The Garden Magazine 



Vol. III.— No. 3 



Published Monthly 



APRIL, 1906 



| One Dollar a Year 

 1 Ten Cents a Copy 



How to Avoid the Spring Rush 

 and Have a Better Garden 



*■ I^HE planning and planting of a garden 

 *- can be divided into about fifty items 

 which are classified and numbered below. 



Go over these now and strike out the items 

 that do not concern you, e. g., hotbeds, if you 

 cannot have them this year. 



Next put a check mark against the items 

 you will do yourself and a cross against the 

 work which you will have done by hired 

 labor. The invariable tendency is to at- 

 tempt too much. Unless you have a mental 

 picture of yourself doing ^he work at the 

 right time and in the best possible way put 

 it on the hired man's list. Let us take no 

 chances this year. 



Then concentrate on the items that can 

 be done evenings before April 10th. 



The rest is easy ; for the secret of success in 

 gardening is to plan everything before the 

 ground is fit to dig. 



Check off each item as fast as it is done. 

 Use this "check list" faithfully during April 

 and you are bound to have a better garden. 



This "check list" is an annual feature of 

 The Garden Magazine. If you see any way 

 of improving it or of simplifying the work of 

 gardening in the one month when everything 

 has to be done at once, please give us the 

 benefit of your experience. 



The chief improvement this year consists 

 in giving references to articles in the mag- 

 azine containing the best available sugges- 

 tions for each piece of work. The numbers 

 refer to volumes and pages. They show 

 what a valuable reference work the bound 

 volumes have become. 



Do you realize that there are two bound 

 volumes of The Garden Magazine already 

 and that the easiest, cheapest and pleasantest 

 way to secure a working library on home 

 gardening is to have your set bound? If 

 you do not, you will never refer to the back 

 numbers and they will get lost. Without an 

 index they will be of no use. Do you know 

 that the publishers supply indexes free to 

 subscribers? Better arrange with the pub- 



lishers now for bound volumes or it will be 

 too late and you will always regret it. 



INDOORS BEFORE APRIL I St. 



i. Send postals for catalogues of adver- 

 tising seedsmen and nurserymen. Let 

 us start right by getting new and in- 

 spiring ideas. We need many points 

 of view. 



2. Arrange for manure or buy fertilizers 

 (i: 27, 236). 



3. Plan the vegetable garden (2: 261). 



4. Plan the flower garden (1 : 17). 



5. Order seeds, plants, trees. 



6. Order better tools (1 : 134, 67). 



7. Order complete spraying outfit (1 : 32, 

 22, 68). 



8. Buy some good books on gardening,e.g., 

 "How to Make a Vegetable Garden" 

 and "How to Make a Flower Garden" 

 (2: 229). 



9. Get outfit for canning fruits and vege- 

 tables (2: 69). 



10. Make separate and better facilities for 

 storing vegetables and roots (1: 76); and 

 plan to have plenty of fresh vegetables 

 all winter. 



11. Make veranda boxes (1: 228) and bird 

 houses {Country Life in America, 6: 88, 

 186; 5 : 344). 



12. Write all labels and mark on them the 

 distance apart the plants shoidd stand 

 when thinned or transplanted. 



13. Look over roots in cellar (1 : 57) 



14. Clean and sharpen tools (1:57). 



15. Start flower seeds in window. 



16. Take slips of geraniums (2: 164). 



17. Plan a children's garden. 



18. Start a garden diary (1: 265). 



19. Join a civic or village improvement 

 society or start one. 



OUT OF DOORS BEFORE APRIL ISt. 



(or before farmers begin to plow) 



20. Clean up ! 



21. Put all the manure you can get pn the 

 vegetable garden. 



22. Manure asparagus and rhubarb beds or 

 fertilize with nitrate of soda (1: 140). 



23. Fertilize (1: 82), roll and repair the 

 lawn (1: 146). Good time to make 

 new ones (Country Life in America, 

 March, 1906). 



24. Any grading or draining? 



25. Prune fruit trees (1:64) and grapes 

 (1:18) not berry bushes or early-bloom- 

 ing shrubs (1: 225). 



26. Prune hardy roses, already planted, by 

 March 15th. 



27. Train berry bushes (1: 88) and grapes 

 (1: 18). 



28 Spray fruit trees, berry bushes and orna- 

 mental shrubs with lime-sulphur before 

 the buds open (1: 22). 



29. Get Paris green and Bordeaux mixture 

 ready for later sprayings (1 : 144). 



30. Get pea brush or chicken wire ready; 

 provide poles for beans and tomatoes. 



31. Trim paths and borders. 



32. Buy or make a hotbed (1 : 58) and a cold- 

 frame (1:30 ). 



33. Plant deciduous trees and shrubs. 



34. Plant fruit trees (1 : 122, 183), and berry 

 bushes (1: 106, 125). 



35. Plant new hardy roses about March 

 25th (1:129). Sow sweet peas (1:150). 



36. Sow a few seeds of extra early round 

 peas and Golden Bantam corn (1: 105). 



OUTDOORS ON APRIL 15th. 



(or as soon as the land is fit to dig and 

 before the danger of frost is past). 



37. Plow and harrow the garden, or dig and 

 rake it. 



38. Sow seeds of hardy vegetables (1: no). 

 Practically everything except beans, 

 corn, vines and tomato family. 



39. Plant onion sets and early potatoes. 



40. Transplant hardy vegetables from cold- 

 frame to garden, especially cabbage and 

 cauliflower plants. 



41. Sow seeds of all hardy flowers (1 : 117). 



42. Prepare for frost (1: 169). 



43. Divide and rearrange perennials; give 

 surplus to neighbors who cannot buy 

 them. If you want a large mass of one 

 kind of perennial flower propagate by 

 cuttings (2: 116). 



44. Prune tender roses (1: 129). 



45. Spray roses with whale oil soap toward 

 end of April (1: 129). 



46. Plant evergreen trees and shrubs. 



HOTBEDS AND COLDFRAMES 



This is the busiest month for hotbeds and 

 coldframes. They need the closest care on 

 account of sudden rains, hail, changes of tem- 

 perature, frost, rapid alternation of clouds 

 and sunshine, and the dangers of drying out, 

 burning foliage, spindling plants, etc. 



47. Sow tender annuals in hotbeds before 

 April 1st, e. g., cosmos and others which 

 cannot stand frost (1 : 34). 



48. Start cannas by April 1st and the early 

 crops of dahlias and gladioli, also dahl- 

 ias for propagating; main crop out- 

 doors in May. 



49. Harden cabbage and other vegetables 



that can stand frost. Have them ready 

 to move from coldframes to open by 

 April 15th. Harden tender vegetables 

 and flowers by transferring them to 

 coldframes April 15th, from which they 

 may be set out-doors the first or second 

 week of May. 



50. Sow seeds of perennial flowers that will 

 bloom the first year from seed if sown 

 now in coldframes (3:140). 



