March 19, 1890] 



Garden and Forest. 



141 



ordinary petroleum lamp, furnished with an extremely wide 

 shade, the under surface of which is white, and covered 

 with a mixture of grease and tar or any sticky, substance. 

 The moths are attracted by the light, and in flying about it 

 they come in contact with and are held by the adhesive mix- 

 ture. This simple but first-rate contrivance has been tried 

 in several orchards with much success. To catch the enemy 

 before it has sown the seeds of mischief is certainly a much 

 more sensible way than to fight with the mischief itself. 



Trade-Unionism for Gardeners. — The improved position 

 of the followers of many trades and professions in England 

 which has resulted from combination, has set gardeners to 

 thinking whether something of the same kind could not be 

 done by a union of a similar kind amongst themselves. 

 The scheme propounded by the first to move in this matter 

 is, briefly stated, an association for all professional garden- 

 ers ; a registry of places and men ; the boycotting of all 

 who are not members of the association ; the issue of certi- 

 ficates to all qualified gardeners, and the limitation of appren- 

 tices with a view to relieving the present very congested 

 condition of the horticultural labor market. Whilst it 

 is felt that, considering the nature of the training a man must 

 undergo before he becomes a competent gardener, he is, as a 

 rule, very badly paid, it is clear that so long as there are 

 twice as many men as there are situations for them, there is 

 small chance of a rise in gardeners' wages. There is small 

 prospect, therefore, that the movement will prove very help- 

 ful. England is admittedly the best training ground for horti- 

 culture, and we are committed to free trade in labor as well as 

 in everything else. Combination or a "strike" amongst gar- 

 deners would probably result in a loss to themselves, as horti- 

 culture is very much of a luxury, and a man cannot be com- 

 pelled to pay more than he chooses for his luxuries. With the 

 nurserymen it is different, and consequently nurserymen pay 

 their permanent staff well, as they are bound to do. Mean- 

 while it is a curious commentary on the complaints of the 

 gentleman's gardener that whilst he cannot command satis- 

 factory wageSj employers are at their wits' end to find com- 

 petent men. Only this week I have been informed of three 

 first-rate situations for Orchid-growers for which suitable men 

 were not forthcoming. W. Watson. 



London. 



Berlin Letter. 



GERMANY is the land of societies, and it is no wonder, 

 therefore, that at the capital of the Empire there are not 

 only one or two, but half a dozen horticultural societies. The 

 oldest and most important one of these is the Society for the 

 Advancement of Horticulture in the Royal Prussian States. 

 Its members are gardeners, amateurs and many botanists. It 

 is the society which is now attracting general attention, from 

 the fact that under its direction is to be held the great Interna- 

 tional Horticultural Fair, of which I wrote you in a former 

 letter, and in which the decorative features of horticulture are 

 to have the leading place. 



Another old society, which is held in high esteem, is the 

 Berlin Horticultural Society ; its members are mainly nursery- 

 men in the vicinity of the city. Then there are a Gardeners' 

 Society, a Society of Commercial Florists, a Society of Fruit- 

 growers, and a Society of Graduates of the Pomological Insti- 

 tute at Proskau. The gardeners of Berlin make a great deal 

 of society life, but the activity of this life is confined mainly to 

 the winter months, because in summer, work, in most of "the 

 nurseries, begins at four or five o'clock in the morning and 

 ends at eight or nine in the evening. The number of nurseries 

 where the work begins at six or ends as early as seven is very 

 small. It is little wonder, then, that society life drags in the 

 summer season. 



The Society for the Advancement of Horticulture has 

 monthly meetings, at which prizes are offered for special 

 plants and discussions are held on subjects connected with 

 them. Prizes were offered for groups of ten Amaryllis at the 

 January meeting. Of three competitors, the head-gardener of 

 the famous garden of the late Mr. Borsig gained the first prize, 

 which was a large silver medal. His specimens were so vigor- 

 ous, the flowers were so large and the colors so brilliant that 

 they might well compete with the best English plants. The 

 cultivator said that pot-culture was best for "these bulbs. 

 He transplants them but once during their period of vegeta- 

 tion, and thus gets strong bulbs, each of which bears two 

 scapes with a pair of flowers. The second competitor showed 

 seedling Amaryllis, and his practice is to plant the young bulbs 

 out, whilst strong bulbs are cultivated in pots, plunged in warm 

 soil four inches below the surface. Then the roots grow over 

 the rim of the pot, and no further transplanting is needed. A 



variety of Clematis patens, called Vesta and trained in balloon 

 form, was exhibited at the same meeting. This beautiful 

 white flowering plant was greatly praised by its exhibitor for 

 winter bloom and cut flowers. Another good winter bloom- 

 ing plant shown was the new Iris Bornmuelleri, with yellow 

 flowers. It was sent to the exhibitor by a collector in Persia, 

 and it flowered in a cold frame in the middle of January. 

 Anemone blanda was also shown and highly commended, be- 

 cause it had flowered in the open air in the last week of Jan- 

 uary along with Christmas Roses and Eranthis hyemalis. This, 

 indeed, may be our earliest spring flower in the open air. 

 Eranthis is flowering freely in the botanical gardens here, al- 

 though the temperature fell below zero last week. 



Specimens of Lilium auratum in flower attracted much 

 attention. The bulbs are placed in an ice-cellar immediately 

 on their receipt in autumn, where they are kept until needed 

 for forcing. They are at once brought into a house with a 

 temperature of from fifty-nine to sixty-four degrees Fahren- 

 heit, when good sized bulbs will show four or five flowers in 

 four weeks. The flowers are highly appreciated here in the 

 winter months, and they are quite often seen in the flower- 

 shops this winter. It has been supposed that they were im- 

 ported from the Riviera like Roses, but this exhibitor said that 

 other florists as well as himself raised many of them here. 



The beautiful Tulipa Greigi, from Turkistan, is another 

 flower which had been forced for exhibition. It began to 

 bloom about the 20th of January and lasted for a long time. 

 It was remarked, however, that the colors of the flower were 

 not as brilliant nor the marking of the leaves as decided as 

 when they were grown in the open air. It was stated that this 

 Tulip, unlike most others, does not thrive well in a sandy soil, 

 but needs a strong one, which does not thoroughly dry out in 

 the summer-time. Deep planting is also necessary for its best 

 development. One member stated that Tulips and Lilies gave 

 the best seed when the scapes are cut and put in water to 

 ripen. Under these circumstances the reserved nutrition is 

 used for the development of seeds, while in the other case, 

 where the scape remains on the plant, the reserved nutri- 

 tion is carried downward to be stored in bulb. The question is 

 one of sufficient interest to demand investigation, as was another 

 made at this meeting, to the effect that in England some 

 growers of Chrysanthemum-seed cut off the flowers and place 

 them in water, thinking that in this way they get better seed. 

 Berlin. Udo Dammer. 



Cultural Department. 



Notes on Strawberry Culture. 



/n PHIS year's fruit catalogues contain florid descriptions of 

 •*■ many new and apparently desirable varieties of Strawber- 

 ries, and it is quite perplexing to find that each one of these 

 varieties is claimed to be of better quality than any other one. 

 For many years I have been buying " the very finest of Straw- 

 berries." I have tested about twenty-five sorts, with a hope of 

 reaching some day the climax of perfection, yet I sometimes 

 doubt whether any Strawberry has yet been found which is 

 better than the old Wilson's Seedling. 



However, the Wilson seems to be declining in southern 

 New Jersey, and I have now supplanted it with a sort which, 

 with me, does better, known as the Pearl. This variety, as it 

 grows here, is remarkably well rooted, of vigorous habit and 

 of as good quality as any I have tried. 



The quality of a Strawberry depends much on the soil in 

 which it is grown, how the plant is manured and the weather 

 under which the fruit ripens. Varieties which are excellent 

 when grown under conditions favoring them, are compara- 

 tively worthless when these conditions fail. It is generally 

 thought that the Strawberry requires high culture and fertiliza- 

 tion with stable manure ; yet this treatment will harm the 

 quality of any variety of Strawberries. I have found Straw- 

 berries to do best on a fairly fertile soil, and fed with potash 

 and lime, with no nitrogenous manures. If the plant be richly 

 fed with nitrogen its fruit will be soft, flavorless and prone to 

 decay. If treated with potash and lime it will be sweet and 

 durable. 



I once had a patch of Strawberries on new land which had 

 not been manured. In the winter I top-dressed the field lib- 

 erally with water-slaked shell-lime, spreading this on the rows 

 so as almost to cover and hide the plants. A neighbor had a 

 Strawberry-patch of like age and of the same variety — the Wil- 

 son. His land was freely fertilized with stable manure. Onehot 

 day I picked 400 quarts of strawberries and shipped them to 

 Boston. On the same day my neighbor did likewise. My 

 fruit reached Boston in good order and sold for a high price. 



