleasant 

 articles which have appeared from time to time in your pages 

 from the pens of the Rev. F. D. Horner and Mr. Douglas, and 

 I daresay I am not alone in my feelings of gratitude to them 

 for their hints and for the amusement they have afforded to 

 our leisure moments. Notes on Auriculas would seem almost 

 out of place from this damp climate. A moist atmosphere 

 is a characteristic of Wales. The rainfall is large ; the 

 amount of cloud and driving rain from the neighbouring 

 Atlantic make it appear even larger than the tell-tale pluvi- 

 ometer will gauge. My garden is in a valley surrounded with 

 trees, and the Rhododendrons thrive to such an extent that 

 we are forced to cut them down in places with a ruthless hand 

 to prevent their overgrowing our paths and smothering one 

 another. Everything is indicative of damp, the enemy of the 

 Auricula, yet " where there's a will there's a way ;" and even 

 here with care and attention I have had some blooms which 

 have charmed me and my neighbours, while also some pecu- 

 liarities have occurred which perhaps other growers may have 

 similarly noticed. 



All my plants of Alderman Wisbey, Dickson's Duke of Wel- 

 lington, Campbell's Robert Burns, Summerseale's Catharina, 

 Smith's Aun Smith, and Mrs. Smith, besides other sorts of 

 which I had but a single representative, never bloomed at all ; 

 the plants seemed to be perfectly healthy and vigorous, but 

 they never showed symptoms of forming a truss. Of all my 

 sorts which did bloom none was better than Heap's Smiling 

 Beauty. I had three plants, all of which came out perfectly, 

 and I gather from the prize lists at Manchester that other 

 growers found this fine variety to be in form this year. I had 

 a Col. Champneys in grand condition with nine large pips, 

 which everyone at first sight selected as a gem. Vivid, gay, 

 and dashing it certainly was, but place Smiling Beauty along- 

 side, and the effect was as though you brought a gas jet to 

 bear upon a farthing rushlight, so necessary is the golden 

 throat to light up a first-rate Auricula. 



My green edges have been very disappointing. Oae plant 



