ISi 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



[ Angast 30, 1877. 



and Co. secure the chief prizes for fountains, garden seats, 

 tools, and appliances; but these " general " classes are com- 

 parative failures — a farce, perhaps, is the proper word. The 

 plant decorations are excellent, and, notwithstanding the seem- 

 ingly high prizes, this system of embellishing a large hall is 

 probably less costly than by employing floral decorations in 

 the orthodox manner. 



The association of music and flowers is appropriate ; both 

 are attractive, and both are provided liberally at the Agri- 

 cultural Hall, continuing throughout the week. Mr. F. W. 

 Wilson, late of the Crystal Palace, proves as efficient as ever as 

 floral manager. 



BOOKS. 



The Colorado Potato Beetle. Illustrated and Described by Dr. 



Andkew Wilson, &a. W. & A. K. Johnston, Edinburgh 



and London. 



We recommend this work to our readers. It will enable 

 them to identify the marauder should it attack their Potato 

 plants, and it notes the remedies that have been suggested. The 

 coloured portraits of the insect and its larva are very good. 

 We can afford spaoe for only one extract. " The chemical 

 remedy most in vogue is Paris green, a powder consisting of 

 Soheele's or Paris green (the arsenite of copper) added to 

 plaster of Paris, to ashes, or to flour ; one part of the former 

 being added to twelve or fifteen parts of the latter substances. 

 With this powder the infested Potatoes are dusted, this treat- 

 ment appearing to have no injurious effect on the plants, 

 although it has been remarked that the subsequent year's crop 

 is usually of inferior quality and exists in diminished quantity. 

 It is hardly necessary to remark that Paris green is a highly 

 poisonous substance, and that great care must be taken in its 

 application. A convenient method of application of this sub- 

 Stance is that by means of an extemporised duster or dredge, 

 such a3 may be made by punching a number of small holes in 

 the bottom of any old tin vessel. This apparatus may be tied 

 to a stick, and can be employed with great facility in the 

 distribution of the powder." 



Various Experiments for the Production of New and Desirable 



Grapes, and a Description of Forty Varieties obtained by 



Hybridisation. By G. Haskell, Ipswich, Mass. 



Two years since we noticed some of the seedling Grapes 



sent to us by Mr. Haekell, and commended especially two 



which had the Black Hamburgh and White Chasselas for their 



male parents. Mr. Haskell has continued his experiments, and 



the pamphlet, of which we have stated the title, records the 



results. We will copy one paragraph because it relates to a 



subject now especially demanding attention. 



Recent experiments in France have shown that the most 

 effectual eradication of the Phylloxera was by flooding the ground 

 and thus drowning the insects. As the Riparia of this country 

 flourishes, and really does best in wet bogs and meadows, even 

 when the roots are immersed in water all winter and the soil is 

 saturated all summer, may we not expect that this trait will 

 prevail in some of these hybrids and make them almost proof 

 against the Phylloxera, especially if planted in such wet soils ? 

 I shall place them in Buch soils and localities, and hope others 

 will do so too, that the experiment may be fairly tried. 



NOTES on VILLA and SUBURBAN GARDENING. 



Coleos Verschafeelti and V. splendens are among the very 

 beBt of foliage plants for richness of colour and effectiveness in 

 the flower garden. They are extensively used in working out 

 the various designs for scrolls, panels, or other pattern bedding, 

 in which cases they are generally planted closely so as to shelter 

 each other, and the tops are kept pinched to the uniform height 

 and shape of the pattern. When massed in larger beds and 

 edged with Centaurea ragusina few beds are more beautiful. 

 Cuttings of Colensea strike very freely, and no plants are more 

 easy to grow; they require a position near the glass, a tolerably 

 rich soil, plenty of water when growiDg, and a temperature 

 during the winter of not less than 45°. Let no one try to grow 

 these plantB who cannot maintain this temperature. If only 

 just a few plants can be thus wintered the quantity required 

 can be raised with the greatest rapidity in the spring with the 

 help of a dung frame, for every little side shoot or top will soon 

 make a bushy plant. 



The very pretty and dwarf-growing Alternantheras are also 

 extensively used in modern bedding, and require much the same 

 treatment as Coleuses. Cuttings inserted thickly, or old plants 

 taken from the ground and potted, if kept in the same tempe- 

 rature as recommended for the Coleus, will furnish abundance 



of cuttings for increase in the spring. A. amosna, amabilis ? 

 magnifica, and paronychyoides are the beBt. Iresine Lindeni 

 as a dark bedding plant is also very useful, and will flourish 

 under the same treatment as the Coleus ; it is a decided im- 

 provement on I. Herbstii, being brighter in colour and of much 

 better habit. 



The several varieties of bedding Lobelias are exquisitely beau- 

 tiful, and are well adapted for small beds or for edgings around 

 larger beds. Their dwarf growth and continuous-blooming pro- 

 perties are not to be equalled by any other bedding plants we 

 possess. Lobelias are easily raised from seed sown thinly at 

 the present time, the seedlings being wintered in a greenhouse; 

 or seed may be sown in heat' early in the spring. But though 

 the majority of the seedlings come true they are not entirely to 

 be depended on, and therefore a stock of any particular variety, 

 to keep it select and true, must be perpetuated by cuttings. If 

 stock plants are kept on a shelf in a greenhouse throughout the 

 winter many of them will become dense masses, and young 

 rootlets will start from the base of each Bhoot : these shoots will 

 strike very freely. The varieties of the L. pumila section are 

 now mostly used, and a double variety exists which in some 

 places and seasons answers well, but in others we have seen it 

 a complete failure. 



Ageratum Imperial Dwarf and one or two other varieties are 

 very useful. Their immense bunches of lively lavender flowers 

 together with their dwarf habit render them valuable as bedding 

 plants. They can be either increased by seed or cuttings. A few 

 old plants cut down and potted in the autumn and wintered in a 

 greenhouse afford an excellent supply of cuttings in the spring. 

 Heliotropes are not now as much used for bedding purposes as 

 formerly, but we recently saw two beds of Miss Nightingale at 

 Kew very even and beautiful, and the perfume from them was 

 delightful. Heliotropes are easily propagated by cuttings and 

 can be wintered in a warm greenhouse. 



Of all plants used for their golden foliage the Golden Feather 

 (Pyrethrum) is perhaps the moBt popular. It is readily raised 

 from seed. Seedlings raised annually have not that tendency 

 to bloom as have cuttings or older plants. Sow in March, and 

 prick out the Beedlings when large enough to handle; or a little 

 seed may be sown now in the open ground. As a compaoion 

 plant to the Golden Feather is the Golden Chickweed (Stellaria 

 graminea aurea) ; it is very neat and effective and is quite hardy. 

 For covering the ground closely and for producing a creamy 

 yellowish mass Mesembryanthemum eordif olium variegatum is 

 very well adapted. A few pots of cuttings inserted at once will 

 furnish a sufficient supply in the spring. 



The Centaurea makes a noble edging plant, but is not so easy 

 to strike as some of the plants above named ; but cuttings taken 

 off now will strike freely enough if ordinary care be taken to 

 prevent damping. Keeping them in small pots and somewhat 

 dry during the winter, with plenty of air, is the best means of 

 preserving a slock of this pleasing white-foliage plant. 



Succulents are now extensively used for bedding purposes, 

 especially Echeverias, Sempervivums, and Sedums. They are 

 increased by offsets. Frost does not injure these so much as 

 damp around the collar. If placed in a dry shed, or along the 

 eide of a wall where wet is kept away by coverings, plantB may 

 be preserved through the winter. 



Leucophyton Browni is a very neat and one of the most 

 beautiiul of dwarf foliage plants ever introduced. Cuttings of 

 it strike best in a cold frame, where also the plants may be 

 wintered. Its bright silvery appearance is most peculiar but 

 attractive. Gazania splendens is not now often seen, but a good 

 bed on a bright day has a very pleasing effect when the sun 

 Bhines. Cuttings strike freely, and may be wintered in covered 

 frames. 



The dying-off of Calceolarias soon after being planted out has 

 caused them to be less popular than formerly, but we possess 

 nothing so gay when the plants are well grown. To increase a 

 stock of these valuable bedding plants cuttings should be inserted 

 in tolerably sandy soil in a cold frame early in October, allowing 

 them to remain there throughout the winter, keeping out frost 

 by covering the glass with mats, straw, or any other material, 

 giving air on favourable occasions to prevent damp. Though 

 the bedding Calceolaria is no aquatic it is very impatient of 

 drought, and therefore requires deeply trenohed and well- 

 manured beds to grow it well. — J. W. Hoobman. 



DOINGS OP THE LAST AND WORK FOR 

 THE PRESENT WEEK. 



KITCHEN GARDEN. 



We have not done much in this department except to clear- 

 off any crops that had ceased to be useful, making the ground 

 tidy by clearing away the weeds. Sometimes it is convenient 

 to dig-in the vegetable refuse, and that is oiten as good as a 

 dressing of manure. We had a good illustration of this in the 

 spring of the present year. About four acres of ground had to 

 be planted with Potatoes, and two acres of that were sown with 

 Rye in the autumn, and about planting-time the Rye whioh 



