The Garden Magazine 



Vol. XI— No. 3 



Published Monthly 



APRIL, 1910 



) One Dollar Fifty Cents a Veas 

 ' Twenty-Five Cents a Copy 



MDTOTS 



•&*- ^•*i» - Si 



REMMOTR 



[For the purpose of reckoning dates, New York is 

 generally taken as a standard. Allow six days' difference 

 for every hundred miles of latitude.] 



Tabloid Hints 



EVERY gardener looks back over his 

 season's work, and sees where he 

 could have saved a good deal of effort and 

 have got better results by more careful 

 planning. If you have made a garden last 

 year think over all its details before beginning 

 this spring. Bear in mind the great import- 

 ance of planting for succession — that is 

 more important to most of us than planting 

 for great quantity. Everything seems to 

 demand attention all at once in the early 

 spring, but the rush can be relieved and the 

 problems all smoothed out by deliberate 

 forethought. Therefore: 

 Indoors before April ist. 

 i. Make a plan. 



2. Prepare a seed list. 



3. Order seeds, roots and tools. 



Then you will have time to consider the 

 matter of fertilizers. Make out an order for 

 whatever materials you decide on. Also 

 buy a spraying outfit. 



Make a hotbed. Look over the tools in 

 order to see that twine, labels, paint, stakes 

 and all the sundries are on hand. 



But remember: Get the seed order made 

 out first of all. 

 Outdoors before April ist. 



i. Clean up and remove all rubbish 

 that has accumulated during the winter. 



2. Prepare any broken fences, trellises, 

 supports. 



3. Attend to grading and draining. 



4. Fertilize, roll and repair the lawn. 



5. Prune and train fruit trees and berry 

 bushes. 



6. Fertilize asparagus and rhubarb beds. 



7. Mulch the strawberries. 



All these things done you will be ready to 

 attend to planting deciduous trees and 

 shrubs, roses, fruit trees, also shifting and 

 rearranging the shrubbery border. 



Get pea brush ready for immediate use. 

 Outdoors by the middle of the month. (As 

 soon as the ground can be worked and before 

 all danger of frost is past.) 



1. Plow, dig and trench the whole vege- 

 table garden. 



2. Sow seeds of hardy vegetables. 



3. Sow seeds of hardy flowers. 



4. Lift up and divide and replant per- 

 ennials. 



5. Prune established roses. 



6. Do not forget to spray (where neces- 

 sary) with miscible oils or whale oil soap, 

 especially shrubbery and fruits. 



7. Hardy vegetables started in frames 

 may be transplanted. 



In heat, April ist or before: 



1. Sow tender annuals in the hotbeds. 



2. Start canna roots. 



3. Gradually harden off plants that have 

 been wintered or started in the hotbeds. 



Effective Planning 



TF YOU would have the greatest results 

 *- from your garden, carefully plan how 

 you are going to use the ground for its 

 greatest efficiency. The easiest way will 

 be to make a plan on quadrille paper. 



The planting schedule described by Mr. 

 Baldwin will tell you how to keep your 

 ground busy without spending much fore- 

 thought — he has done all that for you. 

 Mr. Baldwin has based his schedule on 

 several years' experience in the Middle West. 

 Eastern readers will be perfectly safe, how- 

 ever, in following the dates just as though 

 the table had been written in the East. 

 There is no radical difference between the 

 conditions of the East and the West in such 

 things. Springtime is springtime all over 

 the Northern Hemisphere. 



These hints in designing will help: 



Make the rows the long way of the garden 

 — you do not have to turn around so often. 



Provide a windbreak if the place is ex- 

 posed. An effective windbreak means 

 earlier vegetables in spring and later crops 

 in the fall. 



Run the rows north and south if possible 

 and get even illumination. Never run rows 

 at right angles. 



Place the permanent crops — raspberries, 

 asparagus, rhubarb — in one group. 



Put the tall crops at the north end of the 

 garden — they will not shade the dwarf ones. 



Allot space, first of all, for the veg- 

 etables you most need, then fill in with the 

 extras. 



Plant beets, carrots, parsnip, turnips, and 

 all the root crops in one plot, which can be 

 alternated with other crops next year. 



Remember tomatoes do not thrive con- 



tinuously on the same ground. Plant in 

 fresh soil if possible. 



Put the vines in one patch, so that disease 

 and the squash bug can be fought more 

 effectively. 



Put all the tropical plants — tomatoes, 

 egg plant, peppers — in the full sunshine. 



Put the cabbage family, in one group, so 

 that if club root appears the lime treatment 

 can be given in one spot. 



Plant onions in the richest and most finely 

 pulverized soil. 



On newly turned sod put a hoed crop — 

 potatoes or corn. Never plant strawberries 

 on turned sod because of the white grub. 

 If it appears, poison with carbon bisulphide. 



Radishes and lettuces can be planted any- 

 where as fillers, or even as markers among 

 the long-germinating seeds. 



If you use a wheel-hoe, adopt a unit width 

 and make everything multiples of that to 

 save readjustment of the tools. This will 

 also allow you to put fillers between the 

 wider spaced rows and still maintain the 

 unit system. For example: 



One foot: Radish, lettuce, onions, root 

 crops. 



One and a half feet: Kohlrabi, spinach. 



Three feet: Celery, peppers, tomatoes. 



Four feet: Potatoes. 



Six feet: Vines. 



A few timely suggestions for the fruit 

 garden will be found on page 172. 



Planting for Color 



TN SEVERAL articles of this month's 

 ■*■ number of The Garden Magazine, 

 you will find some real facts about planting 

 for color — combinations that have been 

 perfectly successful. We shall have more 

 to say about this in succeeding numbers, 

 giving the experiences of amateurs in various 

 parts of the country, and written in response 

 to the invitation made in this column in the 

 February. Garden Magazine. 



The planting table for shrubs will help 

 you to find the shrub that will give certain 

 colors at certain seasons, and has been com- 

 piled by selecting the best available material 

 from all the shrubs offered in the nursery 

 trade. 



Readers of The Garden Magazine will, 

 of course, refrain from pruning flowering 

 shrubs until after they have flowered, with 

 the one exception of Hydrangea paniculata. 

 Remember that the spring-flowering shrubs 

 flower on the wood made last year. To 

 prune back now is to remove all the flower 

 buds. 



The same thing is true of the fruit trees. 

 Cut out superfluous branches and thin out 

 to let in light, if for nothing else. 



