The Garden Magazine 



Vol. XV— No. 3 



PUBLISH! D MON 1 HLY 



APRIL, 1912 



One Dollar Fifty Cents a Year 



Fifteen Cents a Copy 



Double Numbers Twenty Five Cents 



[For the purpose of reckoning dates, New York is 

 generally taken as a standard. Allow six days' difference 

 for every hundred miles of latitude.] 



Starting the Planting Season 

 Right 



THE COURSE OF EVENTS 



NOW — before you do any real garden- 

 ing for 191 2, start a diary. Next 

 comes planting, all important in April. 



In the vegetable garden 



1. Spread manure thickly. 



2. Plow or trench the ground deeply 

 and thoroughly. 



3. Harrow or rake it, leaving it as level 

 as possible. In planting, prepare only as 

 much ground as you want at any one 

 particular time. 



4. As soon as the soil stops freezing, but 

 before corn planting time, sow: Peas, bush 

 beans, lettuce, spinach cabbage, kale, 

 cauliflower, radish, turnip, beets, salsify, 

 carrots, parsnips, onions, potatoes. 



5. Get whatever cultivators, sprayers, 

 fertilizers, spray mixtures, etc. you may 

 need before you really have to use them. 



6. Collect pea brush and bean poles. 

 Plant the latter firmly before you sow the 

 beans. 



7. Transplant cabbage, lettuce, and 

 other hardy vegetables from the hotbed, 

 but cover them with newspapers every 

 night for a while. To outwit cutworms, 

 sprinkle some poisoned bran among the 

 newly set seedlings. For details see the 

 January, 191 2, Garden Magazine. 



8. About corn planting time you can 

 sow lima beans, melons, cucumbers, squash, 

 and pumpkin. An individual frame over 

 each hill will help these along wonderfully. 



9. About two weeks later sow tomatoes, 

 peppers, okra. and eggplant outdoors. 

 Watch out for these; they are the tender- 

 est of all. 



10. Dress old asparagus and rhubarb 

 beds with nitrate of soda. 



11. Don't forget to label every row you 

 plant unless you are following absolutely 

 a plan that is all down on paper. 



Around the grounds 



1. Rejuvenate the bad spots in the lawn. 

 Scratch them with a rake, sprinkle over 

 them some new soil and some seed; then 

 roll and water. 



2. Sprinkle some fertilizer over the rest 

 of the lawn and dig out dandelions as soon 

 as they appear. 



3. Plant deciduous trees, shrubs, peren- 

 nial vines and roses ; also evergeeens, taking 

 care that their roots do not dry out at all. 



4. Do any odd jobs of draining and level- 

 ing, so that you can get vegetation started 

 in such places before warm weather. 



5. Prune summer and fall-flowering 

 shrubs but not syringa, lilac and rambler 

 roses. Bush roses can be pruned now. 



6. Trim borders. Repair paths and 

 drives; by May they will have dried out 

 and settled so as to make repairs very 

 difficult. 



7. Start improvements that will make 

 your place handsomer and more homelike 

 than it was last year. 



8. Plan to let the children have gardens 

 of their own, as well as tennis courts and 

 croquet grounds. 



9. Dig around hedges, shrubs and trees. 



Among the flowers 



1. Put the potted house plants outdoors 

 for a few hours each day. When they are 

 well hardened, plunge them 

 in an out-of-the-way border 

 for the summer. 



2. Root slips of geranium, 

 etc. in pots or boxes. 



3. Plant pansies, sweet 

 peas, gladioli, and all the 

 hardy annuals by April 15. 

 Save the tender sorts like 

 dolichos, nasurtium, salvia, 

 canna, etc., until all danger 

 from frost is over. 



4. Divide clumps of peren- 

 nials. Fill in any empty 

 spaces in the borders. 



5. Put up trellises for 

 vines, brush or wire for 

 sweet peas, and wooden or 

 wire stakes for dahlias, gladi- 

 oli, etc. 



In the fruit garden 



1 . Rake the mulch off the 

 strawberry rows. 



2. Cut back to a few strong 



157 



canes, the raspberries, blackberries and cur- 

 rants. As soon as the leaves unfold, sprinkle 

 them with Paris green or pyrethrum. 



3. Finish up the pruning of all fruit 

 trees completely, before growth starts. 

 But don't overdo it on old neglected trees 

 the first year. Clean out, wash with some 

 germicide, and fill with concrete, all 

 cavities in main branches and trunks. 



4. Spray with lime-sulphur or kerosene 

 emulsion if the buds have not opened; if 

 they have, use bordeaux mixture with 

 arsenate of lead. 



5. Plow under the cover crop. Burn 

 all pruning rubbish and keep the ground 

 under the trees cleaned up. 



TO CORRECT A WRONG IMPRESSION 



There is a more or less widespread 

 idea that the directions and suggestions 

 published in The Garden Magazine are 

 purely local and have no general applica- 

 tion. The accompanying map from the 

 U. S. Crop Reporter helps to prove the 

 fallacy of this notion. As the average dates 

 for corn planting show, there is far more 

 difference in garden operations as one 

 goes from North to South or, vice versa, 

 than there is between points three or four 

 times as far apart from East to West. 

 The average planting seasons are more 

 synchronous, for instance, in Boston and 

 Pierre, S. D., than in New York and Fair- 

 fax, Va. The note at the head of this 

 page provides for an adaptation of dates 

 according to latitude, and for longitudinal 

 differences you need only refer to the map 

 below, to ascertain the allowance required. 



Showing corn planting time In the Eastern United States 



