1 88 



Garden and Forest. 



QUNE 13, iS 



In a paiier read before the Illinois State Horticultural Society 

 last winter, Mr. D. B. Wier held that the curculio prefers to 

 deposit its eggs in the fruit of the native plums. He therefore 

 advocates the planting- of native varieties among the trees of 

 foreign origin. His claim is that the insects will not only pass 

 by the latter trees for the former, but that a large percentage 

 of the eggs deposited in the native fruit will fail to develop, so 

 that the increase of the pest will be held in check. Another old 

 remedy is dusting the trees with air-slaked lime. It is reported 

 in the bulletin of the Ohio Experiment Station for May, that 

 orchards treated in this way in Michigan have yielded abun- 

 dant fruit. The lime is applied by means of a flat paddle froni 

 a barrel in a wagon which is driven along the rows of trees on 

 the side towards the wind. The lime can also be mixed with 

 water and ajiplied in a spray. This last method has been 

 practiced near Boston with remarkable success. S. A. 



Orchid Notes. — Cattleya Skiniierii alba, a lovely variety, bear- 

 ing snow-white flowers with just a few purple stripes in the 

 throat, is a native of Costa Rica, and to be well-grown needs 

 more heat than is usually accorded the type. It delights in abun- 

 dance of water, both overhead and at the root, during the grow- 

 ing season, and requires a long season of rest, in a cool, dry 

 house. One plant now in bloom here is bearing 25 flowers on 

 two spikes, and they will last a month in perfection, forming the 

 chief attraction of the Cattleya House. Cattleya Wageneri is 

 a very rare and chaste var. of C. JMossia, bearing pure white 

 flowers, with a dash of lemon at the base of the large open 

 lip. A superb form is now in bloom with us, the flowers 

 being fully 9 inches across and of good substance. This 

 plant is doing unusually well in a basket filled entirely with 

 sphagnum moss, a capital potting material for most Orchids 

 when care is taken that it does not become saturated with 

 water. A thorough soaking about once a week is often 

 sufficient. Miltonia {Odontoglossiim) vexillaria will soon be 

 at its liest, and may now be seen in abundant varieties. 

 Among the choice of these may be noted var. rubella, with 

 flowers of deep rose; var. leucoglpssa, pale rose, with a large 

 pure white lip; var. Hilliaiia, with large rose-colored flow- 

 ers, dotted and striped with dark purple ; var. siiperba, a deep 

 colored form, the base of the lip being white, with radiating 

 crimson lines. This Orchid is probably the mosi beautiful of 

 the Miltonias or of the Odontoglossums, to which genus it was 

 formerly referred. Unfortunately it is seldom seen in good 

 condition in this coiuitry. In many instances the cause of 

 this is too little water, as may easily be seen by their starved 

 and thrips-eaten condition. 



Thrips has always been the pest of this species and will be 

 sure to appear whenever the watering is neglected. The 

 plants should be watered at least once a day and always 

 from overhead. During the hot summer days or when the 

 firing is heavy in winter it may be necessary to syringe the 

 foliage a few times. Under this treatment thrip never attack 

 the plants here. In respect to heat we try to keep a temperature 

 of 60° — 65° the whole year round. We use peat and moss in 

 equal parts for potting, particular attention being paid to drain- 

 age. Under the above treatment these Orchids grow like weeds, 

 producing 3 to 4 spikes of flowers from a bulb and increasing 

 the numijer of leads and size of bulbs every year. 



Kenwood, N. Y. F. Goldring. 



Staking Plants. — Hollyhocks, Dahlias, perennial Larkspurs, 

 Bottonias, Sunflowers and many other tall-growing, top- 

 heavy plants, will need staking. Never wait till the plants grow 

 large and are blown over or broken down, but stake them be- 

 fore they need support. Once the stakes are set, it is an easy 

 matter to tie up the plants occasionally, and in this way to pre- 

 serve their good form. Use neat stakes, but strong ones, and 

 firmly set. A large Dahlia, heavy with rain, will require a 

 strong svipport in a high wind. Chestnut, locust and red 

 cedar stakes worked at the saw-mill in suitable lengths, and 

 from one to two inches square, and with the sharp corners 

 planed off, can be used for tall, heavy plants like Dahlias and 

 Sunflowers and foryoung trees. Good stakes can also be made 

 from the refuse yellow pine which can be procured at many 

 saw-mills. Such heavy and stiff stakes are not best for tall 

 Lilies like L. auratiim, L. superbuin and others, which grow 

 from five to nine feet high, but long, strong, elastic stakes are 

 preferable. These sway a little in tlie wind with the plant, and 

 at the same time are perfectly secure, and for this purpose 

 there is nothing better tlian Red or White Cedar saplings such 

 as are used for bean-poles, slender and neatly dressed. Almost 

 any stake does for smaller plants, although the cane stakes so 

 much used by florists are not of much value in the flower gar- 

 den ; they rot otf in the ground too quickly. But whatever 



is used should be neat, and firmly set, and, if the plants 

 are in rows, accurately in line. The plants should grow higher 

 than the stakes, and they should l)e so tied as to hide 

 them, and at the same time not to appear as if crushed or in 

 ail unnatural position. IV. F. 



The Rock-Garden in Spring. 



"T^ULIPS are still conspicuous among the plants flowering 

 ■*■ this week in the New England rock-garden. The most 

 beautiful of them is the Lady Tulip of gardens, Tulipa Clu- 

 siana (also known as T. privcox and T. rub>-o-alba),a common 

 plant from Portugal to Persia, and one of the most clearly 

 marked and least variable of all the Tulips. It has linear, 

 acuminate, channeled, glaucous leaves, a slender tlexuous stem, 

 twelve or eighteen inclies high, and a delicate white flower two 

 inches long, the narrow segments marked on the inside with a 

 handsomepurplespot, the three outer flushed externally, except 

 along the edges, with bright red. The anthers and filaments 

 are dark purple or nearly black. The flowers of Tulipa 

 acuminata, or, as it is often known in gardens, T. cornuta, are 

 always striking and interesting. They are sometimes scarlet 

 and sometimes yellow, and these colors are sometimes 

 blended. The segments are very long, and all are narrowed 

 gradually into a long, narrow, horn-hke point. This is a 

 very old inhaljitant of gardens, and a very distinct tvpe, 

 but its native country is not known. It is very hardy 

 here, and one of the most easily cultivated of all the Tulips. 

 Tulipa reflexa is also in bloom. This is another Tulip 

 which is only known in gardens, and which, as Mr. Baker has 

 suggested, is probably a liybrid between T. acuminata and T. 

 Gesneriana. It has handsome bright yellow flowers, two and 

 a half to three inches long, the segments narrowed gradually 

 to an acute point and sharply reflexed above the middle when 

 the flower is fully expanded. Among our native Violets 

 worthy of a place in the garden is Viola pubescens, the 

 common yellow Violet of northern woods, with broadly 

 heart-shaped, downy leaves, and rather small bright yellow 

 flowers, which continue to appear during several weeks. It 

 takes kindly to cultivation, thriving in the shade, and is 

 springing up everywhere in the rockery from self-sown seed. 

 The Pepper-root (Dentaria diphylla), another inhabitant of 

 northern woods, proljably is not seen very often in gardens, 

 where, however, it can well fill some shady nook or pocket in- 

 the rockery. It has large compound leaves, with three rhom- 

 bic-ovate, coarsely cut leaflets and short racemes of rather 

 large white flowers. The long, fleshy, toothed root-stock pe- 

 culiar to the plants of this genus of the Mustard Family {Cru- 

 ciferce) have a pleasant pung-ent flavor, to which they owe 

 their common English name. Another pretty shade-loving 

 native plant now in flower is IValdsteinia fragoides, a low 

 perennial herb, with leaves divided into three cut-toothed 

 lobes, and small bright yellow flowers, in size and shape not 

 unlike those of the Strawberry, but produced upon many- 

 flowered scapes rising above the foliage. 



Gardeners hardly realize or appreciate the beauty of our 

 North American Lady Slippers {Cypripediuiu), and yet among 

 them are plants as showy and far more delicate and beautiful 

 than any of the tropical species in which the horticultural 

 world is just now so deeply interested. All the species of the 

 Eastern States are perfectly hardy and can be grown as easily 

 as any of the more delicate of our wild plants. They will 

 thrive, with the exception of C. acaitle, which requires drier 

 soil and a more sunny exposure, along the margins of Rhodo- 

 dendron beds in peaty loam, or in the shady and least dry 

 parts of the rock-garden. They are easily transplanted and 

 make excellent pot-plants, if needed for the decoration of con- 

 servatories or living-rooms. The only one of these interesting 

 plants blooming here now is the larger of the two yellow flow- 

 ered species, C. pubescens. It has stems two feet high, pubes- 

 cent like the broadly-oval, acute leaves, and handsome flowers, 

 . with a pale yellow giblious lip, and long, linear, twisted petals. 

 It is the common bog species north and west, and is found 

 also on the Alleghany Mountains. 



Varieties of Iris pumila, with bright-blue and with yellow 

 flowers, are now in bloom. It is a dwarf European species, 

 three or four inches high, with large solitary flowers, well 

 suited to the rock-garden, and an excellent subject for a dwarf 

 edging to the herbaceous border. The dwarf Iris is very hardy, 

 and spreads rapidly, soon making broad, dense mats. Not less 

 beautiful is the crested dwarf Iris of the southern Alleghany 

 Mountains {Iris cristatd), a low plant, with leaves only three or 

 four inches long, and very handsome, light blue flowers, with 

 a long, slender tube much longer than the short-clawed divis- 

 ions of the perianth, of whicli those of the outer series are 



