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THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE OF AMERICA 
STRAWBERRY PLANTS IN POTS FOR 
CHRISTMAS 
npHE plants should be very carefully selected. Choose 
only the very strongest ones, and be certain that 
you do not get old plants, but only the new ones with 
good strong white, or very light roots. Strong plants 
that have been grown in small thumb pots, sunk in the 
ground so they become established while on the plant, 
are the best. They should be especially encouraged to a 
thrifty, strong growth for only a short time longer, then 
they should be carefully brought to the dormant state, 
both by withholding water and given frost action, and I 
have found they do better if well rested and have a good 
hard freeze. Leave the soil on them in which they grew 
in the pots, and carefully pot them in an extra good 
strong friable soil that should be well firmed. Be careful 
not to injure the roots. 
At first, they should be plunged in a frame outside that 
will protect them, and they should be brought into an 
active growth very slowly. A very slight bottom heat 
to encourage root action without top growth is best. The 
better root system they get, the better they do when 
brought in to the forcing house. A location close to the 
glass with plenty of good ventilation is proper, and this 
is especially true as we near the ripe fruit stage. As a 
rule we find plenty of dark murky days about the time 
we should have them in bloom (about November 5-10 
for most sorts), and there may be trouble to get them 
properly fertilized or pollenized, and to make a sure thing 
of it one can take a small feather or camel hair brush 
and touch them up by hand. 
Of course, we all know of the two kinds, perfect and 
imperfect blooms, and if we use the heavier fruiting va- 
rieties that are generally imperfect in flower, we must 
have the perfect flowered plants also in order to get the 
pollen to put on the imperfect blooms, but we only need 
a few nlants. Just after the bloom petals are ofif, the 
plants may be encouraged by giving them some liquid 
manure water, but be sure not to overdo this. It is a 
sure thing that any plant will "burn" if too much liquid 
fertilizer is given, yet it is a fine thing to encourage a 
plant by giving it plenty of the food it likes and will 
assimilate — and they do have a wonderful appetite some- 
times — the fruiting plants especially. Do not spray or 
syringe any fruit plant when it is in bloom or at the 
time when nature needs the ripe pollen to fertilize the 
coming fruit, else you will find that there will not be 
the fruit coming that you expect. 
I will suggest that you try the following sorts — they 
are all self-pollenizing or the perfect flowered: Mt. Vern- 
on, old but good : The Marshall, none better ; Gandy, old. 
Brandywine and Warfield are also both excellent if you 
have some Marshalls along with them. These sorts I 
have fruited in the above manner. They were good, but 
probably several of the later sorts will be as good or 
better. — 5". L. Harper, in The American Florist. 
IRIS ROSENBACHIANA 
TT is curious that a plant of the easiest culture — on my 
light, warm soil it grows as readily as Iris reticulata, 
and does not require frequent lifting — should be rather 
scarce and expensive after being in cultivation for at least 
thirty years, writes A. R. Goodwin in The Garden. It 
was discovered about 1885 on the mountains of East 
Bokhara, Turkestan. 
It is exceedingly variable in color, and in its wild state, 
we are told, two varieties are found growing together. 
the flowers of one form being blue, those of the other 
being a fine violet. It grows easy from seed, and seed- 
lings also vary much in color, being variegated in purple, 
yellow and white. Sir Michael Foster (see "Bulbous 
Irises") describes a rare form as nearly pure yellow with 
a few purple or violet markings ; another form is pure 
white, except for a large patch of deep violet on the blade 
of the fall and some few veins. 
A bed of these Irises with their endless combinations 
of blue, purple, red, yellow and white would be gorgeous 
in the extreme, especially if carpeted with a low-growing 
Thyme or similar rock plant to prevent the flowers from 
being splashed. 
At the time of flowering the three to five leaves are 
short, but develop quickly after the flowers are past, and 
are finally six inches to eight inches long by two inches 
in breadth and lanceolate in shape. For such a large 
flower the bulbs seem small ; they are ovoid in shape, 
three-quarters of an inch to an inch in diameter, with 
thick root fibres and brown tunics, never reticulated as in 
the Netted Iris (Iris recticulata). 
rT^fi 
li^«BL*jfe J «i\ 
Fron 
Garden. 
Sicmlcss Juno Iris Roscnbachiana. 
In 1916 this Iris was fully out in my garden on April 
10, but this year it was not in flower until well into May. 
The flowers are four inches or more across on long tubes, 
the falls oval, almost strap-shaped, and the standards are 
an inch long. It belongs to the third section of the Juno 
Irises, known as Stemless Junos, all the members of 
which, with perhaps two exceptions, have their leaves 
absent or very short at flowering time in spring. 
OUR COVER ILLUSTRATION 
'T^HE picture on the outside cover shows a splendid 
house of "Louisa Pockett" Chrysanthemum, grow- 
ing under conditions that to our expert American culti- 
vators would seem to be quite primitive. In a note ac- 
companying the picture, Mr. Pockett says that dozens of 
the blooms averaged 11 to 12 inches in diameter and the 
same in depth. It will be remembered that Australia be- 
ing the antipodes of the United States, their fall is our 
spring, so this picture was taken in April, 1917. 
Mr. Pockett further states that the flowers exhibited 
of this variety and Golden Champion created such a sen- 
sation that they were "screened" by the Amalgamated 
Picture Company, and shown in all the moving picture 
shows throughout Australia. 
We want everybody devoted to gardening to be 
acquainted with our Magazine, and will be glad to send 
a sample copy to any interested friends if you will 
furnish their address to The Gardeners' Chronicle, 286 
Fifth Ave., New York. 
