210 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 272. 



Notes. 



The first shipment of California cherries left Sacramento for 

 the east on May-day. 



A most instructive feature in Mr. Gustave Kobbe's map of 

 the suburbs of New York is the distinction it marks between 

 good roads and bad, the former being indicated by red and the 

 latter by black lines. It should be very useful to drivers and 

 bicyclists, and also to pedestrians desirous of studying our 

 local flora. 



The editor of Meehans' Monthly suggests that in the search 

 for improved vegetables the Rocky Mountain Thistle should 

 not be forgotten. Dr. Coues has stated that the young leaves, 

 which roll up into a head like that of Lettuce, are used as food by 

 thelndians, and Mr. Meehan has seen these heads in Colorado as 

 large as small cabbages. The Artichoke is the flower-head of 

 a botanical relative of this Thistle, which Dr. Gray named 

 Cnicus edulis. 



The May number of the Popular Science Monthly contains 

 an article by Professor Halsted on " Decay in the Apple-barrel," 

 in which it is explained how the fruit is attacked by various 

 molds and other fungi as well as by bacteria. The article is 

 illustrated, and shows in a graphic way the progress of the dif- 

 ferent kinds of rot. The article has its practical side, in which 

 it is shown how these diseases can be prevented or arrested by 

 proper storage, and how the attacks of these various kinds of 

 decay can be warded off by treatment of the fruit while it is on 

 the tree and of the tree itself. 



Writing of his boyhood in a small town in the north-eastern 

 corner of Ohio, Mr. Howells says, in the last issue of Scribner's 

 Magazine : " The portable steam saw-mills dropped down on 

 the borders of the woods have long since eaten their way 

 through and through them, and devoured every stick of tim- 

 ber in most places, and drunk up the water-courses that the 

 woods once kept full ; but at that time half the land was in the 

 shadow of those mighty Poplars and Hickories, Elms and 

 Chestnuts, Ashes and Hemlocks ; and the meadows that pas- 

 tured the herds of red cattle were dotted with stumps as thick 

 as harvest stubble. Now there are not even stumps, the woods 

 are gone, and the water-courses are torrents in spring and 

 beds of dry clay in summer." 



Last Friday two thousand pupils of the industrial schools of 

 the city celebrated Arbor Day in the concert hall of Madi- 

 son Square Garden. The exercises were arranged by the Kin- 

 dergarten and Potted-plant Association, of which Mrs. George 

 J. Gould is president, and included an address by Mr. C. H. 

 Allen, with some practical directions for the care of potted 

 plants by Mr. Samuel Henshaw. Through the courtesy of the 

 managers of the Flower Show, the children visited the exhi- 

 bition. A potted plant was presented to each child, for the 

 successful cultivation of which prizes will be awarded in the 

 fall. More than a hundred premiums in money are offered 

 by Mrs. Gould, and Mr. C. B. Weathered has offered a glass- 

 window conservatory for the best-grown Chrysanthemum. 



A bulletin of the Rhode Island Experiment Station, on the 

 subject of Sea-weed, states that when this is used as a manure 

 nothing is gained by composting it or allowing it to ferment. 

 The best practice is to use it in its fresh state, either for plow- 

 ing in or for the top-dressing of grass-lands, but since it con- 

 tains seventy to eighty per cent, of water it will not pay to haul 

 it a long way from the shore. Since it contains a compara- 

 tively large percentage of nitrogen and potash, it is not a well- 

 balanced fertilizer, and needs to be supplemented by some 

 material rich in phosphoric acid. It is preferred to stable- 

 manure for growing Potatoes, since they are less liable to the 

 disease known as scab than those grown on barnyard-manure. 

 Sea-wrack shares with commercial fertilizers the conspicuous 

 advantage of being free from seeds of weeds, spores of fungi 

 and eggs of insects. 



On the trial grounds of Peter Henderson & Co. white Roman 

 Hyacinths were showing color on April 12th, and a few days 

 later were fully open, the bulbs averaging six spikes each, 

 and from eight to ten inches long. The colored Roman Hya- 

 cinths, blue, mauve, soft rose, dark pink and the new yellow, 

 were about two weeks later in coming into bloom than the 

 white. The yellow we do not consider much of an acquisi- 

 tion, but the blue and rose have good strong color, and are 

 more attractive than when forced under glass. The white Italian 

 sorts, known to the trade as "Red-skinned Romans," came into 

 bloom with the colored varieties ; and the flowers, though 

 usually pure white when forced, in theopenairareslightly suf- 

 fused with a pleasing rosy flush. A dozen varieties of Polyan- 



thus Narcissus were showing buds on April 22d, and Paper 

 White, with its larger-flowered variety, Grandiflora, Grand 

 Soliel d'Or, Double Roman, Constantinople, and the so-called 

 Chinese Sacred Lily were in full bloom on May 2d. Notwith- 

 standing the marked difference in the bulbs, the flowers of the 

 last two seemed identical. The Polyanthus Narcissus flowers 

 were altogether superior to the forced blooms we have seen this 

 season. It is noteworthy that none of the bulbs mentioned 

 had any other covering than the snow, although they are 

 classed as unreliable in this climate. 



Not long ago Professor F. A. Waugh wrote to the Kansas 

 Farmer a statement which seemed to justify the general belief 

 that white varieties of Grapes are not so hardy as black sorts. 

 A tabulated record of two-year-old vines at the Oklahoma Ex- 

 periment Station showed that 15.7 per cent, of the white varie- 

 ties died, 26.4 of the red varieties, and only 7.2 per cent, of the 

 black varieties. Professor Waugh did not claim that these 

 figures were decisive as to the hardiness of Grapes of different 

 colors, but they seemed to bear in the direction of the popular 

 belief. In a late number of the Kansas Industrialist, Profes- 

 sor Mason, after stating that it is a risk to draw an inference 

 from one season's behavior of any lot of young vines, showed 

 that some of the white varieties, like the Green Mountain, 

 were very hardy, and that the Delaware, a red Grape, was 

 grown with success as far north as Minnesota. In order to 

 show that the question of hardiness can be explained by a 

 cause wholly independent of the color of the fruit, he classified 

 vines of 100 varieties which have had a record of about five 

 years on the grounds of the S^ate College of Kansas, in ac- 

 cordance with their specific botanical relations, and from these 

 figures he derives the interesting results that in Kansas fifty- 

 two varieties out of 100 rank as tender; of these, forty-two have 

 an infusion of the bloOd of Vitis vinifera, and six more are 

 hybrids of V. aesfivalis ; in other words, more than eighty-two 

 per cent, of the tender vines contained blood of V. vinifera and 

 V. sestivaUs, while less than eight per cent, of the tender ones 

 are descended from parents with no other blood than that of 

 V. Labrusca and V. riparia. 



The Department of Agriculture has lately published a 

 farmer's buUefin upon the so-called Russian Thistle, or Rus- 

 sian Cactus, which is really a Saltwort (Salsola Kali, var. Tra- 

 gus). When young it is an innocent-looking plant, tender and 

 juicy, but with the dry weather of August it sends out stiff 

 branches covered with sharp spines, which harden as the 

 plant increases in age. When the ground becomes frozen the 

 November winds loosen the small roots, and the plant goes 

 racing across the country like the western Tumble-weed, to 

 which it is related, scattering seed as it goes, and stopping 

 only when the wind falls, for there are few fences or forests to 

 stop it in the Dakotas. It is always a weed, spreading and 

 multiplying rapidly, flourishing to the exclusion of everything 

 else. Its spines are so sharp and strong that it is difficult to 

 drive a horse through a field where the plants abound, and in 

 some places it is necessary to wind leathers about the horses' 

 legs while at work. Dogs of hunters are often injured by these 

 sharp spines, and threshers cannot get gloves thick enough to 

 protect their hands when working. It was introduced into 

 South Dakota some fifteen years ago, proliably in a small 

 quantity of Flax-seed which was then imported from Europe. 

 The weeds cover new territory with wonderful rapidity, as they 

 are carried miles in a single season by the wind. Where a few 

 plants were first seen four or five years ago, every spot of land 

 where the sod has been broken is now occupied. Some 30,000 

 square miles between the Missouri and James rivers, in South 

 Dakota, are infested, and there are scattered localities in the 

 states further east where the plant is not yet so abundant as to 

 cause alarm. In the infested area more than 640,000 acres are 

 devoted to Wheat, and as the damage from the weed cannot 

 be less than five bushels an acre, at the minimum price of fifty 

 cents a bushel, this means a loss to the farmers in the two Da- 

 kotas of $1,600,000, while the loss to other crops, injuries from 

 spines, and fires caused by the plants leaping over fire-brakes, 

 will increase the total damage to something more than 

 $2,000,000 for the year 1892. The suggested remedies are 

 based on the fact that the weed is an annual with short-lived 

 seeds, so that if cut at the proper time and prevented from go- 

 ing to seed for two years it can be exterminated. It is sug- 

 gested that a Russian Thistle should be placed in each school- 

 house, so that pupils might become familiar with it, and 

 that they should be taught to kill it wherever found as they 

 would kill a rattlesnake. Of course, no more land should be 

 broken up than can be properly culfivated, and every farmer 

 should keep down the weeds on his own farm, and insist that 

 his neighbor should do likewise. 



