VIII PROPAGATION 155 



open air. French grafting wax which can be used 

 cold is preferable to home-made material, but winter 

 grafting can hardly be considered worth the trouble 

 for amateurs, unless it be carried out on a large 

 scale, and close frames with bottom heat in properly 

 constructed houses can be provided. 



Boses on their own Boots. — It is constantly being 

 put forward as a new discovery that Eoses, especially 

 some varieties, may themselves be struck as cuttings, 

 and will in time form fair plants and give decent 

 blooms. " Why then," it is said, " take all this 

 trouble about stocks and budding? You plant your 

 cuttings in the autumn, in any quantity, as it is all 

 wood that you will cut away at the spring pruning, 

 and you thus get real genuine Eose bushes — Eoses 

 on their own roots, which cannot be killed by frost 

 unless root and all perish together, and whose 

 suckers are welcome as they are only increase to 

 the Eoses." 



The simple answer to this is, that not only does 

 it take longer thus to form plants which will give 

 fair flowers, but that it is a fact that Eoses on their 

 own roots do not grow so well or flower so well as 

 those which are budded on stronger rooting stocks. 

 Nevertheless some varieties, especially of the free 

 and hardy garden sorts, will answer in this way, 

 and the best modes of striking the cuttings shall 

 therefore be described. 



The usual time for taking them is November. 

 They should be prepared of as ripe wood as can 

 be found of the current year's growth, about ten 

 inches in length. The thorns had better be trimmed 

 off, but none of the buds as all these will help if they 

 grow. If a small portion of "heel " or older wood 



