i8 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 307. 



should be lost before doing- this work. Seeds sown now and 

 grown on without a check all summer make neat plants to 

 flower next winter, but sowing in September is preferable. 

 Where old plants can be carried oversafely through the sum- 

 mer, if they do well they are better than young ones, as a 

 greater number of flowers are obtained to a plant. Seeds of 

 herbaceous plants sown now will come up well, and, if trans- 

 planted before they become crowded in the seed-boxes, will 

 make strong plants to set out in spring. Most of them will 

 flower next summer, although some will not do so until the 

 second year, no matter when they are sown, while seeds of Iris, 

 Paeonies, Hellebores, Dictamnus and others take at least three 

 years before flowering size is reached, and, indeed, if these 

 are not sown as soon as gathered they often remain dormant 

 a year before germinating, so they should always be sown as 

 soon as ripe, when this is practicable. 



We commence propagating Carnations about the tenth of 

 January, this being a good time to root them, and the weaker 

 growing sorts, such as Lizzie McGowanand Grace Wilder, are 

 secured first. There is a tendency in the flowers of this latter 

 kind to come streaky in color, and this may be avoided to a 

 great extent by taking all cuttings from the plants that do not 

 show this tendency. Daybreak is now recognized as a standard 

 kind, but to secure well-shaped plants at lifting time, cuttings 

 should be taken as late as possible, and as Daybreak roots 

 more easily than any kind I know, it is possible to take cuttings 

 as late as May and to have fine plants at lifting time. Carnation 

 cuttings do not like sunshine or drought ; plenty of water, 

 shade and gentle bottom-heat will secure success. 



Among greenhouse plants, Ericas, Boronias, Dipladenias, 

 Luculia gratissima and Rubber-plants can now be propagated 

 with more success than at any time ; when Ficus cuttings are 

 made we place the cut ends in dry sand to heal over for a few 

 hours before putting them in the cutting-bench, and when the 

 cut is thus healed very few fail to root. Bouvardias are best 

 increased by root-cuttings at this time, and it is also preferable 

 to raise new plants each year, as these give better flowers, 

 though, perhaps, fewer in number. Peperomias make ideal 

 plants for house-decoration, and a few leaves taken now and 

 rooted in the same way that Begonia Rex is treated, will soon 

 form useful material for use later on. 



If seedlings of Ferns are coming up in various places in the 

 greenhouses they should be carefully lifted and pricked off in 

 pans, to be potted later ; these make nice plants for jardinieres 

 during the summer or to grow on. Adiantums do not come 

 so spontaneously as many others do, and to secure a quantity 

 of these a sowing of spores at this time will give a good supply. 

 Old plants, divided into small pieces and started in the prop- 

 agating-bench, will also make good plants, but they are never 

 as shapely as seedlings are. The colored-leaved Draceenas, 

 when used for furnishing the house, soon lose their bottom 

 leavesand become unsightly. If the tops are very highly col- 

 ored, after making cuttings of them, they will root far better if 

 placed in bottles of water than in sand, a little charcoal being- 

 added to keep the water sweet. The cuttings should be potted 

 as soon as roots form, which will require about a month if the 

 bottles are stood in a warm place. The stems may be cut in 

 lengths of two inches, to be placed in a flat and covered with 

 chopped sphagnum moss and sand. If the flat is placed on 

 the hot-water pipes to get a good bottom-heat, every piece 

 will grow, and these make the best plants, although they re- 

 quire a longer time than the tops. The tops are earlier in 

 showing color. 



South Lancaster, Mass. -£. U. Vrpet. 



Correspondence. 



Oil of Basswood. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest: 



Sir, — I note with interest in the Consular Reports for Decem- 

 ber, 1893, an account from Mr. Johnson, United States Consul 

 at Stuttgart, of the attempts made in Germany to produce a 

 substitute for olive-oil, and a question is suggested to me by 

 this report which you may be able to answer. Mr. Johnson 

 says that the south Germans have made a table oil from the 

 beech-nut which has " given great satisfaction," but the supply 

 is too precarious on account of the scarcity of the nut in cer- 

 tain years. More recently a better and more certain substi- 

 tute has been found in oil made from the seed of Linden-trees. 

 According to the report of Dr. C. Muller to the German Botan- 

 ical Society, this oil "has a nu-nber of excellent qualities, 

 which would appear to make it certain that the Linden-seed 

 will be considered one of the principal sources for obtaining 

 table oil." The regularity with which the Linden produces 



seed precludes any fear of scarcity ; and the percentage of oil 

 in Linden-seed is given as fifty eight. It is maintained, Consul 

 Johnson says, that " the oil has a peculiarly fine flavor, free 

 from all bitter or aromatic taste, and that it has the appearance 

 of olive-oil. It belongs also to the oils which do not evaporate. 

 Oil made from Linden-seed will never become rancid. It has 

 no tendency to oxygenate. It will stand a great degree of cold 

 without freezing. Dr. Muller has exposed it to a temperature 

 of three degrees, Fahrenheit, below zero without being able to 

 notice any change." 



Do you suppose that the seeds of our native Lindens (Bass- 

 wood) would yield such a percentage of so excellent an oil ? 

 From an economic point of view, the question must be very 

 well worth considering. 



Boston, Mass. J • E- c. 



[The seeds of all the Lindens undoubtedly contain oil in 

 larger or smaller quantities, but what percentage can be 

 obtained from the American species can only be ascer- 

 tained, of course, by careful experiments. The subject is 

 an interesting- one, and well worth the attention of our 

 agricultural chemists. — Ed.] 



Timber Cutting on State Lands. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — It may be of interest to your readers to learn something 

 of the work done in Minnesota recently, looking into the re- 

 turns of timber-cutting on lands belonging to the state and to 

 state institutions. The investigations are being conducted by 

 a joint committee of the Senate and the House of Representa- 

 tives in a very efficient manner. 



Many of the returns are found to cover but a fraction of the 

 timber cut, and the state seems to have been defrauded ex- 

 tensively. One of the ways in which this has been done is 

 as follows: A buys pine-stumpage at auction from the state; 

 he agrees to pay a certain price and to put a certain mark on 

 the logs, and these logs are to be sealed by the Surveyor-Gen- 

 eral of Logs and Lumber. The Surveyor-General's deputv 

 comes to the landing when these logs are piled on the bank 

 of the stream, and scales those that have the state mark on 

 them, but does not make sure that these are all the logs that 

 were taken from the section the state has sold. This gives the 

 lumberman abundant opportunity to haul logs from the same 

 section to some other landing and to put some other mark on 

 them, which many of our enterprising and liberty-loving log- 

 gers are not slow to do. On one of the sections cut in this 

 way it was found that over 7.000,000 feet had been cut from it, 

 while the Surveyor-General's deputy, virtually accepting the 

 lumberman's report of his own work, returned but 600,000 

 feet. Besides this, a very large amount of cutting is done 

 without any form of permit, the timber thus stolen being prin- 

 cipally from Sections 16 and 36, which in each township are set 

 aside by the state as an endowment for her public schools. It 

 is said that during the past two years the state has not received 

 reports of one-half the amount of log-timber cut on its lands. 



SI. Paul, Minn. -V. 



Grafting Grapes. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — I have an acre of unreclaimed swamp on my farm, 

 around the borders of which are growing twenty or thirty 

 strong wild Grape-vines, which clamber over trees and bushes 

 and bear every year large crops of white and purple grapes, 

 generally of large size, but with very thick skins and of coarse 

 quality. Would it be profitable for me to graft these vines 

 with grapes of better sorts, and if so, how shall I proceed ? 



Hamburgh, N. J. Q'lis. 



[No doubt, it would be a good thing if the thrifty vines 

 about this swamp were made, by grafting, to produce 

 Niagara, Brighton or Worden grapes, instead of the wild 

 fruit they now yield, but, unless one has considerable expe- 

 rience in this matter, he will be very fortunate if his fail- 

 ures do not outnumber his successes. In some parts of 

 the country this practice is quite general, and entire vine- 

 yards, planted with unprofitable varieties, have been grafted 

 with desirable ones. At the same time, many other persons 

 who have carefully copied the processes as described have 

 signally failed. We are not aware that the French method 

 of using both stock and cion in a somewhat herbaceous 

 condition has been tried to any great extent in this country. 



