276 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 172. 



firmed the experience in other stations, that the seed grown 

 in Puget Sound, Washington, and on Long Island was equal, 

 at least, to the best imported seed. 



Taste has indeed changed since the middle of the seventeenth 

 century, when Sir Christopher Wren wrote from Paris : " Fon- 

 tainebleau has a stately wildness and vastness suitable to the 

 desert it stands in." Who now would think this palace archi- 

 tecturally "wild," or characterize as a "desert," the beautiful 

 forest that surrounds it ? 



The Maryland Farmer, in advocating the advantages of 

 intensive culture, states that an irrigated vegetable-garden two 

 and a half acres in extent, in the suburbs of Paris, employs 

 three men, two women and a horse, the work of the latter be- 

 ing to pump the water into the reservoir for distribution and 

 to draw the loaded cart to market before daylight in the morn- 

 ing. The average product of this little garden, at Paris prices, 

 is $4,000 a year. 



At the last session of the Minnesota Legislature some thirty- 

 five sections of land were set apart, to be known as the Itaska 

 State Park, and dedicated to the perpetual use of the people. 

 Under the act a commissioner is empowered to procure for 

 the state from the owners of land within the limits of the park 

 concessions to the state by contract or deed, subject to the 

 approval of the Governor. When any tract of land within 

 the limits of the state park cannot be secured in this way the 

 commissioner is authorized to institute proceedings, to con- 

 demn the land and to convert it to use as a park. 



Mr. A. L. Hatch, writing from Hill Crest Experiment Station, 

 Wisconsin, to the Rural New- Yorker, in regard to the sun- 

 scald of Apple and other fruit-trees, says that the best remedy 

 in that region has been found to be "medicated straw." 

 Straight Rye straw, which has been dipped in whitewash con- 

 taining some carbolic acid and Paris green, is set about the 

 tree closely and extended up among the branches as far as 

 practicable, being tied in several places. Thus prepared and 

 put on, the protection lasts several years, or until the growth 

 of the tree will make its renewal desirable. The medication 

 serves as a preventive of injury from insects, mice, rabbits 

 and borers. 



A circular has just been issued by the Division of Ento- 

 mology of the United States Department of Agriculture which 

 gives in the space of half a dozen pages condensed informa- 

 tion concerning several of the more important insecticides. 

 Formulas are given for preparing kerosene emulsions, resin 

 washes and arsenical mixtures, together with directions for 

 their use and the necessary cautions to be exercised. Of 

 course, all the points given here have been published before, 

 but the department is doing good service by issuing in this 

 available form answers to those questions which experience 

 has proved are most often asked by correspondents when they 

 begin to look about them for help against some invading 

 insects. 



A late bulletin of the New York Agricultural Experiment 

 Station reports renewed success in -using potassium sulphide, 

 or liver of sulphur, as a remedy against Gooseberry-mildew. 

 Liver of sulphur costs less than twenty cents a pound, and as 

 only half an ounce of it is dissolved in a gallon of water this 

 is an inexpensive remedy, since one gallon will spray ten or 

 twelve large bushes if applied with the usual spraying nozzle. 

 Of course, where a few plants are sprayed with a syringe more 

 of the liquid will be required. The spraying should begin as 

 soon as the leaves unfold, and should be repeated every fifteen 

 or twenty days. Gooseberries are among the most desirable 

 of fruits for home use, and they are very remunerative as 

 market crops where they can be grown, for buyers are willing 

 to pay almost any price for bright green fruit. 



In Tulare County, California, near Lindsay Station, Mr. J. J. 

 Cairns is preparing eighty acres of land to be planted in fruit. 

 The land is a mixture of clay and sand loam, so that it is easily 

 tilled, but has never been irrigated, and, for lack of facilities, it 

 must be watered, if at all, with a pump from wells. It is 

 necessary, therefore, that the land should be placed in the best 

 condition for holding water, and Mr. Cairns took off all but 

 two plows from his gang, weighted it, and sent it into the soil 

 to a depth of from twelve to thirteen inches with the aid of a 

 ten-mule team. Following this team came a subsoil plow, to 

 which fourteen mules were attached, and this tore up the sub- 

 soil to a depth of thirty inches from the surface. These state- 

 ments are given on the authority of the Tulare Register, and 

 if the land does not absorb and hold all the moisture which 

 falls upon it from the skies, or any other source, there is no 



efficacy in deep plowing. This piece of land will be watched 

 with interest for a year or so. 



In an article published in the Journal of the Royal Horticul- 

 tural Society, Mr. Maurice L. de Vilmorin states that a single 

 manufacturer in the year of 1889 preserved 400,000 kilograms 

 of sorrel, a salad herb which is as much appreciated in France 

 as it is neglected in England. This was said to illustrate the 

 statement that France raises so many vegetables, which from 

 their nature are not qualified to undergo long journeys, that 

 factories are found everywhere for preserving them, and that 

 their good quality, combined with the care taken in their 

 manufacture, gives them a market value throughout the 

 world. Not only green peas, French beans and tomatoes are 

 canned in immense quantities, but asparagus and several 

 other vegetables, including the sorrel above mentioned, are 

 similarly treated, and three-fourths of the product is exported. 



Interesting as showing the prevailing fashion in tree-plant- 

 ing in New England, is the account of the census of the Salem 

 trees made in 1859, when it appears 2,651 trees were standing 

 in the city streets, and that of these 1,656 were Elms, 353 were 

 Maples, and, strangely enough, no were Cherry-trees. "The 

 totel disappearance of these Cherry-trees, as they were re- 

 moved owing to the nuisance caused by the foraging of boys," 

 Mr. Robinson suggests, " is an answer to those writers who ad- 

 vocate the planting of fruit-trees in the public streets." But in 

 other countries, where boys are better disciplined than they 

 are in the United States, fruit-trees are successfully and very 

 profitably grown along the borders of the highway, and such 

 trees in Germany and other European countries have proved 

 most profitable investments both to abutting land-owners and 

 to village corporations. 



The Metropolitan Museum of Art.has now been opened for 

 two successive Sundays, and has been visited by probably 

 25,000 persons, a large proportion of whom were evidently 

 working people who are unable to visit the galleries on week 

 days or evenings. It is a noteworthy fact that the examples of 

 work in wrought iron, which few persons on week days stop to 

 glance at, were constantly surrounded and discussed by groups 

 of workmen. Why should there not be a movement toward 

 the Sunday opening of the Museum of Natural History, where 

 artisans of many kinds might find 'pleasure and profit ? The 

 Jesup collection of American woods, for example, is interest- 

 ing to the botanist and the landscape-gardener, but it has also 

 a mine of information and suggestion for the carpenter, the 

 cabinet-maker, the wood-carver and the architect. It is argued 

 that admission to these museums on Sunday may lead to the 

 toleration of amusements of a less elevated character ; but it 

 is not so probable that the opening of the libraries and the mu- 

 seums will prove " an entering wedge for the admission of the 

 Continental Sunday" as it is that such opportunities will open 

 the hearts and minds of workingmen to the admission of new 

 light which will increase their knowledge, intelligence and 

 ambition. The so-called experiment of Sunday opening has 

 been tried in Boston and Philadelphia for fifteen years, with 

 great advantages to the people who have availed themselves 

 of these privileges, and the Continental Sunday has given as 

 yet no signs of its arrival. 



Dr. J. A. Lintner writes that the Pear-midge, Diplosis fiyri- 

 vora, has appeared in Catskill, where it is said that ninety per 

 cent, of the fruit on the Lawrence trees in one orchard are 

 affected, while other varieties, like Anjou, Seckel, Bartlett and 

 Bosc, are attacked to some extent. Hitherto this most danger- 

 ous enemy of the Pear has only been reported in one locality 

 in the United States, that is, at Meriden, Connecticut, where it 

 was probably introduced some ten years ago in Pear-stock 

 imported from France, and, a few years thereafter, almost en- . 

 tirely destroyed the crop on the Lawrence and seriously in- 

 jured other varieties. Effort was made to exterminate it be- 

 fore it spread farther by picking the entire crop in an off 

 year and destroying it, and it was believed that the pest had 

 been brought under control. So far as ascertained now the 

 invasion is confined to an area with a radius of about three 

 miles, but it may be much more extensive. Fruit growers in 

 New York state and elsewhere are requested to make search 

 on their Lawrence trees first, and then on other Pears, and 

 report the result to Dr. Lintner, at Albany. The infested fruit 

 can be recognized at once by the fact that its upper three- 

 fourths is enlarged and irregularly swollen, and has a differ- 

 ent color from its base. When cut open perhaps from ten to 

 twenty pale yellowish footless larvae will be disclosed, each 

 about one-tenth of an inch long and pointed at the ends, much 

 resembling the larvae of the Wheat-midge. If this pest is con- 

 fined to a few localities Dr. Lintner thinks that it can be ex- 

 terminated by united effort. 



