November, 191.5 



THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 



119 



soil being shaken out and new added), shed all its 

 leaves except those at the very top of the stem, which 

 was about three feet in length. Its usefulness, 

 however, was not at an end. The stem was cut into 

 six or eight inch lengths and placed in a sand bed 

 where many of them rooted and produced young 

 Dracaenas, one of which I now have. The piece of 

 stem left attached to the old root sent out three 

 branches, but was frosted the following winter so that 

 its opportunity for being original was lost. 



Penna. Mrs. S. X. Rhoads 



Seedling Dahlias 



AMONG seedling Dahlias I have had some in- 

 teresting breaks toward a fragrant flower. 

 Three years ago I raised, among a batch of fine seed- 

 lings from Kel way's single Chinese Lantern Dahlia, a 

 white single which I kept because it had a sort of 

 scent. It is hardly a perfume, but most resembles 

 the smell of a cake of Ivory soap. That white is 

 distinguished for wiry stems, great freedom and 

 regularity of flowering, and heavy lustrous green 

 leaves distinct from the foliage of other dahlias in the 

 garden. As a cut flower, a bunch of these is very 

 attractive, and resembles the Helleborus known in 

 England as the Christmas Rose. 



The season after this originated, I saved seed of 

 Wodan, Phenomene, and other sorts, bees supple- 

 menting the pollination I did by hand. From nine 

 Wodan seedlings I have one which smells like a June 

 Peony; it is almost identical in bloom with the 

 original Wodan, though the plant is not so good, 

 in habit. From Phenomene I have a fine single 

 bronze with yellow ring, a large, good flower 

 every way, with a distinct pond-lily fragrance. 

 The curious coincidence is, that the year the seed 

 was saved, a plant of Chinese Lantern and a plant of 

 its daughter, the fragrant white, grew next to the 

 seed-bearing plants of Wodan and Phenomene. 

 There are great chances that bees affected an acci- 

 dental cross, and that either the soap-scented 

 white or its parent Chinese Lantern threw in the 

 odor for an inheritance. Chinese Lantern, I may 

 say, is a perfect witch as a seed parent, though of 

 medium size and scentless. By no reasoning that I 

 can explain I picked this dahlia the first season I 

 grew it as certain to make wonderful "breaks " in the 

 next generation, expecially to break up in color. 

 Results have been beyond my wildest dreams. 



Certain other first-generation offspring of Chinese 

 Lantern make seed which endures a winter in the 

 soil of an ordinary garden, and sprouts of itself in the 

 spring, as hardy as a feverfew or a marigold. I had 

 three such seedlings after a winter which killed a 

 good part of the peach buds all through this valley; 

 but by somebody's carelessness, two of the three 

 were rooted up. The survivor is a good carmine 

 single, yellow zoned, decidedly on the "star" type so 

 favored by a noted Scotch firm for cutting purposes. 



The backyard of a Long Island City dwelling, in which 

 ordinary every-day flowers struggle to outshine each other 



If my garden were large enough, it is quite possible 

 that I might breed up a considerable assortment of 

 scented dahlias from the three sorts as a base. I 

 have no facilities, however, for taking care of much 

 that is new. If any State experiment station or re- 

 sponsible grower or amateur cares to take up such a 

 line of research, I shall be glad to furnish some seed 

 of this year's crop, and what tubers I have in spring, 

 through The Garden Magazine. 



Penna. E. S. Johnson. 



Protecting the Roses 



DOX'T attempt to fix the Roses for winter until 

 the plants are perfectly dormant and the wood 

 well ripened. Some bury them in dirt; others straw 

 them in; they are sometimes lifted and stored in 

 frames; and I have even seen boxes placed over 

 many of the more tender ones. There are good and 

 bad points about every method. Burying is very 

 good but is a lot of work and of ttimes causes loss by 

 wet rot; the same is true of strawing in, for in very 

 mild winters, when we usually have considerable 



wet, muggy weather, the plants suffer from lack 

 of air. Lifting and storing the plants in frames 

 causes a serious check to the plant and prevents it 

 attaining the size it should. The box method is 

 all right but very unsightly and is almost prohib- 

 itive when a person has any quantity of Roses to 

 protect. With plants that stand in beds I have had 

 success by placing poultry wire on the outside of the 

 bed and filling it with leaves about three inches high. 

 They, of course, pack down from time to time 

 but can be shaken up occasionally with a fork. 

 First apply a mulch of manure to the ground. 

 Plants that stand separately are best strawed in; 

 and climbing roses of the more tender varieties are 

 best taken down from their support (if this is pos- 

 sible) and buried about one foot deep. When climb- 

 ing Roses are on a trellis they can be protected by 

 covering with straw. McC. 



Redeeming a City Lot Back Yard 



THE house that I have occupied for some time 

 is one of a row, and the back yards of my 

 neighbors are the ordinary sad looking, neglected 

 affairs — scrubby grass in the centre, with vacant 

 borders running down each side close to the fence. 



I have always loved flowers, and without any great 

 trouble have converted my backyard into a real 

 garden, for I was bound that I was going to have 

 something beautiful with which to gratify my eyes 

 when I looked out of my back windows. 



In the centre of the lawn I have a round flower 

 bed, in which is a Yucca filamentosa, or Adam's 

 needle, Zinnias. Marigolds, Cockscomb, Candytuft, 

 Carnations and Balsam. The path surrounding 

 this bed is made of defective electric blocks, or cut 

 outs, which could not be used by a factory in the 

 neighborhood and which I had for the transporting. 

 A marble company also in the locality were making 

 marble columns for a public building, and the pieces 

 of marble that were cast away as worthless make 

 the mound-like edging to my walk. Certainly 

 "necessity is the mother of invention! " 



At the back of my yard, a Clematis and Wisteria 

 divide the honors, and in front of them are lupines, 

 Salvia and Phlox, also a few Spirea and Buddleia, 

 Liatris, candytuft, etc. Along the border I have 

 over 300 gladiolus, and there are also about twenty- 

 five really fine rose bushes, a Dutchman's Pipe vine, 

 Funkias, Canterbury bells, single and double Rose 

 Geraniums, Foxgloves, and many other little plants 

 in which I take more than a fatherly interest. 



"The garden is a lovesome thing'' — certainly my 

 garden, surrounded as it is by ugly backyards in 

 which neither grass, trees nor flowers flourish, proves 

 this statement. I had no fixed rule for planting; 

 as I bought the seeds and plants I simply put them 

 where I thought they would look best. And the 

 result is one of which I am vastly proud ! 



Long Island City. L. I. Phild? C. Bresioff. 



Two views of the same garden. The circular bed in the middle of the lawn gives opportunity for considerable floral display; and the proper background of green is afforded by Rose 

 bushes and vines on the back fence. Compare this backyard with the one right next door shown in the left-hand view 



