270 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ October 6, 1870. 



ELOWER GAEDEN. 



Trim and dress frequently during the decline of the season. 

 Look well after choice seeds. Dahlias should be earthed-up 

 round the stems to preserve the crown of the root should any 

 frost suddenly come. In consequence of the fine autumn a 

 good quantity of seed will be gathered ; choose a fine day, and 

 cut that which is ripe : it may be gradually dried. Auriculas 

 will require more attention now. Raise the frames on bricks, 

 keep the lights off as much as possible, but always draw them 

 over the plants in heavy or continuous rain. Plant offsets of 

 Tulips as quickly as possible, and make preparations for plant- 

 ing the best beds towards the latter part of the month. All 

 soft or diseased bulbs had better be planted forthwith. I fear 

 many fine seedlings have been seriously thrown back, and in 

 some instances wholly lost, by last season's blight, frost, and 

 mildew. If the beds of Pansies for nest year's blooming are 

 not already made, lose no time in putting the plants out, that 

 they may be established before frost comes. Take off all rooted 

 layers of Carnations and Picotees, pot them in half-pint or pint 

 pots, and place them in a frame for ten days. 



GEEENHOUSE AND CONSEEVATOBY. 



Much has to be done in these and the other plant houses for 

 the next fortnight. All pots should be washed clean and all 

 insects extirpated. Should any plants prove so foul that some 

 time must elapse before they can be thoroughly cleaned, they 

 had better be removed to the plant hospital or some of the other 

 houses where they will be out of sight and can do no mischief. 

 Everything must now be made thoroughly clean, if success is 

 to be obtained through the dull winter months. Above all 

 things let the glass, both roof and sides, be washed ; those who 

 are unfortunately scant of labour cannot accomplish this, but 

 the difference in point of success between a dirty roof and a 

 clean one will be found enormous, all other matters being 

 equal. Let everything liable to suffer from frost be housed 

 immediately. A single night's frost will render nugatory the 

 labour of many months. The tall Cacti should by this time 

 have completed their growth ; it is good plan to remove the 

 terminal point from such as are still growing, and to diminish 

 the supply of water ; indeed, tkey will need very little, if any, 

 between the end of October and January. Let them have 

 abundance of light, which is of paramount importance in secur- 

 ing good bloom. Whatever watering may be necessary should 

 be done early in the day, so as to allow of getting the super- 

 fluous moisture dried-up before night, for there is much more 

 danger from damp among plants in flower at this season than 

 from frost. Preserve a rather low temperature ; and on cold, 

 dull, cloudy days it will be advisable to use a little fire heat 

 with air, so as to secure a moderately dry state of the atmo- 

 sphere before night. Use fire heat very sparingly, however, 

 and only when it may be necessary to prevent injury from damp, 

 or to keep the temperature from falling below 40°. Where 

 plants have been brought from warmer houses it will hardly be 

 safe to allow the night temperature to average below 45°, but 

 in houses containing a mixed collection of plants there is moi e 

 danger to be apprehended from a high night temperature than 

 from keeping it somewhat lower than may be suitable for some 

 of the inmates. 



STOVE. 



The temperature of this house must, of course, decline with 

 the decline of the year; as light is restricted, so, too, must be 

 the heat. Continue to remove to a cooler house with less 

 atmospheric moisture all Orchids which have thoroughly 

 ripened their growths. The Cattleyas, when rooting freely, will 

 coEtinue to sprout buds from the base of the pseudo-bulbs if 

 kept in constant excitement ; this, although it increases the 

 volume of the plant, robs the blossom. The Aiirides, Dendro- 

 biums, &c, will continue to enjoy a tolerable amount of both 

 heat and moisture. In the growing or warmest house let 80° 

 by day and 70° by night be the maximum for a week or two ; 

 for the other at rest, 65° by day and 60° by night will be 

 sufficient. 



FORCING PIT. 



Frost may shortly be expected, and the pleasure ground and 

 flower garden will then be stripped of its gay colours ; how 

 to preserve and encourage in- doors a constant succession of 

 flowers during the dull winter months becomes, therefore, an 

 important consideration at this period. Part of this business 

 may be accomplished by retarding autumn flowers, and part 

 by genuine forcing. Success in the latter, it is well known, 

 depends in no small degree on elegibility of the plants selected, 

 as well as on the condition of the stock at the end of autumn. 

 All plants intended for this purpose should have undergone a 



preparatory course for weeks, nay for months, previous. An 

 equally important concern is to provide a proper house or pit. 

 In such a place three or four principles are of the greatest im- 

 portance, and must be duly secured — viz., a sufficiency of at- 

 mospheric heat, a steady and permanent bottom heat of, as 

 near as possible, 75°, plenty of atmospheric moisture at com- 

 mand, and abundance of light ; in addition, a night covering 

 would be a great acquisition. Those who cannot command 

 such a perfect structure may resort to a pit heated by ferment- 

 ing materials, the best and most enduring of which are tree 

 leaves, more especially those of the Oak. Two-thirds of these, 

 fresh from the trees, mixed with one-third of last year's stock 

 in a half-perished state, and trodden firmly to the depth of 

 4 feet or more, will make a gradual and enduring warmth. A 

 coating of tan may be placed over it for plunging. Some 

 structure of this kind should be prepared a3 soon as fresh 

 leaves can be obtained. — W. Keane. 



DOINGS OF THE LAST WEEK 

 Another sunny week, but trying to most things not fully 

 established. All the water we saved from the rains has been 

 used-up for nearly a week, and but for the cooler, longer, and 

 dewy nights we should be feeling very much the want of water. 

 Partly owing to the heat and the dryness, we have been visited 

 with clouds of flies. On the afternoon of the 28th ult. the 

 air was filled with them. We could scarcely move without 

 being covered, and eyes, mouth, and nostrils getting their share. 

 On some places they formed large clusters like bees. The flies 

 were about half the size of the common house fly, and brownish 

 in colour. They have been more scanty since, though there 

 were plenty of gnats and ephemeral flies that enjoyed their 

 short existence in the sunbeams. It appeared, too, that in 

 the afternoon numbers of the small greenish fly that have 

 plastered the leaves of Turnips and Cabbages, rose on the wing 

 for short periods. Altogether one might have supposed we 

 were going to be visited with one of the plagues of Egypt. 

 Every day we are reminded how dependant we are, and how 

 even the most minute organisms and the smallest insects may 

 render nugatory all our efforts. How soon the red spider and 

 the green fly would, if left to themselves, leave little but a wreck 

 in our vineries and Cucumber houses ! This season good fields 

 of Turnips have here been the exception, not the rule ; and 

 even some of the best of these fields, after passing through the 

 ordeal of possible attacks from the Turnip beetle and growing 

 rapidly, considering the dry season, are now next to destroyed 

 by whole clouds of a small greenish fly plastering the leaves. 

 Caterpillars and a similar fly are causing sad havoc in the 

 gardenB in the neighbourhood, attacking everything of the 

 Cabbage tribe and leaving little but wrecks behind. A cottager 

 told us lately that they had much reason to be grateful for the 

 fine crops of early Potatoes, as they would be very expensive to 

 purchase soon, owing to the devastations of tho fly among the 

 Greens of all sorts that would have helped in winter. 



KITCHEN GAEDEN. 



Cabbages. — As already stated, we' have scarcely suffered at 

 all from caterpillars. Scotch Kale, Savoys, Brussels Sprouts, 

 and Cauliflowers scarcely present a hole as marking where 

 they had been present. All these, too, have escaped this little 

 fly, though here and there patches are to be found. It has 

 been worst on the young Cabbages just planted out and be- 

 ginning to grow. The little point of growth in the heart and 

 the smaller leaves round it would be covered with the flies, and 

 these, if left to themselves, would soon suck out all the juices, 

 and if the plant lived at all, it would either grow without a 

 heart, or send up from the base two or three heads instead of 

 one, and thus retard the time of cutting for use. By dusting, 

 squeezing, and syringing with clear soot and lime water, we 

 thought we had got rid of the intruders, but we find that others 

 have come and taken their place. This week, too, many of the 

 stumps of the Cabbages that were planted in the autumn of 

 1869, and which were looking so well, are becoming covered 

 with these insects, and if let alone and no heavy rains come, 

 they will soon be in as bad a plight as some of our best Turnip 

 fields. We find that sewage water, if clear and not too strong, 

 not only kills them but prevents them from coming. Even on 

 young Cabbages it is quite as effectual as clear soot water. 

 Fine soot is very good as a slight sprinkling. Neither that, 

 however, nor the sewage water over the top or leaves would 

 do where the vegetable was to be used soon afterwards. 



It is always well to be learning even in little things, for, like 



