Page 26 



BETTER FRUIT 



May 



THE ROSE— ITS PLANTING AND THE CARE OF IT 



F. V. HOLMAN, IN SUNDAY OREGONIAN 



PLANTING should be done, if pos- 

 sible, with comparatively dry soil — a 

 very difficult thing to do sometimes. By 

 dry soil I do not mean dust, but I mean 

 soil which breaks all at one time in that 

 beautiful way that a gardener likes, when 

 the spade is put into it and it is turne 1 

 over. For myself, I get leaf mold from 

 Sauvie's Island, where I go duck shoot- 

 ing. This is as black as gun powder, 

 even when it is dry. A similar mold can 

 be found in the forests or woods around 

 Portland, but if you cannot get that the 

 best thing to do is to get well rotted 

 manure with two parts of rich loam to 

 make the soil in which to plant your 

 rose bushes. 



Anyone can make leaf mold by gather- 

 ing up the leaves from the streets and 

 sidewalks in the fall and putting them in 

 a sugar barrel or other cheap barrel, 

 pressing the leaves down as much as 

 possible, and leaving the barrel uncov- 

 ered so that the rain will wet the leaves 

 and cause them to rot. Be sure to keep 

 the leaves wet throughout the winter. 

 By the next spring each barrel will be 

 about half full of black pulverized leaf 

 mold ready for use, and this is the best 

 material with which to plant roses that 

 you can get in any way. Hundreds of 

 tons of leaves are carried away by the 

 street cleaning department each year 

 which should be saved and used. 



I use my hand in planting roses, for 

 you know that after all the best tool is 

 your right hand — unless you are left- 

 handed. Make the hole at least two feet 

 deep. Fill the hole to near the top — 

 you should not plant your roses too 

 deep — then take the rich earth, not too 

 wet, and press it down with your hand 

 about the bush so that there will be 

 actual contact of the root with the soil. 



If you have quite a large hole and a 

 large bush you can step on the soil 

 gently and firm it down — gardeners 

 sometimes use the handle of a spade and 

 pound it down, but with small roses the 



hand is the best tool. If you plant when 

 the soil is very wet it will cake, and the 

 tender roots — the white roots — which 

 really give all the sap and substance to 

 the plant, will not penetrate this hard 

 soil. There is another thing to be taken 

 into consideration; the hardy varieties, 

 the hybrid perpetuals and hybrid teas, do 

 better where planted in the fall, and it is 

 better to get low-budded roses for that 

 purpose, which, however, are more or 

 less expensive. These should be planted 

 so that the point of .budding will be about 

 three inches below the surface. 



TREE ROSE CAROLINE TESTOUT 

 .\ugust blooming. Portland, Oregon, Heights 



DUCHESS OF PORTLAND 



This enables the bush to grow roots on 

 the budded variety, so that it has two 

 sets of roots — one set on the stock and 

 the other on the budded variety. Roses 

 thrive better and produce larger flowers 

 when budded on some strong growing 

 stock. I prefer Manetti, as it is hardy 

 in Oregon, and produces a large quantity 

 of sap, and usually does not send up 

 suckers. Some florists prefer the Euro- 

 pean dog brier, but it is liable to grow 

 suckers, and these must be carefully 

 removed or they will ruin the budded 

 variety. 



While you may plant any well matured 

 plants of the hardier varieties in the fall, 

 do not plant teas at that time, for they 

 are very tender and delicate, and we 

 often have a cold snap in December or 

 January which will kill them if they are 

 not well rooted, and you will simply lose 

 your roses. 



A great many of the roses you buy 

 from florists here or in the East are very 

 small plants, with little or no earth about 

 the roots. These should be carefully 



MRS. EDWARD MAWLEY 



pruned when planted, and if the roots 

 are more than four or five inches long 

 cut those off also to that length, because 

 the nearer the sap roots are to the plant 

 the better the plant thrives. Also cut off 

 all rosebuds on such plants. I know 

 when you get a new variety you are very 

 anxious to see what it is going to do, 

 but blooming is a tax on the vitality of 

 the plant. When it is young and tender, 

 just out of the hothouse, it needs all the 

 vitality that it has in order to grow 

 strong and vigorous. While early, bloom- 

 ing will not kill your plants it enfeebles 

 them, and they are liable never to be 

 hardy and strong, just as feeble children 

 are liable to grow into weak men or 

 women. 



^ ^ <S> 



ONE of the handsomest trade papers that comes 

 to The News is "Better Fruit," published at 

 Hood River, Oregon. It is a model of typographi- 

 cal beauty and contains articles of interest to fruit 

 growers all over the country. — Chicago Packer 

 News. 



INCREASING THE VALUE OF THE HOME 

 BY HAVING A BEAUTIFUL ROSE GARDEN 

 SURROUNDING IT, PORTLAND, OREGON 



