390 



JOUBNAL OF HOETICULTUEE AND COTTAGE GAEDENEB. 



[ November 14, 1872. 



than usual, and Apples seem to come later. A few decayed fruit 

 soon taint a room. 



Orchard Trees. — 'Where there is plenty of room we have no 

 doubt that orchards -mil continue to be planted, and it is very 

 desirable to have the trees far enough apart to allow fine 

 meadow grass for pasture to grow beneath them; there is 

 something rather pleasant in gathering the fruit even after it 

 has fallen on long soft grass. In all such orchards, when full- 

 grown, the trees and crops will often be greatly improved, first 

 by pruning-out all crossing branches, so as to leave the trees 

 rather open in the centre; and secondly, if the trees are old, by 

 scraping moss and lichen from their bark, and giving the stems 

 and branches a good dressing with limewash. If the lime should 

 be unpleasant to the eye, it could be mixed with soot or cow 

 dung. To mis the soot well, if dry, it should first be brushed- 

 up with a little water into a thick paste, so that every particle 

 may be wetted before it is added to more water and the white- 

 wash. This, too, is the only way in which dry flowers of sul- 

 phur can be thoroughly mixed with cold water. Just enough 

 water should be used at first to make it into a homogeneous 

 thick paste. For applying such mixtures as the above, a large 

 whitewash brush is very good for the boles of trees ; but for 

 dispatch, and when smaller shoots and boughs are to be reached, 

 nothing is so effectual as a syringe which has seen its best days. 

 In small gardens, and where room is valuable, small bush or 

 pyramidal trees will in every way be the best, most pleasant, 

 most economical, most and soonest fruitful. "What a comfort to 

 be able to do almost everything for them — pruning, nipping, 

 examining, gathering the fruit, etc., standing on terra firma 

 instead of incurring the danger of ladders ! For comfort and a 

 great supply in little room, commend us to dwarf trees bristling 

 with flower-buds. We have stated lately that the cheapest 

 mode to secure this is to plant on mounds, give the neces- 

 sary strength, and encourage the roots to keep near the surface 

 by surface-mulching. We can hardly conceive anything more 

 beautiful than such trees clothed with bloom, and again covered 

 with fruit ; and there can hardly be a more pleasing occupation 

 for an amateur than thinning the fruit, nipping-in the shoots, 

 and in a bad season removing encrusted, or malformed fruit to 

 give more assistance to what is really good, and all done so easily, 

 without reaching or climbing. 



We put on a brisk fire for the late vinery in the morning, with 

 air all day, and little heat and less air at night, the object being 

 to keep a somewhat dry moving atmosphere to prevent damp- 

 ing, and the latter, notwithstanding the quantity of rain, has 

 hardly shown itself. 



Other empty fruit houses are, after being washed and cleaned, 

 crammed with plants. We stated lately that we brought off 

 many of the leaves in orchard houses to give more light to 

 under-crops. In one of these houses, damp season and alto- 

 gether, Grapes ripened well, and we have cut the most of them, 

 as in severe weather the frost might be too much for them 

 when we could protect the under-crop. The ripening we attri- 

 "bute partly to the large panes of glass — 20 inches between the 

 rafter sash-bars. Such houses unheated are very useful. They 

 would be still more useful, and under better command, when 

 heated even by a simple mode, hot water being the best when 

 the houses are large. When left unheated, the safety inside, 

 when the house is shut up, greatly depends on the comparative 

 stillness of the air. Another safety-valve for all fruits that 

 open their blooms early, as Apricots, Peaches, &c, is retarding 

 the bloom by giving all the air possible to such houses, except 

 in severe frost. It will take a very severe frost to hurt such 

 trees in bud with the close still air insured from a protection of 

 glass. Of course, if in bloom, the trees would not stand any- 

 thing like the same amount of frost. The cooler such unheated 

 houses can be kept from now until the buds swell to opening, 

 the more secure will the fruit be. We should have no difficulty 

 in this matter if perforce we did not fill our orchard houses in 

 winter with many other things that need protection. The 

 principle aimed at, however, is to retard rather than to advance 

 in winter. It is not the only case in which comparatively 

 standing still is the best means of safety. Some years ago we saw 

 a nice bed of Calceolaria cuttings in a cold pit struck and grow- 

 ing freely before ours were inserted. A very cold winter 

 coming on, most of these fine-looking Calceolarias succumbed. 

 We happened scarcely to lose a single cutting. The worst 

 weather had passed before our cuttings made a single root. 

 Want of growth was one cause of their safety. For a month 

 the pit was covered with litter, and when carefully removed 

 the cuttings looked much as if they had passed through an 

 ordinary night. Let amateurs be convinced that it is not desir- 

 able to have fruit trees in cold orchard houses blooming too early, 

 and one chief cause of failure will be removed. 



ORNAMENTAL DEPARTMENT. 



We find the mass of our beds in the flower gardens still un- 

 touched, Geranium leaves are still green, and we have gathered 

 a few very fair blooms ; there are still plenty of Ageratums, 

 Salvia fulgens, yellow Calceolarias, ifcc. Our elevated position 

 gives us the advantage of a later bloom than is generally found 



in more sheltered valleys. The Iresine Lindeni was very fine 

 with us, but after the cold rains the leaves dropped. We lifted 

 a few large plants previously, as the colour of the leaves comes 

 in well for dressing. 



Centaurea. — We have taken up a few of the white-leaved 

 Centaureas and placed them in as small pots as the roots would 

 go into, after removing the larger leaves. They soon strike 

 fresh root if they have a little mild bottom heat. If too much 

 is given, the roots decay ; if none at all, the plants will often 

 look well enough for months, but when the time comes that you 

 expect them to make fresh growth, they will go off and disap- 

 point you. Even those which have a little bottom heat must not 

 be taken out of it all at once after they are rooted, but be lifted 

 by degrees, and then they will stand in a comparatively cold 

 place if not overwatered. One advantage of having a lot of 

 these old plants established with their fresh-made roots is, that 

 by picking-out the centre of each shoot early in the spring, 

 there will soon be numerous small sucker-like shoots that strike 

 as freely as Verbenas in a hotbed, and have only to be hardened- 

 off. Like many other things, however, such cuttings will make 

 more progress in a hotbed in spring than they will do in weeks 

 in the autumn in a cool place. For instance, we have seen Cal- 

 ceolaria cuttings make more progress in a fortnight in March 

 and April in a close warm atmosphere, than they do, or we wish 

 them to do, in three months when inserted in a cool place at the 

 end of October or during the first fortnight of November. 



These Centaureas may be easily raised from seeds, and some 

 species and varieties come more true than others ; but just as in 

 the case of the Cineraria maritima, the white mealy tinge of 

 the foliage is more to be depended upon from cuttings than 

 from seeds. Wishing to have two strings to our bow, we gene- 

 rally take off rather strong cuttings in September, and remove 

 most of the leaves, leaving only the small ones at the point, 

 and insert the cutting close to the side of a small pot ; or if we 

 put two in a pot, each is fixed close to the side, and a bit of 

 slate stuck down in the middle of the pot between them. This 

 is chiefly done to prevent the roots of the two cuttings inter- 

 lacing with each other. When thus taken off we place them in 

 a cold pit or frame for a month, and by that time the base of 

 the cuttings has begun to swell — technically to callus, and we 

 then give them a genial bottom heat, and the roots push quickly. 

 We then gradually harden-off. By this means there are few 

 losses. If put into heat at once there is danger of damping-off. 

 If continued in a cold frame we might wait as long for roots as 

 we do in the case of Calceolaria cuttings, which would^ hardly 

 suit us as respects room. Most of our plants, after rooting last 

 season, stood the winter in the orchard house. It is very rarely 

 that the Centaurea has stood out of doors with us, and when 

 it has, it has been elevated so as to suffer little from damp. 

 Many large plants out of doors seemed all right until examined 

 in spring, and in most cases damp had been more injurious than 

 frost. 



We proceeded with thinning, pruning trees and shrubs, &c, 

 and making preparations for new work and planting. — E. F. 



TRADE CATALOaUES RECEIVED. 



Kelway & Son, Royal Nurseries, Langport, Somerset. — Cata- 

 logue of Gladioli. 



J. Dickson & Sons, Newton Nurseries, and 108, Eastgate Street, 

 Chester. — Catalogue of Forest Trees, Ornamental Trees, Shrubs, 

 de. 



G. Shrewsbury, 59, Old Bailey, and Lower Norwood. — Cata- 

 logue of Gas Seating Apparatus, &c. 



TO CORRESPONDENTS. 



*,* We request that no one will write privately to any of the 

 correspondents of the " Journal of Horticulture, Cottage 

 Gardener, and Country Gentleman." By so doing they 

 are subjected to unjustifiable trouble and expense. All 

 communications should therefore be addressed solely to 

 The Editors of the Journal of Horticulture, &c, 171, Fleet 

 Street, London, B.C. 



We also request that correspondents will not mix up on the 

 same sheet questions relating to Gardening and those on 

 Poultry and Bee subjects, if they expect to get them 

 answered promptly and conveniently, but write them on 

 separate communications. Also never to send more than 

 two or three questions at once. 



N.B. — Many questions mast remain unanswered until next 

 week. 



Books {Anxious Inquirer). — You can have the " Cottage Gardeners' Dic- 

 tionary " from this office if you enclose 7s. 2d. in postage stamps with your 

 address. 



Royal Horticttltural Society's Fruit Show (IT. Fowle). — In our report 

 we stated that you took the first prize. The mistake was the Society's in their 

 advertisement. 



