2l6 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 431. 



Cultural Department. 



Carnation Notes. 

 /^\UR plants intended to bloom next winter are still in pots 

 ^-^ and boxes, and will remain there until toward the end of 

 the month. They are standing in a cold frame, and the sashes 

 are not placed over them unless the night is likely to be frosty 

 or rainy. Usually our stock is planted out by the middle of 

 May. Experience has shown us that even a light frost is a 

 severe check to plants. In the fall of the year they will stand 

 a temperature, several degrees below freezing without injury, 

 but at this season of the year, after being brought along with 

 fire-heat, they are in a much more tender condition, and a 

 freezing which would have no apparent effect on them in Sep- 

 tember or October would greatly cripple the plants now. Last 

 year we had much trouble with cut-worms. During the latter 

 part of May they ruined a good many plants, and would have 

 wiped out the entire lot had they not been fought persistently. 

 This season cut-worms appear to be more numerous than ever, 

 and we prefer to keep our young stock in boxes until they are 

 lessened. If any of the readers of Garden and Forest can 

 recommend a radical cure for this pest it would be a decided 

 service to many growers. We have tried about every remedy 

 we have heard of, but none have been successful. Paris green 

 mixed in fresh bran and scattered among the plants poisons 

 some of the cut-worms, but the majority avoid the poison and 

 keep to the Carnation foliage. Lime, tobacco-dust, hellebore, 

 etc., whether dusted on the plants or scattered about the stems, 

 do not in the least check their ravages. Carbolic acid, mixed 

 with water at the rate of one pint of acid to fifty gallons of 

 water, and sprinkled with a rose-can over the plants, did not 

 seem to be any deterrent, nor was Paris green or sulphate of 

 copper, used in a similar way. Hand-picking with a lantern, 

 although a slow method, if persisted in nightly is as efficacious 

 as any remedy I know of. This season we have trapped a 

 large number by scattering succulent leaves of Cauliflower and 

 Cabbage among Phlox, Strawberries and other affected plants. 

 There ought to be some means of wiping out this pest, but 

 growers in this locality seem to be of opinion that cut-worms 

 and rose-bugs'cannot be destroyed unless insecticides are used 

 strong enough to injure or kill the plants. 



Plants in the benches indoors require plenty of water during 

 such hot weather as we are now having. We recently gave 

 our benches a mulching with well-rotted cow-manure, after 

 having previously tied up the plants and slightly loosened the 

 surface. There is no reason why good blooms cannot be had 

 indoors until planting-time comes around again if the neces- 

 sary water, stimulants and syringing are supplied. Syringing 

 with good force on mornings and evenings of clear days will 

 benefit the plants and keep red spider in check. Of course, 

 plenty of outdoor blooms may be had by the middle of July 

 from stock specially grown for summer flowering ; but those 

 produced under glass are cleaner than those grown outside, 

 although their stems may not be so wiry. 



A good deal has recently been written in the horticultural 

 press concerning Fowler's arsenical solution as a cure for Car- 

 nation-rust. Mr. E. G. Hill, the well-known Carnation grower, 

 of Richmond, Indiana, who exhibited some of the finest blooms 

 at the New York Carnation Show last February, states that a 

 one-ounce bottle of the solution mixed with eight gallons of 

 water and applied once a week, so as to thoroughly wet all the 

 foliage, cleared up some of his worst cases of rust after 

 three applications given at intervals of a week, that the 

 diseased leaves turned black, alter which they were gathered 

 and destroyed. We have tried this arsenic cure on a few 

 affected plants of Rose Queen and Daybreak, but can- 

 not see that it has checked the disease, and the leaves 

 have not become discolored. We experimented with the 

 solution in different strengths and find that by applying it 

 at the rate of one ounce to two gallons of water the rust is 

 apparently killed after two applications. As a further experi- 

 ment we tried the solution on a few plants at the rate of one 

 ounce to one-half gallon of water and failed to detect any 

 injury to the plants, although possibly repeated syring- 

 ing with this strength might result in injury. There is no 

 question but the dangers of rust have been exaggerated 

 to some extent, but it is, nevertheless, the worst foe the 

 Carnation grower has to fight. We have tried copper solu- 

 tions with only a moderate amount of success. I believe a 

 great deal may be done to prevent the spread of rust by clean- 

 liness in the houses and by careful hand-picking of any affected 

 plants when they first show the disease. But when whole 

 houses are attacked it will not pay to use such measures, and 

 from an experience with Fowler's solution I am satisfied that 

 it will destroy the rust if applied somewhat stronger than Mr. 



Hill recommended. It lias not been claimed that it will pre- 

 vent spread. A longer trial is necessary, on a more extensive 

 scale, to thoroughly settle how far the arsenical solution is a 

 success, but it has proved a benefit in our own case, and we 

 feel certain, if given a fair trial, it will be of advantage toothers. 

 A good deal of labor is involved in spraying whole houses of 

 plants so as to thoroughly wet them all, but as most private 

 places grow only a few dozen, or at most a few hundred plants, 

 the work can readily be accomplished. 



Of last year's introductions, Alaska is likely to prove the 

 best. It is a persistent bloomer, with a stout wiry stem, flowers 

 of good size and form ; and the plant is a vigorous grower. 

 Eldorado, yellow, raised by Mr. Shelmire, is well liked in this 

 locality by those who have grown it. Its flowers have brought 

 as much as a dollar and a half a hundred at wholesale in the 

 Boston market. It flowers more freely than Bouton d'Or, Gold- 

 finch or Buttercup. Meteor, as a crimson, while it gave some 

 fine flowers early in the year, cannot be classed as a prolific 

 bloomer, and compares unfavorably with the older F. Man- 

 gold. Rose Queen and Bridesmaid were by no means suc- 

 cesses last winter, and we purpose trying them again next year. 

 Rose Queen burst its calyx badly, and Bridesmaid, while of a 

 pleasing shade, did not give more than one or two flowers on 

 each plant. Stock of these varieties was started earlier this 

 year, and possibly by having larger plants next September the 

 returns next winter will be more satisfactory. Nicholson has 

 done indifferently this year, nearly every plant having died out, 

 and this experience is common. With the introducer at Fram- 

 ingham it is at this time doing well, but we do not believe it 

 will be grown much after next season in this locality. William 

 Scott is still proving far superior to all other pink varieties and 

 is growing and flowering better than ever betore, with no sign 

 of disease. Lizzie McGowan continues to do splendidly in this 

 neighborhood and is grown in preference to other white sorts. 

 A few growers near Boston still cling to Mrs. Fisher, and as a 

 summer bloomer it is unexcelled, but it compares unfavorably 

 with Lizzie McGowan in winter. For some reason, however, 

 Lizzie McGowan is not well grown by some of the leading 

 Carnation growers in this section. As a rule, their soil is light 

 and sandy ; we find it succeeds best in a heavy clayey loam. 



Taunton, Mass. W. N. Craig. 



The Hardy Flower Garden. 



"THE month of June is the most interesting of any in the 

 -1 hardy flower garden, and the plants not in bloom are fresh 

 and green. The tall Leopard's Bane, Doronicum plantagi- 

 neum, var. excelsum, is just past its best. It is about two feet 

 tall and quite showy, and, with the Dandelion, one of few com- 

 posites in bloom so early in the season. The common Marsh 

 Forget-me-not, Myosotis palustris, and particularly the variety 

 semperflorens, does well in the borders, and lasts for years if 

 it is well watered during the summer months. M. alpestris is 

 earlier and more tufted, blooming densely during the early 

 spring months. It is a perennial in its native country, the 

 European Alps, while here it is little better than an annual, and 

 to succeed with it a new stock must be raised every year. 

 Polemonium Richardsoni, a medium-growing Jacob's-ladder, 

 does better in a rather moist shady place than in the full sun- 

 light, as we lately discovered. Some yellow-flowered kinds, 

 which we did not think much of, might have done better had 

 we tried them in shade. Phlox ovatus is the earliest of border 

 Phloxes, and quite showy. 



The Globe-flowers, Trollius Europasus and T. Asiaticus, are 

 among the choicest of border plants. They are rather stately, 

 though not tall, with neatly divided and attractive foliage. The 

 flowers are yellow, and, as the name implies, quite globular, 

 being incurved in the same way as a Chinese Chrysanthemum. 

 T. Asiaticus is the dwarfest and earliest, and the flowers are 

 also a slightly deeper shade of yellow. The Day Lilies are 

 among the handsomest of border plants, and they are thor- 

 oughly hardy. They are not aggressive, but when established 

 will thrive under adverse conditions. I know an old cottage 

 garden, much shaded and pestered with tree-roots, where 

 these Day Lilies grow thriftily and never fail to bloom well. 

 Hemerocallis graminea is the earliest, followed by H. flava and 

 H. Mittendorffiana. H. Thunbergii is an autumn-blooming 

 kind, and the finest of all. It has been offered many years by 

 a leading firm, but is still scarce. 



Lvchnis Chalcedonica is never lost. It will grow wherever 

 it has a chance. Its heads of bright scarlet flowers compose 

 well in bouquets. If cut down when going to seed it will start 

 afresh and bloom in the autumn. The Ragged Robin, the 

 double L. Flos-cuculi, has lately been offered, I believe, as a 

 specially new thing. It is an acquisition, new or old. The 



