240 



Garden and Forest. 



[NuM^fcR 27$. 



The New South Wales collection is from the current year's 

 crop. It comprises the following varieties : Winter Pearmain, 

 Claygate, Golden Russet, Kentucky Red Streak, Northern Spy, 

 Pomme de Neige (Fameuse), Five-crowned Pippin, Triomphe 

 de Luxembourg, New Hawthornden and Brown's Perfectiori. 

 These apples average about the size of large New York speci- 

 mens, but are not pronounced in color. The low color is, no 

 doubt, due to early picking, as the samples were fifty-two days 

 in transit. The Five-crowned Pippin is very like large speci- 

 mens of Yellow Newtown Pippin in shape and color, but dif- 

 fers in the more prominent ridges, five in number, which 

 crown the fruit. Its quality can scarcely be compared with the 

 Newtowns on exhibition, from the fact that they have undoubt- 

 edly suffered somewhat in transit. 



Taken as a whole, the apple exhibits do not adequately rep- 

 resent the apple-growing of the country. Most of them were 

 collected hastily and in restricted portions of the various states, 

 and some of them were taken wholly from commercial ware- 

 houses or cellars. Yet it is apparent that even an imperfect 

 exhibit is a great advertisement to the state. The exhibits 

 from Idaho, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota and Wisconsin, 

 for instance, have attracted much attention and have already 

 disabused the minds of thousands of people of disparaging 

 notions which were held in regard to those states. The Cana- 

 dian provinces have also attracted much attention. Some of 

 the states still have apples in storage, and the plates are re- 

 placed as soon as the specimens become unfit for exhibition ; 

 yet the apple exhibits are constantly growing less, and they will 

 soon give place to new fruits. 



Chicago, 111. L. H. Bailey. 



Notes. 



Fruit of the Kumquat, Citrus Aurantium, var. Japonica, from 

 Florida, has been lately sold in this city in hmited quantities 

 under the name of Too-kin-kan, at sixty cents a dozen. This 

 fruit is oval in shape, and is said to be more rare than the glo- 

 bose form. 



Experiments seem to indicate that the deadly mildew of the 

 Gooseberry can be kept in check if the plants are sprayed with 

 a solution of sulphide of potassium of the strength of half an 

 ounce to a gallon of water. This remedy is worth trying if it 

 will enable us to have this admirable fruit in perfection here 

 as it is grown in England. 



Green Clover, cut while in blossom and applied early in 

 June, is an admirable summer mulch for Raspberries and 

 Blackberries. If enough of it is applied so as to lie four or five 

 inches deep, and in a row a yard wide along the hills, it will 

 form a compact mass, retain the moisture in the soil and en- 

 rich it. It is less liable to contain the seeds of weeds than 

 coarse manure or straw. 



The long period of wet weather this spring has delayed gar- 

 den operations in many parts of the country. At such a time 

 as this, the value of improved implements, by which planting 

 and cultivating by horse power can be done rapidly, is readily 

 seen. An Ohio farmer writes that he remembers the time 

 when it took five men and two horses a day to plant ten acres 

 of Corn, but now one man with a machine and check-row at- 

 tachment can plant from fifteen to eighteen acres in a day. 



Ex-Governor Hoyt, of Wyoming, who has been making an 

 agricultural survey of that state under the direction of the De- 

 partment of Agriculture, writes that its fifteen million acres of 

 forest is a possession of incalculable value. The fimber-limit 

 here rises to a height of from 10,000 to 11,000 feet, and in view 

 of the money value of this supply of timber, and of the yet more 

 vital importance of these forests to the agriculture of the coun- 

 try. Governor Hoyt urges immediate action for their preserva- 

 tion, and adds that it is beyond comprehension that the fullest 

 possible provision for their protection against fire and pillage 

 has not already been made by the General Government. 



The fruit-stores of this city are now receiving a small supply 

 of what is known to the trade as the West Indian pomelo. It 

 is somewhat pear-shaped, larger than what is usually sold as 

 grape-fruit, and smaller than the shaddock. The flavor is 

 somewhat inferior, and the fruit is dry, although occasionally 

 a heavy one can be found which is more juicy. Cherries are 

 very scarce, although they are now coming from as far north as 

 North Carolina. The Carolina cherries, however, are inferior to 

 the CaHfornian fruit, which still commands seventy-five or 

 eighty cents a pound. Peen-to peaches are now coming from 

 Georgia, and so are Huckleberries and gooseberries. 



There has just been issued by the Herbarium of Harvard 

 University a List of the Plants contained in the sixth edition 

 of Gray's Mafiual, compiled by John A. Allen. It forms a 



clearly printed, small octavo pamphlet of 130 pages, giving the 

 names and authorities of 3,781 species, including the Hepat- 

 icse. There is also an appendix, giving about 150 names of 

 species to be added to those enumerated in Gray's Manual, or 

 to be substituted for the names there used. The list, which 

 will be very convenient for collectors, can be obtained at the 

 Herbarium of Harvard University, the copies bound in paper 

 costing ten cents and those bound in leatherette twenty-five 

 cents apiece. 



Covering grape-clusters with paper bags has long been prac- 

 ticed as a preventive of fungous disease, and it has been 

 claimed that this practice often hastens maturity of different 

 fruits. Experiments on this point at the Maine State Agricul- 

 tural College Station last year did not show that the ripening 

 of the fruit was hastened by bagging. A writer in the Country 

 Gentleman, who was much annoyed by the depredations of 

 birds in his vineyard, found that bagging the clusters was the 

 best means of protecting them from these marauders. Grapes 

 treated in this way can be left longer on the vines — that is, they 

 will not be injured by the earliest frost, and, therefore, the sea- 

 son for the fruit may be prolonged. 



Mr. T. Greiner, writing to the Country Gentleman on the 

 merits of the various forms of the Bush Lima Bean, says that 

 there is no reason why any one should grow a pole Sieva 

 when its dwarf form can be as easily produced as any ordinary 

 bush bean. The pods hang in close clusters and may be 

 picked by the handful. They are not easily penetrated by 

 water and the ripe beans will endure many rain-storms without 

 any injury. This dwarf Sieva is the variety known as Hender- 

 son's Bush Lima. Kumerle's or Dreer's Bush Lima has a low 

 spreading habit, with the pods massed close to the ground. It is a 

 late variety, but in quality excels all others. It is suggested as 

 an advisable plan to mulch the ground around the plants in 

 some way so that the beans can be kept off the ground. Bur- 

 pee's Bush Lima is a genuine acquisition, being fully as early 

 as the pole Lima and bearing abundantly. 



Extravagance in plant fashion and plant buying has not been 

 confined to the Tulip maniacs of Holland or to the Orchid col- 

 lectors of England and the United States, as the usually thrifty 

 and self-contained Japanese may be equally absurd when pos- 

 sessed with the mania of fashion. There is in Japan a plant 

 related to and very similar in general appearance to the Oron- 

 tium of our marshes ; it is the Rhodea Japonica, and naturally 

 it has pretty bright green leaves, but just now it is the fashion 

 in Japan to make collections of individuals with leaves variously 

 variegated, striped or blotched. A green-leaved plant is worth, 

 perhaps, one cent in Tokyo, but it is said that as much as 

 $3,000 has been offered and refused for a plant of three or four 

 leaves which could not be duplicated in their peculiar mark- 

 ing ; and in a recent issue of the Gardeners' Chronicle, Mr. J. H. 

 Veitch, in his " Travelers' Notes," describes a visit to a grower 

 of Rhodea in Tokyo. Here he found a number of plants 

 ranging in price from $50 to $2,000 ; the plant for which $2,000 

 was asked was twelve inches wide, five inches high, with 

 eight leaves streaked with white. 



The most attractive shrubs in Central Park during the past 

 week have been the Tartarian Honeysuckles. Perhaps they 

 appear better when planted singly on a lawn than when they 

 are massed together, for one of their best features is the grace- 

 ful outline of mature specimens when they spread out into 

 superb masses with their branches bending to the grass on all 

 sides. The flowers of this Honeysuckle, which are borne in 

 profusion, are white, pink, rose or deep red and delicately 

 perfumed. The shrub comes into leaf early ; its foliage is lux- 

 uriant, pure in color and remains unfil late in the autumn, and 

 the red or orange berries are ornamental. Another bush 

 Honeysuckle is Lonicera Ruprechtiana, which resembles the 

 Tartarian Honeysuckle in its general characteristics, but has 

 still more beautiful fruit, which ripens at the end of June, and 

 for a month the dark red berries, hanging in pairs in such 

 abundance that all the branches droop under their weight, 

 make the plant a conspicuously beautiful object. Another 

 beautiful bush Honeysuckle is Lonicera Morrowi, which also 

 bears a great quantity of bright berries, which show well 

 against a background of lighter-colored leaves than those of 

 the other species. All the bush Honeysuckles are admirable 

 shrubs, including several native varieties. Lonicera Fragran- 

 tissima and L. Standishii, both of which are probably forms of 

 the same species, the latter being the most hardy, have also 

 been planted quite freely in Central Park. These belong to 

 another class, the flowers of both appearing before the leaves. 

 These flowers are pure white, as fragrant as violets, and in this 

 latitude a few of them appear as early as February. 



