72 



JOURNAL OP HOETICTTLTITRE AND COTTAGE GAEDENEK. 



[ July 26, 1S64. 



taining a rather large leaf with the growing point above it, 

 nor is anything gained by putting in ertra-sized cuttings. 

 Those shoots with three joints, or at the most four, are far 

 preferable to those with six joints. If the shoot have two 

 joints with the growing point it should be cut with a sharp 

 knife immediately beneath the lowest leaf, and that leaf 

 being cut oif the cutting is all that could be desired ; but if 

 the cutting be no more than 3 or 4 inches long and have 

 three joints with the growing point the two lowest leaves 

 may be displaced, and the shoot be cut transversely under 

 the lowest. The cuttings ought never to be taken from 

 bad-habited sickly plants, otherwise they are likely to par- 

 take of these defects, but from those which are healthy and 

 well constituted. 



Though there is but one way of making shoots into 

 cuttings, there are several methods of treating them after- 

 wards in order to induce them to strike root. The best is to 

 pot them singly into 60-sized pots, in a compost of loam one- 

 half, leaf mould one-fourth, and river sand one-fourth. 

 Silver sand is preferable to river sand, but not indispensable, 

 for Geraniums will strike almost in any way if one end of 

 the cutting is put in the soil. We place a rather small crock 

 so as to he flat at the bottom of the pot and cover the hole, 

 and on this the least touch of moss or sphagnum, or the 

 rougher part of the compost ; we fill as many pots as we 

 have cuttings with the compost, which should be sifted 

 through a half-inch riddle or sieve, place a handful in 

 each, then press it gently down with the hand, and strike 

 off all above the rim of the pot with the open hand. The next 

 process is to make a hole in the centre of each pot with a 

 dibble, and, with the cutting in the left hand, we take up a 

 pinch of silver sand between the thumb and fore-finger of 

 the right hand and drop it into the hole ; the cutting is then 

 inserted in the hole up to the lowest leaf, and a little more 

 silver sand is placed around the cutting on the surface of the 

 pot. A run round the compost next the pot fixes the cutting 

 firmly, and secures space for watering, a gentle tap on the 

 bench completing the operation- We have now cuttings 

 with their bases surrounded by sand, and not one will fail 

 to emit roots and be a plant in fifteen days if placed in a 

 greenhouse in a moist shady place, and the soil about them 

 kept moist, but not wet, for too much moisture is quite as 

 injurious as too little. 



When well rooted the cuttings, or rather young plants, 

 maybe potted into 48-sized pots, and placed in a cold frame 

 for a week or ten days until established, when they should 

 be placed out of doors on coal ashes in a sheltered situation, 

 and the point of each shoot nipped out at the third leaf. 

 By the beginning of October they will be strong bushy 

 plants if duly supplied with water, and as it is not safe to 

 keep them outside any longer, they should be taken into the 

 greenhouse, placed on shelves near the glass, and have 

 abundance of fresh air daily in mild weather, and water once 

 or twice weekly as occasion may determine, but none to be 

 given until the soil becomes dry. The temperature should 

 range from 40° to 50°, fire being only employed to prevent 

 the mercury from falling below 35° at night. Air must be 

 given when the thermometer reaches 45°, and the house 

 should be shut up with a temperature of 50°. 



In February the plants will be furnished with from four 

 to six shoots, each of which will in all probability furnish a 

 cutting, which, if there be the convenience of a hotbed, may 

 be taken and struck ; and these cuttings furnish nice plants 

 by bedding-out time, and though small, afford a fine bloom 

 late in the season. Such cuttings may be inserted either 

 singly in 60-sized pots, or round the sides of a pan or pot, 

 and being placed in a Cucumber-frame, they will be well 

 rooted in about a fortnight or three weeks. They should 

 then be hardened off by placing them in the greenhouse, 

 shifted into 48's by the middle of March, and placed on a 

 shelf, where they should be duly supplied with water, and 

 have the points of the shoots pinched out in the beginning 

 of April. If the cuttings are inserted round the sides of 

 pots or pans, they should be potted off in March into 48's, 

 and have the points of the shoots pinched out when the 

 roots have taken good hold of the soil. These will be stiff 

 nice plants by the beginning of May, when they should be 

 hardened off in a cold frame for . a week or so, and then 

 removed to some sheltered situation where they can be 

 protected with mats placed on hooped sticks should severe 



frost occur. Though nice " stuff," such plants are not equal 

 to those struck in autumn, nor do they flower so well as 

 older plants ; but they are, nevertheless, very useful when 

 the stock is short or the supply of autumn-struck plants not 

 sufficient to fill the beds or parterres. 



The autumn-struck plants in 48-sized pots, from which 

 the last-named plants are taken, should be potted in the 

 beginning of April into 24-sized pots. They will grow 

 rapidly, and in ten days after potting may be removed to a 

 cold frame, where, by covering in frosty nights with mats, 

 and with due regard to giving air and water, they will by 

 the second week in May be strong, dwarf, bushy plants, 

 some of them more than a foot through, and for the most 

 part coming into bloom. After a fortnight's exposure in 

 some sheltered yet open situation they may be planted in 

 beds, where they will at once produce an effect of which any 

 gardener may be proud. 



Now this system, I may be told, requires considerable 

 house-room to carry it out. This is certainly true ; but the 

 extra size of the plants and the immediate effect they pro- 

 duce is worth the room and trouble ; and those who try this 

 plan against the ordinary methods will, I think, find one of 

 the plants cover something like four times the surface, so 

 that one-fourth of the number of plants will do the same 

 work, give a greater effect, and fully a month or six weeks 

 earlier than late autumn or spring-struck plants. — G. Abbey. 

 (To be continued.) 



SMALL LOCAL SCIENTIFIC SOCIETIES. 



We should have very little difficulty in collecting the 

 names of five hundred societies having for their objects 

 some improvement or the acquirement of knowledge of 

 various productions of nature. These objects are multitudi- 

 nous, ranging from the growth of a large Gooseberry to the 

 acquirement of a flora or fauna of all the British isles. 

 These societies are dotted about in every county, and each 

 society is a centre from which diverge around it better 

 habits, better tastes, and better knowledge. From time to 

 time we publish what some of these societies are doing, and 

 some of their doings in the report of the Bloomsbury Flower 

 Show appear in our columns to-day ; but we have a stout 

 pamphlet before us which tells of still higher efforts, and 

 evidencing still further advance in the pursuit of that kind 

 of information which makes a man fonder of home, because 

 there are his books and his other sources of pleasures which 

 he finds are the only pleasures which have not their track 

 traced by regret. 



The pamphlet we have mentioned is No. 5 of "Trans- 

 actions of the Woolhope Naturalists' Field Club." Now, 

 very few of our readers, without a reference to their topo- 

 graphical dictionary, would be able to tell that this Woolhope 

 or Wolhope is a village about eight miles from Hereford, 

 one of the most lovely districts of England; and there 

 amongst its quiet Apple orchards dwell many of the members 

 of this Naturalists' Club ; and not only is the Club flourish- 

 ing, but the President, C. Wren Hoskyns, Esq., in his 

 annual address, thus rejoices over the increase of such local 

 associations :— 



"I cannot, however, enter upon the duty of endeavouring 

 to recall the proceedings of the Woolhope Naturalists' Field 

 Club during the past year without indulging a reflection, 

 which occurs to me very strongly, upon the great extension 

 of interest which has taken place in thbse pursuits which 

 form the out-of-door study and objects of societies like our 

 own, and have led to their increased establishment in the 

 surrounding counties and districts. Nothing, perhaps, in 

 the year has been more remarkable than the evidence of this 

 which it embraces in the growth of these kindred associa- 

 tions around us, and the joint meetings and augmented 

 interests to which they have from time to time given rise. 



" Beside the Malvern, the Cotteswold, and the Warwick- 

 shire Clubs, which we formerly recognised in the adjoining 

 or neighboiuing counties, we have now to welcome the re- 

 storation of the Dudley and Midland Geological and Scientific 

 Society, the Severn Valley Field Club, the Oswestry, the 

 Bridgnorth, and the still-more-recently-established Caradoc 

 Club, occupying areas that well deserved the scrutiny of 

 separate societies, while their establishment has increased 



