September, 1910 



THE G A R D E N MAGAZINE 



71 



k 



My exhibition flowers must be protected 

 from high winds, and although some of these 

 places are not sightly, they are ideal for this 

 purpose. These same exhibition blooms 

 need as much babying and care, from the 

 bud to the perfectly full blown flower, as the 

 rare orchids of the florist. Flowers and plants, 

 too, grown in the open are more dwarf. Then 

 for advertisement, of course there must be 

 the showy rows, grown where there is the 

 most travel. Many small things, too, help 

 to attract trade — a piazza covered with vines, 

 long rows of many colored asters partly 

 hidden by the foliage of perennial borders. 



I have only sold cut flowers for two years, 

 as the root seemed to be the objective, and 

 the flowers were for my friends and the hos- 

 pitals; but I noticed that there were many to 

 whom I gave flowers 

 who had a very de- 

 cided preference as 

 to color and arrange- 

 ment, and when the 

 flowers were a gift 

 felt diffident about 

 expressing that 

 choice, whereas if 

 they were buying the 

 flowers their taste 

 was often very un- 

 like mine. Of course 

 there are always 

 those who "want 

 what they want," 

 and I cannot, in the 

 least, influence some 

 of my customers in 

 their choice of varie- 

 ties when buying 

 bulbs. 



When a customer 

 asks what are the 

 best kinds to pur- 

 chase, I always an- 

 swer the question by 

 asking another, 

 "What do you want 

 them for?" 



The one thing 

 more than another 

 that gives satisfac- 

 tion to a customer is 

 to have the flower to 



be true to name and a prolific bloomer. 

 Some kinds grow only a few very perfect 

 flowers, late in the season, others are covered 

 with medium sized flowers from early till late. 

 One example of the first is the cactus dahlia 

 Kximhilde. One customer said to me, "I 

 don't care if it had but three flowers in a 

 season, I would plant^ it for those three 

 alone. " So among most buyers there is more 

 satisfaction if they know the habits of the 

 particular Idnd they are buying. To a be- 

 ginner there will be disappointments enough 

 without adding a mistaken choice to the list. 



It is hard on me too, to sell carefully 

 sprouted and labeled roots to a customer 

 who with a trowel will dig a hole in the 

 sod for the tuber, then forget all about it 

 and be ready for me with a complaint that 

 her flowers are "nowhere near like yours." 

 So, selling dahlia bulbs and putting in 



lots of advice, too, seems to work the best 

 with me. 



In the spring the time occupied in getting 

 the dahlia tubers ready for delivery, packed 

 in boxes and labeled, is from four to six 

 hours a day during the busiest part of the 

 season. Most of my local trade I deliver 

 myself, as we are on an electric car line, and 

 this is one of the pleasanter parts of the work. 



But the part of the work that pretty nearly 

 approaches the definition of laborious is the 

 planting, which I oversee myself. Placing 

 the tubers, marking and watching the 

 covering of them, I find pays, for when one 

 has handled and cut the root, there will 

 be no carelessness in breaking off the tender 

 sprouts. 



When the plants are a foot or so high, other 



Dahlias gro-wn for tubers. Shelter is not an important consideration 



taller stakes are provided, to which the 

 growing plants are carefully tied, for cultiva- 

 tion must be carried on as long as possible, 

 between the rows, so the plants must not 

 be allowed to fall either way. 



Some of my bitterest disappointments in 

 plant and blossom, come from the weather. 

 Hot and dry, cool and damp, either extreme 

 seems to displease the dahlia. But one 

 thing is as unchangeable as the hills and 

 rocks of old New England itseH; no dahha 

 attains even a slight degree of perfection 

 without cultivation, good fertilizers and 

 lots of sun. Failures innumerable, suc- 

 cesses a few, have fixed that fact very securely 

 in my mind, and for three years my little 

 income from the sale of bulbs, premiums 

 by no means a small part, and cut flowers 

 has never fallen below $175 per year, and 

 one banner year it reached $225. This, of 



cour.se, is the profit, all expen.se of_ Cultivation 

 and fertilizers being subtracted. .The flower- 

 ing season of the. dahlia is not reached till 

 the latter part of .August, .so out of my in- 

 come from the bulbs I have bought other 

 summer flowering bulbs — peonies, gladiolus, 

 and such lilies as I can grow on our heavy 

 soil. My aster beds have added quite materi- 

 ally to this scheme of making one part of the 

 garden furnish stock for the other. A two- 

 hundred-foot border of hardy perennials, too, 

 is one of the gratifications of my personal 

 taste made possible by the selling of dahlia 

 tubers. 



There seems to be little or no expense 



connected with just the growing of dahlias, 



if the stock is on hand. Tags, for labeling, 



cost $1 per thousand. We are near a 



paper-box factory, 



and often I get boxes 



not quite perfect 



which answer very 



nicely for packing 



'tubers. 



The expense of the 

 roots at first is seem- 

 ingly a large one. 

 Bulbs may be bought 

 at wholesale for from 

 five to fifteen cents 

 each, by the hun- 

 dred. These will be 

 the good average 

 dahlias that are in 

 common demand. 

 Rare varieties and 

 new importations 

 are high, some of 

 them ridiculously so, 

 and the price, at 

 which these kinds 

 are sold is regu- 

 lated by two fac- 

 tors, viz., the \drility 

 of the tuber and its 

 keeping quality. 



If a variety is in- 

 troduced one year, 

 uith a value of $2 

 per tuber, and drops 

 to So. 25 the next 

 year, it mil nearly 

 always be found that 

 it is either a poor keeper as a cut flower 

 or a poor root-producer. Yellow Colosse 

 is a very marked example of this, and I 

 could mention dozens of others. Of course, 

 I have squandered many good dollars on 

 seemingly wonderful dahlias, but all inves- 

 tors get left once in a while, and I am still 

 learning. I raise quite a few seedlings, but as 

 yet have found no profit in it, though lots 

 of enjoyment. Packages of seeds are easily 

 bought for $0.25. One of Mme. Victor 

 \'assier gave me twenty-four good plants 

 from twenty-five seeds this spring. Among 

 them there may be a prize-xnnner. Any- 

 way I enjoy the spirit of hoping for a won- 

 derful production, which is the sensation of 

 the stock exchange; without doubt flower 

 lovers do get up as wonderful enthusiasm 

 as this, and there are no homes ruined nor 

 great fortunes lost by its gratification. 



