February, 1911 



THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 



27 



Rescuing Worn-out Bulbs 



AN excellent February idea for amateur gardeners 

 . is that each one should establish an in- 

 dividual " Band of Hope for the Rescue of Orphaned 

 Pot-Hyacinths." The formula says: "There is 

 much good in everyone, and a rather papery and 

 battered hyacinth bulb is not necessarily beyond 

 restoration to a life of usefulness." This is a fact. 

 I have been sole proprietor of such a mission for 

 nine years, and the rescued now amount to two 

 good pecks; or to fifty square feet of crowded 

 flowery beds, if you are not used to measuring 

 hyacinths by the peck like rutabagas. 



The whole trick lies in keeping the potted bulb 

 in a light, cool place, not only till the spent flower- 

 stems wither, but so long as it has leaves. Given 

 light and a little water, the leaves will rebuild the 

 bulb. For convenience, I keep my spent plants 

 in bedroom windows until the first of April, and 

 then, removing pots without breaking the root- 

 ball, earth them in some flower bed in which the 

 soil has thawed enough to be manageable. By the 

 middle of June large, rather light-weight bulbs 

 will be found, with no roots nor leaves. These, 

 with the few offsets they may have made, should 

 be taken up, cleaned of soil, and well dried all 

 summer. Plant in October or November in light 

 soil, preferably in beds left empty by the freezing 

 off of annuals. The forced bulbs are not usually 

 worth potting a second year; but planted out 

 closely in beds they make a cheerful show — Dutch 

 Romanized, so to speak — slender, extra early, 

 and often smaller in bells than the year before. 



All Of the bedded bulbs and bulblets should be 

 lifted and cured as before when their leaves have 

 died. By the second year some of the original 

 roots have made three or four small flowering bulbs, 

 while some have attended just to rebuilding their 

 own stout persons. These last may be graduated 

 from the sanatorium and go back into pots for 

 the winter, or they will produce splendid flowers 

 in the outdoor bed. A small offset will, in five or 

 six years produce a true "exhibition spike" and 

 in a year or two after that will split itself into small 

 trash again, to begin life over. Thus, in my two 

 pecks of bulbs saved from eight seasons, I find 

 sometimes one grand flower-spike of a double 

 blackish tint; sometimes two poor stems; sometimes 

 two good stems and one poor one; and at last 

 a half-dozen little double blacks, fairy size. Al- 



lowing for mortality, I may next have five medium 

 spikes of the black, and next year after that, 

 three fine ones and one fair. With all costlier 

 sorts the increase is slow — Morena, Gigantea, 

 and La Peyrouse on the contrary, are as the English 

 sparrow's posterity; they ripen early, therefore 

 ripen perfectly, and get the very most out of their 

 roots and leaves before being lifted in June. 

 Pennsylvania. E. S. J. 



The Rejuvenation of Azaleas and 

 Poinsettias 



ON THE 22nd of February, 1909, I received as 

 a gift, an azalea which was covered with 

 exquisite pink and white blossoms. It remained 

 in bloom for nearly a month. When the last 

 blossom faded, I removed the plant from the parlor 

 with the intention of throwing it away, as I sup- 

 posed, being a hothouse plant forced into bloom, 



After your Christmas azalea has finished blooming, 

 keep the soil moist and it will bloom next year 



it had exhausted its vitality. I was told, how- 

 ever, that if it was never allowed to become dry, 

 it would bloom another year. 



The experiment was surely worth trying. Dur- 

 ing the spring and summer I watered it occasionally, 

 and in the autumn repotted it, using very rich 

 earth. A florist told me afterwards that it 



would have been better to have repotted it in 

 the spring. 



Late in November, buds appeared. Every 

 few days, I would plunge the pot in a deep pail of 

 water, allowing the water to reach as far as possible 

 into the branches. I also sprinkled the leaves. 

 This was continued until the color began to show 

 in the buds. Once a week I used a little ammonia 

 when I watered the plant. 



A year afterwards, on the 22nd of February, 

 1910, there were over seventy blossoms on the plant 

 and a few days later there were more than a hundred. 

 The plant was much larger and more beautiful 

 than when I received it. 



I had a similar experience with a poinsettia 

 which was given me one Christmas. I cast that 

 aside also, but my housekeeper rescued it, put 

 it in a sunny pantry window and tended it until 

 it began to put forth new leaves. In the fall it 

 was repotted and at Christmas time — it was 

 again in bloom; but it presented a grotesque 

 appearance, as the blossom was at the end of a 

 leafless stalk nearly two feet high. I subsequently 

 learned that the leaves had dropped because I had 

 allowed it to become too dry. The poinsettia 

 needs to be kept moist (not wet). It should also 

 be cut down when it is through blooming; then it 

 will branch out and be attractive in shape. 



Massachusetts. Etta Rich Soule. 



Raising Snapdragons from Seed 



I DO not believe any plant can give more satis- 

 factory results in a garden than the snap- 

 dragon; it is so easily grown and seems to be 

 practically free from insect pests. I have always 

 had them in my garden, but never in such quan- 

 tities as last summer. And it was the result of 

 two packages of seed sown indoors in small seed 

 pans about the last of February. 



One package was of pink snapdragons and the 

 other red. I gave the pans bottom heat to hasten 

 germination by placing them on boards over the 

 radiator in my room for a few hours each day, 

 until the plants showed above the surface of the 

 soil. A piece of cheesecloth, laid over the top 

 of the pans and kept moist, prevented the surface 

 from parching and injuring the tiny shoots. 



When the plants were from one to one and a half 

 inches in height they were transplanted and placed 

 in a window with a southern exposure, which gave 

 the needed light and sun. Three transplantings 

 developed good strong plants by the middle of 

 May, when they were set out in the open ground. 



The two packets of seeds produced from one 

 hundred and fifty to two hundred fine plants — 

 enough for myself and all my neighbors. The 

 plants bloomed from July until hard frost in No- 

 vember. Cutting simply seemed to increase 

 the blooming capacity of the plants. The main 

 stalk, of course, always gives the largest and finest 

 bloom, but when it is cut off a number of side 

 shoots send up blooms which are smaller but quite 

 as beautiful. 



If you have never grown snapdragons in your 

 garden, try this little experiment just for fun. 



Pennsylvania. H. G. 



Snapdragons are easy to raise in the house. Sow seeds in pans, give bottom heat to hasten germination, covering with cheesecloth to prevent the soil from 



drying out. The third picture shows the seedlings four weeks after the seeds were sown 



