470 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 404. 



began to turn, but one of the oldest trees of this species in the 

 country, standing in a sheltered position in Prospect Park, 

 Brooklyn, still retains a large portion of its leaves in the latter 

 half of November, which fairly glow in the sunshine with 

 colors which words cannot describe. 



Besides the awards which we have before mentioned in the 

 Forestry Division of the Atlanta Exhibition, a silver medal 

 has since been given to the Argentine Republic for a collec- 

 tion of native woods and plants, and one to the Republic of 

 Mexico for a collection of over two hundred medicinal plants, 

 well arranged and properly labeled. Bronze medals were also 

 given to the state of Zulia, to the Republic of Venezuela and 

 to F. X. Gartland for ornamental woods. 



The newest offerings in the fancy-fruit stores are Gros 

 Colrnan grapes, from iLong Island hot-houses, at $1.50 to $2.00 

 a pound ; strawberries, from California, costing sixty cents for 

 a box holding less than a pint of the fruit ; prickly pears, from 

 Italy, in considerable demand on account of their decorative 

 value in baskets of fruit, selling for sixty cents a dozen, and 

 pomegranates, from Spain, at the same price. Small lots of 

 peaches, from this state, bring forty cents a dozen. 



In the Parisian markets and along the quays, where well- 

 grown plants may be cheaply bought at almost any season, the 

 dealers have potting-soil for sale in baskets containing, say, 

 half a bushel. In this city amateur buyers of plants can buy 

 potting-soil of local florists, but the small dealers, who supply 

 the greater proportion of the plants that are grown in city 

 yards and window gardens, might find it to their own profit, 

 and certainly to the benefit of their customers, to follow this 

 Parisian custom and provide good potting-soil to those who 

 buy their plants. 



During the warm days of the past week the delicate little 

 lilac and white flowers of Micromeria rupestris opened as 

 cheerfully as they did in July. Among the low-growing sub- 

 shrubs in the rock-garden few are more valuable than this 

 little Mint, with its long succession of flowers and its neat 

 foliage with the odor and taste of Pennyroyal. Its prostrate 

 stems, which turn up at the extremities, make a rounded mass 

 less than a foot high at the centre, and in old specimens spread- 

 ing over a diameter of two feet. It is perfectly hardy, and alto- 

 gether a cheerful and useful little plant. 



The lemon famine of six weeks ago, due to the loss of the 

 Florida crop last winter and to the short supply of Mediter- 

 ranean fruit, made extraordinarily high prices then. The new 

 Sicily crop, which is now arriving, is abundant, and although 

 no lemons are expected from Florida this season, and but few 

 from California, prices are unusually low. The California 

 lemon crop of the approaching season is estimated at 250,000 

 boxes, and the orange crop of the same state at 3,000,000 boxes. 

 Some 3,000,000 boxes, or about 1,000,000,000 lemons, are con- 

 sumed in the United States in a year. 



During last week 34,415 barrels of apples came into the 

 markets of this city, making a total of 309,752 barrels since 

 September ist, and 70,925 barrels more than arrived here 

 during the same period of last year. After Albemarle Pippins, 

 which are mainly exported. Snow or Fameuse apples of fancy 

 grades bring the highest prices of all the varieties now in sea- 

 son. Northern Spy ranks next, and King and Wine-sap follow 

 in the scale. One of the showiest apples occasionally seen in 

 choice collections is York Imperial, or Johnson's Fine Winter, 

 as it is known in the trade. Selected specimens of this fruit 

 are of large size, flat, the clear yellow ground well cov- 

 ered with bright red markings in which distinct white dots 

 occur. 



Experiments in grafting Tomato cions on Potato stocks, as 

 well as Potato cions on Tomato stocks, have often been carried 

 on in this country. Of course, in the latter case, the Tomato 

 roots do not produce potatoes, but the Tomato grafts may 

 bear Potato flowers and seed. In a lecture on Potatoes, deliv- 

 ered before the Royal Horticultural Society lately, Mr. A. 

 Sutton spoke of a Potato-plant grafted on a Tomato, in which 

 the plant, after having produced a truss of flowers and several 

 berries, seemed to have determined that it was its peculiar 

 duty to produce tubers, and, therefore, several of these were 

 started from the axils of the leaves. A picture of this plant 

 showed half a dozen good-sized tubers growing along the 

 stem. 



Campbell's Early Grape, a seedling of Moore's Early, which 

 is in turn a seedling of Concord, promises to be one of the lead- 

 ing competitors of that old and standard variety. A corre- 



spondent of The Agriculturist Aescrih&s the new grape as earlier 

 than Moore's Early, with no tendency to shell off from the 

 stem, so that it can remain on the vine weeks after it ripens. 

 It has no foxiness, and the sprightly flavor is superior to that 

 of the Concord. Its leaves are thicker than those of the Con- 

 cord, and its growth is strong ; the skin is thin but tenacious, 

 the pulp is sweet from skin to centre and the seeds part from 

 it readily. 



The first exhibition of the recently organized Horticultural 

 Society, held last week at Nortliampton, Massachusetts, was 

 an encouraging success. Many Chrysanthemums were shown, 

 mainly by Mr. E. P. Copeland, President of the Society, and 

 noteworthy exhibits were a collection of decorative plants, 

 most effectively arranged, from the greenhouses of Mr. E. H. 

 R. Lyman (D. MacGregor, gardener) ; Chrysanthemums and 

 cut Ifowers from the Hospital (J. VV. Thornley, gardener) ; 

 plants of educational interest from the Botanic Garden of 

 Smith College (E. J. Canning, gardener). Of the florists' ex- 

 hibits the most extensive were those of iMrs. Mann and A. 

 Parks, while several other florists displayed good plants or 

 collections of flowers. 



Raupenleim is a preparation long known in Germany, where 

 it has been used to protect trees from injury by caterpillars of 

 the nun moth and other insects, and to some extent to prevent 

 the winter-barking of trees by deer ; it has also been used 

 experimentally by the gypsy-moth commission of Massachu- 

 setts. Since this insect-lime or insect-glue is comparatively 

 expensive. Professor Nason, of New Brunswick, New Jersey, 

 at the request of Professor Smith, the entomologist of the 

 station there, has obtained as the results of some experiments 

 a substance sufficiently similar to it to warrant comparative 

 tests. The new product is called Dendrolene, and Professor 

 Smith gives an account of tests made with these substances, 

 both of which are crude petroleum products which resist heat 

 to a considerable extent and remain sufficiently viscid at ordi- 

 nary temperatures, so that they do not flow and never become 

 soft enough to run much in the sun. They can be applied to 

 trees with a paddle or trowel and distributed by a stiff brush. 

 When the entire surface of the trees is covered with either of 

 these products the buds will not develop, but wdiere trees are 

 covered from the surface of the ground to the buds and the 

 buds are left free there seems to be no difference in the amount 

 of foliage or the health of the tree. A thin application of either 

 will last six weeks, and an application a quarter of an inch thick 

 has lasted five months in good condition. After a time, how- 

 ever, the German product becomes so hard that a light, rapidly 

 moving insect can move over it, although where it was put on 

 thick enough it was still soft enough to hold any creature that 

 ventured upon it at the end of six weeks. The Dendrolene 

 loses some of its sticky character in that time, but it continues 

 to have a greasy surface and remains a perfect barrier against 

 insects which attempt to cross it. The material can be em- 

 ployed for a variety of purposes, as, for example, against scale 

 insects. If the trunks and larger branches of trees are covered 

 the application will prevent the emergence of the young from 

 beneath the parent scales. Spread over the trunks of Peach- 

 trees early in the season it will prevent oviposition by the 

 Peach-tree borer. This is a satisfactory way of preventing 

 injury to Peach, Apple, Quince and Pear trees from the 

 attacks of either the round or flat-headed borer. Applied from 

 the middle to the latter part of May to the trunks of trees after 

 the loose bark is scraped off, it forms a surface that no insect 

 can light upon or can remain upon without being killed, and 

 one that no young larvae can penetrate. For this purpose 

 the Raupenleim would, perhaps, be better from its tendency 

 to become hard, and where insects are actually in the tree 

 none of them could emerge through the barrier. The dendro- 

 lene will probably answer every purpose if put on a little 

 lieavier. Where the cankerworm is troublesome a band of 

 either substance a foot wide and half an inch thick on the 

 trunk below the point of branching would prevent either the 

 male or female caterpillar from crossing, and it would remain 

 intact until the attack is over. Where shade or fruit trees have 

 been cleared of eggs during the preceding winter it would 

 be a barrier against the vaporer-moth and the bag-worm, and 

 also against the plant-lice which crawl up the tree-trunks 

 in the spring and down again in the fall. A thorough ap- 

 plication would prevent the emergence of the Pear psylla, and 

 an application made on Apple-trees before they are in blos- 

 som would prevent the emergence of any codling-moths that 

 may be in the pupa state beneath it. Altogether, the range 

 of usefulness of these substances is very wide, and a coat of 

 dendrolene might be a perfect protection during the winter 

 when mice, hares and other animals gnaw the bark. 



