February 3, 1912 



THE GARDENERS' MAGAZINE. 



93 



LARGE HYDRANGEAS IN 



THE GARDEN. 



SPRAYING FRUIT TREES 



WITH LIME. 



remembers the time when it was claimed 

 for tlie eaustie soda wasJi that it would 

 destroy the egg.s referred to. The same 

 tiding lias been claimed for different pro- 

 prietary washes, but many growers have 

 been disappointed, after making their trees 

 as clean as a new pin, to see them later 

 on ravaged with hungry caterpillars, and 

 infested with apple sucker. 



Possiblv it was the failure of lyinter 

 washes to destroy oggs ami prevent ; Itacks 

 of inse. pests that first led groovers to 

 turn their attention to lime, and the i;sc 

 of this material is, in a way^ a ease of 

 history repeating itself. By this I mean 

 that many a long year ago, when insect 

 ]>ests were classed comprehetisively under 

 tlie general heading of blight/' and their 

 ravages were accepted as s*)mething that 



An illustration of fine hydrangeas in the 

 portico at Buxted Park recently appeared 

 in our pages, and the specimens shown in- 

 dicated high-water mark in pot or tub 

 culture. Hydi*angea hortensis and H, 

 Otaksa grow and flower well enough in 

 many of the southern counties without any 

 protection, but one has to go westward to 

 see huge specimens in abundance. In 

 Cornwall and in Devon, especially at Tor- 

 quay, Ilfracombe, Clovelly, and other 

 favoured and well-known holiday resorts, 

 hydrangeas are splendid, and form a pro- 

 minent feature in very many gardens. The 



The time is again approaching when 

 gardeners and fruit growlers will be turning 

 their attention to the spraying of their 

 apple trees before growth commences, and, 

 possibly now some are asking themselves 

 the question, What shall I spray with?" 

 Though the spraying that is done, say, in 

 March, before growth commences, is gene- 

 rally termed winter spraying, the term 

 seems hardly a right one, as it would be 

 more correct to call it early spring s])ray- 

 ing, and the first point for considerati<»n 

 is, what are its objects? One is to clear 

 the stems and branches of moss, lichen 

 growths, and rough bark, all of which are 



FINE SPECIMEN HYDRANGEAS IN A FRONT GARDEN AT ILFRACOMBE. 



accompanying illustration shows a front 

 ^Jiia garden on one of the steep hilly roads 

 f,/"T^^^"^be. Here two big hydrangeas 



be 



natural harbours for insect pests, apart 

 from the fact that parasitic vegetable 

 growth must choke up the pores of the 

 bark. In other words, it is assumed that 

 cleanl'ness of the bark is essential to the 



plant ■ oe counted on tne cleanl ness ot the bark is essential to tne 



drantrpT *«ieground. Popular as hy- good health of a fruit tree as is a clean- 



dranrr^ ^"i^giuiina. i-opular as hy- 



H mart V'"' Pl-»t« '^nd 



in the 1 1 ^ ^^f""^^ flowering shrubs 

 ^oction f "^^""^ places no pro- 



'a?ef, " 'f T^^^' ^^-hil- others 

 '^ad to L P^'^'ti"'^ would 



'^'ntable she'r*^''' more severe, and 



P'ot.ot-on': "?i_-.-l-ble, moderate 



fj'om harm. 



keep 



Prar-tice is ad'nnfll / 1 ''''.'''^ S^rdeus the 

 tho plant h ^ '^^^'^*"e the old heads 

 Piants throughout the winter 



line&s of skin to a human being. 



This point about cleanliness reminds us 

 of the early days of spraying, when caustic 

 soda was first used for the purpose, and 

 since then dozens of winter washes of a 

 proprietary nature have been introduced. 

 In short, there is no difficulty in obtaining 

 a winter wash that will clean trees, and 

 leave quite a polish on the bark, and if 



that were all there would be no need to i i ^ i ^ 



resort to the uncomfortable work of hme vegetable gr.»wth. and if it docs not pre- 

 s,)raying at all. There are the eggs of tend to kill tlu^ eggs of msect pests, it will 

 insect pests, however, to be considered in 

 what is called winter spraying, and tMie 



was inevitable, it was customary to ]>iunt 

 the stems and lower )»ranclu's of sttrjiidard 

 trees as high as a niaji could rearli with 

 lime wash, but 1 question wIk'tIici- the 

 growers luid any ■clear idi-a ;is to what tl ey 

 were dniiig it tuf. In a Avord. it was a 

 custom, and as siu-h it reiiuniis. niul is 

 practised in nuniy phicfvs to tlic ]»r< scMt 

 day. The use ni ihv hnisli, huwevor. lias 

 hn'gi^lv given ])!a('(^ to \ho spiay<u\ and in- 

 stead of niiMM^ly painting tlio stems jnul 

 lower bianclu»s a thin film of tlu^ limewasli 

 is deposited all oa<u- tlie tree. The claims 

 f(»r lime spraying ar(^ that it will do c\ ci y- 

 thing that any otlier winter wash can elfiMM 

 in the matter of cleansing and destroying 



seal them to the twigs, so that they cannot 

 hatch out. This particularly applies to 



