i6o 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 26?. 



the needs of their lands and the needs of their crops, they will 

 use the so-called chemical fertilizers more and more, that is, 

 they will use manures which contain definite and known pro- 

 portions of the various plant-foods, so that they can tell just 

 liow much potash and nitrogen and phosphoric acid, and in 

 wiiat forms and combinations, they are feeding to their crops. 

 The rather slighting way in which stable-manure is spoken 

 of in the pamphlet does not add to the strength of the argu- 

 ment. Rich stable-manure will always fill a large space in 

 farm-economy, and as farm-practice approaches toward the 

 exactness of a science this manure will itself have a much 

 greater and more uniform value. And it will always be the 

 men who have learned to utilize to the best advantage the 

 waste products of their farms who will use most intelligently, 

 and, therefore, most liberally, the concentrated fertilizers of 

 commerce. 



Notes. 



It would seem that some good White Pine still remains in 

 Clearfield County, Pennsylvania. An account is given in a 

 local paper of twenty-five sticks of Kne-timber, each one hun- 

 dred feet long and cut by one man during the winter. At 

 Belleville, a stick of Pine was drawn to the river which meas- 

 ured 113 feet in length and was estimated to be worth $100. 



Mr. Richard T. Lombard, of Wayland, Massachusetts, in a 

 paper recently read before the Horticultural Society of that 

 state, stated that nearly four thousand florists are engaged 

 wholly or in part in growing Carnations for cut flowers. It is 

 estimated that fully two hundred millions of these flowers 

 were sold last year, yielding above one million dollars to the 

 growers. 



At the World's Horticultural Congress, to be held in Chicago 

 in August, papers are to be read on the following subjects: 

 Technical Horticultural Education, Relation of Experiment 

 Stations to Commercial Horticulture, Horticulture in its Gen- 

 eral Relation to Art, Improvement of Public Grounds (school- 

 yards, cemeteries, highways, the development and preserva- 

 tion of natural beauty). 



Mr. Charles A. Green, Secretary of the American Association 

 of Nurserymen, sends us the programme of the eighteenth 

 annual meeting of that body, which is to open on the 7th of 

 June, in a beautiful hall which has been built expressly for 

 such gatherings, near the centre of the Columbian Fair 

 Grounds, Chicago. The programme is an instructive one, and 

 papers will be read by such well-known authorities as C. L. 

 Watrous, T. V. Munson, Charles W. Campbell, Professor L. 

 H. Bailey, J. H. Hale, Thomas Meehan, William C. Barry, 

 B. E. Fernow, Robert Douglas, P. J. Berckmans, Parker Earle 

 and many others. 



Since there are hundreds of churches and Sunday-school 

 buildings whose unpicturesque exteriors can be clothed with 

 Ivy or other vines, and whose grounds could be planted with 

 trees and shrubbery, so as to make them more attractive, it is 

 suggested by the Sunday-school Times that the Sunday-school 

 as well as the day-school might do well to have an Arbor Day. 

 And, indeed, if the children of the public schools can on the 

 day appointed help to beautify the public parks and village 

 common, the roadsides and their own door-yards, there is no 

 reason why the home-church and rectory or parsonage grounds 

 should not receive similar attention. If Arbor Day is to have 

 the influence which its founders and friends hope for, the 

 more people and classes of people who can be made to take 

 an active interest in its observance the better. 



More flowers for Easter were sold last week in this city than 

 in any previous year. In the church decorations white Azaleas 

 were profusely used with Lilies, Lilium Harrisii being still the 

 favorite, while the use of large Palms, Hydrangeas and Aza- 

 leas was very general. The flower-market in Union Square 

 on Saturday morning drew together the largest number of 

 buyers ever seen at a similar sale. Full^ one hundred dealers 

 were in attendance, and some of these sold three and four 

 wagon-loads. The quality of the plants was generally good, 

 notwithstanding the earliness of the season and the severe 

 winter. Ascension Lilies sold at fifty cents, L. longiflorum at 

 seventy-five cents for a plant having from three to five flowers, 

 and L. Harrisii from a dollar to two dollars. Cinerarias, 

 Spiraeas, Deutzia gracilis, Cytisus, Roses, Lilacs, Pansies, Vio- 

 lets, Carnations, Stocks and Daffodils were favorites, and 

 prices continued firm until the close of the sale. 



Returning lately from a journey in southern France, Mon- 

 sieur Edward Andr^ exhibited in Paris, before a meeting of the 

 Soci6t6 Nationale d'Agriculture of France, the fruits of various 



tropical trees recently produced in the south of Europe. 

 Among them were fruits of Phoenix Canariensis, Phcenix Sen- 

 egalensis, to which allusion has recently been made in these 

 pages, and of Phcenix dactylifera, the Date Palm, fertilized 

 with pollen from the flowers of the Canary Island tree which 

 has now been established for many years on the shores of the 

 Mediterranean. There were also fruits of the Chilian Jubrea 

 spectabilis, which had recently ripened at Lisbon, and which is 

 surrounded by a yellow pulp of agreeable flavor ; and of Cocos 

 australis of southern Brazil, which produces clusters of small, 

 edible, rose-colored fruit. Hardly less interesting were the 

 fruiting branches of the California Madrofia, Arbutus Menziesii, 

 which fruited last year for the first time at Antibes ; of the 

 soutii African Grape, Vitis Capensis, a curious species with 

 evergreen entire leaves and fruit from which a high-colored 

 red wine is made ; and the Australian Nut, Macadamia terni- 

 folia, whose hard shell contains an almond of exquisite flavor. 



The last bulletin of the Ohio Agricultural Experiment Sta- 

 tion puts into available form such instructions as to spraying 

 orchards and vineyards as will be needed by persons who have 

 not closely followed the work in this field for a few years past. 

 Directions for preparing the fungicides and insecticides for 

 various purposes are carefully given, as well as the proper 

 methods and precautions to be used in. applying them to dif- 

 ferent trees and against different enemies. There is no need 

 to give a summary of this bulletin here as we have more than 

 once published the various details it contains. We must re- 

 peat, however, that no one with an orchard, or a vineyard, or a 

 small-fruit garden, can afford to neglect the pracdce which is 

 here set forth, and persons who are not familiar with the 

 methods cannot do better than to send to the Experiment Sta- 

 tion, Wooster, Ohio, for the Bulletin No. 48. What is stated in 

 the conclusion of this little pamphlet is perfectly true, namely, 

 that the fruit crop of the single state of Ohio would be en- 

 hanced in value by several million dollars every year if this 

 practice were generally followed. 



Of the oranges now on the market, those from Messina and 

 blood-oranges from Catania are in the best condition, the late 

 Florida fruit being injured by frost. California oranges are 

 gaining favor slowly, with the disadvantages of twelve to fif- 

 teen days' time consumed in reaching New York, against five 

 or six days from Florida, and a cost of eighty-five cents a box 

 for freight, instead of thirty-five cents for Florida oranges. 

 Perhaps even a greater disadvantage is the fact that there are 

 no commission consignments of California oranges to the east, 

 and only dealers' orders are sent here. The Riverside Wash- 

 ington navels are the best California oranges now offered and 

 bring a dollar a dozen. Excellent Forelle pears from Cali- 

 fornia are now selling for two dollars a dozen, and the, largest 

 Easter Beurre for twenty-five cents each. Charleston vegetables 

 are succeeding the Florida supplies at prices nearly as high as 

 those asked for the earlier crops several weeks ago. Asparagus 

 brings eighty-five cents a bunch, and peas one dollar and 

 twenty-five cents a half peck. Northern-grown hot-house 

 cucumbers are forty cents each. French Artichokes," from 

 northern Africa, are thirty-five cents, and selected Tunis dates, 

 on stems in boxes of a pound, are thirty-five cents. 



Every American who takes a patriotic interest in places with 

 historic associations will sympathize with the movement to 

 set apart the Revolutionary camp-ground at Valley Forge for 

 a public park. Some years ago the house known as Washing- 

 ton's headquarters here and a few acres of ground were ac- 

 quired and restored by an association. The bill now before 

 the legislature of Pennsylvania provides that the title to and 

 ownership of 250 acres of land shall be vested in that state, so 

 that the fortifications and their surroundings may be main- 

 tained as near as possible in their original condition as a mili- 

 tary camp and for the enjoyment of the public forever. The 

 establishment of the boundaries of this park, with the power 

 to manage and maintain it, is to be vested in a board of ten 

 unsalaried commissioners, appointed by the Governor, and a 

 sum of $30,000 is appropriated for the purchase of the land 

 and other necessary expenses. The price per acre is to be de- 

 termined ultimately by the courts of Montgomery County, so 

 that there can be no suspicion that the project will be turned 

 to the advancement of any private interests. The forts and 

 the line of entrenchments are remarkably well preserved, be- 

 cause the hills on which they were built are so rugged that 

 they have had little value for agricultural purposes and have 

 escaped tillage. A growth of thick underbrush has helped to 

 protect them from washing by the rains. The view from the 

 hills up and down the Schuylkill, extending for many miles, is 

 very beautiful, and the plan seems commendable from every 

 point of view. 



