TREATMENT OF PLANTS FOR WINTER AND SPRING FORCING. 239 
TREATMENT OF PLANTS INTENDED FOR WINTER AND SPRING 
FORCING FOR THEIR FLOWERS. 
By G. T. 
When the summer and autumnal beauty of the flower-garden is departed, the gardener 
commences an anxious supervision of the reserve-garden ; or, to employ a commercial 
phrase, "he begins to take stock" of what he has in store likely to be serviceable in 
producing an in-door floral display, throughout the approaching winter ; and he may 
consider himself an enviable man, if he is quite satisfied with the result of his inspection. 
Too often the very reverse of this is the fact ; nor is there anything very surprising 
in the circumstance, if amid the unceasing activity of business, and the various demands 
continually made on his attention in summer, the stock of forcing-plants should have 
become somewhat overlooked until late in the season. 
It is a truthful proverb which declares that " to reap in summer we must sow in 
winter ;" and this is equally applicable to plants intended for forcing as well as other 
things, for unless an efficient stock of robust, well-cultivated plants be provided early in 
the summer season, it is in vain we look for flowers — leaves and shoots will rather be the 
produce, when artificially excited in the winter season. 
The purport of the following observations, therefore, is to invite more timely attention 
to the matter, as I have known the following treatment advantageously and with the best 
success attend the preparation of plants intended for forcing for their flowers, or fragrance. 
As a general rule, to which, however, there are exceptions, plants intended for forcing 
may be separated into two classes — those requiring to be established in pots at least a 
year, as roses, Persian Lilacs, and other hardy shrubs. Rhododendrons, Pseonies, or what 
not ; and those that have been pot-grown five or six months previous to forcing, as 
Pelargoniums, Salvias, Heliotropiums, and other half-hardy plants. 
Amongst the exceptions to these, may be enumerated the Lily of the Valley, and a 
variety of hardy, fibrous-rooted, herbaceous plants, as Phloxes, &c., which, if taken up with 
good balls containing their roots undisturbed, will succeed, if forced immediately ; 
although a better and more certain production of bloom might reasonably be relied on, if 
established in pots two or three months previously to the operation of forcing. 
On the practical appreciation and observance of two or three essential principles, all 
the ultimate success in the artificial excitation of plants depends ; for, unless they are 
early induced to establish themselves, complete a vigorous and healthy growth, and are, there- 
fore, early thrown into a state of comparative rest; and, moreover, unless when introduced 
into the forcing-house the excitement is conducted slowly and gradually at first, a due 
balance being carefully maintained between the artificial application of heat, and the 
natural amount of light obtainable in our dreary winters, the certain result will be a very 
imperfect premature development of inflorescence; for notwithstanding the ease with 
which plants may now-a-days be supplied with heat artificially, it is apparently impossible 
for science to produce a substitute for light ; and solar light is equally as essential to 
mature and healthy growth, as heat is advantageous in inducing any elongation or 
development of the plant itself. 
With reference to the first-mentioned class of plants intended for forcing — hardy 
deciduous shrubs and evergreens, as Persian Lilacs, and Roses, Rhododendrons, Kalmias, &c., 
some attention should be paid in selecting them to procure such as are dwarf, robust, short- 
jointed, and yet the most vigorous young plants, that can be obtained from the nurserieSi 
The most sunny and exposed part of the reserve-garden should be selected for them ; 
and the soil, if not naturally the best, should be improved by incorporating with it a good 
body of turfy mellow loam and peat, and if the latter is not naturally sandy, a considerable 
portion of rough sand must be artificially added, so as when roughly dug over to afibrd 
an extensive rooting medium, and in a deep rich soil nothing will induce the production 
of abundance of fine fibrous rootlets, sooner than the plentiful presence of sand. 
The middle of October is a good time for transplantation to the reserve department, 
