68 Propagation and Training of Plants. 



You can make very nice flower stakes out of common 

 laths, but I think it would be far better to purchase 

 them from a seedsman ready made. You can get them 

 from ninepence to three shillings per 100, according 

 to lengths of from one foot to three and a half feet. A 

 bundle of 100 would last you for years, and they are 

 always at hand when required. 



Staking plants should be done neatly and room 

 enough left in tying for the stems to swell. If it is a 

 quick-growing plant, leave the stake considerably 

 longer than the shoot to tie it up as it grows. A 

 fuchsia, for instance, always looks best if trained as one 

 leading shoot, with only one stake in the middle of the 

 pot. Any weak or lengthy side shoots can be looped 

 to the stake. This rule holds good for most plants if 

 you wish your plant to be pyramidal in shape. The 

 secret of neat effective staking, is to stake your plants 

 properly with as few stakes as you can, not to have 

 your pot full of unsightly stakes with little foliage to hide 

 them. Supposing you have a plant with a good many 

 shoots or branches, in staking that plant contrive if 

 you can to have the tallest shoot in the centre and the 

 smaller ones outside, and all equally round, so that it 

 may be as well balanced on all sides as you possibly 

 can make it. 



The propagation of flowering plants is a very simple 

 thing. A cutting when properly made and inserted in 

 the soil only requires you to have a little patience till 

 it roots, and to be left alone in the soil till then ; not 

 pulled up now and then to see if it is rooted, as many 

 will do. The same may be said regarding your seeds 



