388 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 344. 



resembles it. The flavor is rich ; the time of ripening is the 

 very last of September. The plums do not tend to rot and 

 are free from curculio stings. After ripening they hang on 

 the tree a long while without rot or loss of quality or drying 

 up. The tree is stocky, a good grower and good cropper. On 

 the whole, for a really first-rate plum, I know hardly one to 

 surpass the Reine Claude. 



Clinton, N. Y. E. P. P. 



Dendrobium Pha'aenopsis Schrcederianum. — As the flowering 

 season of this species comes around, one is more convinced 

 than ever that it is among the very best, not only of Dendro- 

 biums, but of all tropical Orchids. As one plant after another 

 comes into bloom they show a remarkable range of color, 

 varying through pale lilac and rose up to crimson and purple. 

 The plants, too, are very floriferous, and the flowers endure 

 for a long time. Imported plants become established quickly 

 when properly taken care of, and they seem to increase in 

 beauty every year. They should be suspended in the stove 

 near the roof, when they will grow vigorously and show that 

 the admiration which they have universally excited is well 

 deserved. 



Wellesley, Mass. Prank UOUlCl. 



Correspondence. 

 Winter Pears. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — In reference to winter pears, may I inquire if it is safe to 

 set the trees out in autumn ? Would Anjou, Winter Nelis, 

 Lawrence and Josephine de Malines be a good list ? 



New Brunswick, N. J. ■"• A. 



[Pear-trees can be safely set out in autumn if they are set 

 early and firmly and well mulched. A good list for almost 

 any section east of the Mississippi, where Pears grow, 

 would be Anjou, Winter Nelis, Josephine de Malines and 

 Patrick Barry. It is always advisable, when planting for 

 home use, to experiment to some extent. A stocky Pear- 

 tree, five or six feet high and suitable for planting, is not 

 expensive, and an outlay which allows a test of several 

 varieties need not be large. Every one will then settle on 

 a few favorites, and the others can be grafted out if desir- 

 able. Winter pears should be picked as late as possible, 

 handled with special care and stored in a dry dark room 

 until just before they are wanted for use. — E. P. P.] 



The Water Chinquapin. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest: 



Sir, — I was interested in the note which appeared in your 

 issue for August 22d, on your beautiful yellow-flowered Ne- 

 lumbium. This plant has never become established in Eng- 

 lish collections, while Nelumbium speciosum is grown with 

 great ease. Is it hardier than N. speciosum ? If some of your 

 skillful growers would tell us how to manage it we shall be 

 greatly obliged. 



By the way, you speak of it as Nelumbo lutea. Is this a 

 printer's error, or is it a new rendering of what we have been 

 in the habit of calling Nelumbium luteum ? 



Kew. 1". iv. 



[Nelumbo lutea is the name of this plant as it appears in 

 the sixth edition of Gray's Manual. This vernacular name, 

 taken directly from the Ceylonese, was used by Adanson 

 in 1763 and by Geertner in 1788. Undoubtedly, it has been 

 adopted in the Manual because of its priority to the Latin- 

 ized name Nelumbium, which was not used until 1799. It 

 may be, that our Yellow Nelumbo is somewhat hardier 

 than the Indian species, and yet they are both prac- 

 tically hardy in this latitude, N. speciosa having been 

 naturalized in Central Park and other places near New 

 York. The tubers of neither of the plants will live 

 when frozen, but in shallow water and in soil which 

 is not too hard the roots of both will grow downward 

 so as to be out of reach of the ordinary winter frosts. 

 Some people complain here that large roots of Nelumbo 

 lutea sometimes fail to start, but Mr. Tricker finds that it 

 will grow just as easily as N. speciosa, either from the roots 

 or from seed, although both are occasionally uncertain. He 

 treats both plants in the same way ; that is, he starts the seed 



indoors in April in a temperature of from seventy to seventy- 

 five degrees, Fahrenheit, and it will germinate in a week. If 

 the seedlings are kept moving they will be in nine-inch pots 

 by the middle of May, and early in June he plants them out 

 where they will remain. They will not bloom the first year, 

 but there will be abundant flowers the next season if they 

 are not molested. Seed may also be planted out where 

 the plants are intended to grow in June. The hard shell 

 of the seeds should be filed through. If grown from tubers, 

 small ones may be put out in April and grown along in- 

 doors until June, when the conditions will be favorable for 

 rapid growth, or, at least, such that the plants will not 

 stand still. No care has been taken in selecting choice 

 plants of our native Nelumbo, but the flowers vary consid- 

 erably, some_of them being as clear and deep in color as 

 Marliac's Nymphaea chromatella. Altogether, this seems 

 to be a promising aquatic plant for experiments in hybrid- 

 izing. — Ed.] 



The Dahlia Stalk-borer. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — You inquire in your issue for September 5th regarding 

 the larva of the Noctulid moth, Gortyna nitela, preying upon 

 Dahlias. I have noticed it here for three or four years past. 

 It does not generally, with us, destroy the plants directly if not 

 removed, but weakens the stems, so that they are easily 

 broken by the wind or rain, or fall over of their own weight. 

 By tying the plants to stakes passable blooms may be ob- 

 tained, impaired, however, by the lessened vitality of the 

 plant. But a little attention in season will generally get rid of 

 the pest. Packard, in his Guide to the Study of Insects, quotes 

 from the Prairie Parmer the following mode of treatment : 

 " The careful culturist need fear nothing from this trouble- 

 some insect, as an occasional close inspection of the plants 

 about the 1st of July will reveal the hole where the borer has 

 entered, which is generally at quite a distance from the 

 ground, and by splitting downward one side of the stalk with 

 a penknife it may be found and killed. If this inspection be 

 made at the proper time the worm will be found but a short 

 distance from the hole, and the split in the stalk will heal by 

 being kept closed with a thread." I have found a similar 

 borer in the stem of the Tomato, and treated it in this way, 

 not using a thread, but pressing the tissues together by the 

 fingers. It is well to tie the stalks to a stake if the injury has 

 gone far, lest they break where weakened. The borers do not 

 always go downward in the Tomato, but a little inspection will 

 reveal the direction. 



This Gortyna attacks a variety of plants, and is popularly 

 called the stalk-borer. There is another, called by Harris 

 Gortyna zese, which he states, in his Insects Injurious to Vege- 

 tation, attacks the Dahlia. This is properly the Corn stalk- 

 borer. Packard gives it as generically different in his Guide. 

 Its habits are somewhat different from those of the Dahlia or 

 Aster stalk-borer, since it undergoes its tranformations in the 

 stalk of the Corn, while the stalk-borer which afflicts the Dahlias 

 crawls into the ground to go into the chrysalis stage. Taking 

 Mrs. Seliger's identification to be correct, it would not be the 

 true Corn stalk-borer which injured her plants, but the Dahlia 

 or Aster stalk-borer. 



Chicago, 111. P. 7- Hill. 



Keeping Half-hardy Plants over Winter. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — Every year's added experience more firmly convinces 

 me that the best way to deal with half-hardy shrubs and plants 

 is to lift them in late autumn, pack the roots well around with 

 moderately moist soil and set them in a rat-proof cellar over 

 winter. I treat Crape Myrtle, Oleanders, Agapanthus, Trito- 

 mas, etc., after this manner, and, after ripening them off in 

 some cool but sheltered place, like a wood-shed or back piazza, 

 put them in the cellar and leave them there until spring. Un- 

 less the cellar has an unusually dry atmosphere, or the winter 

 proves unusually long, large specimens need no watering at 

 all while at rest in the cellar, and smaller ones no oftenerthan 

 once in five or six weeks. This leaves the wood and tissues 

 plump and sound, while the plant is all the better for its long 

 rest and is ready to start at once into vigorous growth when 

 brought up in the spring. Plants of doubtful hardiness are 

 almost sure to winter well under this treatment, whereas if 

 left in the ground, even with heavy mulching around them, 



