S4 
AND 
April, 1889. 
ORCHARD 
GARDEN 
aaaMwvw'/ww wwwwna/' 
0RCHARD^°§ARDEN 
AN ILLUSTRATED MONTHLY JOUR 
NAL OF HORTICULTURE. 
Devoted exclusively to the interest of the American 
Orchard, Vineyard, Fruit, Vegetable and 
Flower Garden. 
Progressive ! Reliable ! Practical ! Scientific! 
Subscription Price, 50 Cents per Annum 
Five Yearly Subscriptions for $2.00. 
Entered at the Post Office at Little Silver as second class 
matter. 
Edited by H. G. Cornet. 
Our Staff. 
Andrew s. Fuller, Peter B. Mead, 
J. Lamson Scribner. L. 0. Howard, 
Samuel Miller, \v. f. Massey, 
Dr. T. H. Hoskins, Eli Minch, 
Abby Spearman. 
Advertising; Rates. 
Per Agate line, each insertion, 
April, May, June, July, I „ n 
August. September, October, November, ) — duc 
December 40c 
Reading notices ending with “ actv ” per line Nonpa- 
reil, double the above prices. Preferred position, ten 
per cent extra. 
LITTLE SILVER, N. J., APRIL, 1889. 
For spring use in the garden, nitrate of 
soda will be found especially valuable in 
hastening the earliest garden crops. It 
should be broken up quite finely and ap- 
plied broadcast over the soil. It dissolves 
readily and if a small handful be put into 
two or three gallons of water and applied 
around the plants the results will be sur- 
prising, in their quick and thrifty growth. 
It is however a very powerful stimulant 
and should be used with caution. It is bet- 
ter to apply it in a weak state and often 
than to administer it in one or two strong 
doses. For such plants as celery, tobacco, 
cabbage and others of that sort it is un- 
surpassed in its effects by any other fertil- 
izer. There are certain crops however 
upon which nitrate of soda is not by any 
means the best fertilizer to be employed. 
We have been speaking of it altogether as 
a quickener of plant growth, a stimulant to 
be applied early and in cases where the el- 
ements of stable manure, etc., remain yet 
locked up in the soil. A large number of 
plants require an application of potash in 
some shape during their early growth and 
it is therefore very desirable to have on 
hand, in the absence of wood ashes, a small 
supplv of muriate of potash, which may be 
applied as needed, on the surface of the 
soil and raked in. But it is nearly always 
possible to procure a few bushels of un- 
leached wood ashes for the home garden, 
and these with a small bag of nitrate of 
soda and the compost heap should give a 
soil that will bring anything. 
Mr.Kerrof Md. onanotlier pageof this issue 
sends us a timely communication respecting 
the hardiness of the Kelsey plum , a subject 
now under discussion in the columns of 
Orchard and Garden and of which we 
should be glad to hear more. Mr. Minch, one of 
our corresponding editors, has advanced the 
proposition that it is affected in this regard 
by the nature of the stock upon which it 
may be budded and this he says is the ex- 
perience of others besides himself. We 
have fruited it here in Monmouth County, 
upon the peach and it does not winterkill. 
The first year only, the wood of the young 
trees was killed back slightly at the ends. 
We have come to regard it as being about 
as hardy as the peach and the statement that 
it is “as tender as the fig”, is not borne out 
by the facts in the case as given by growers 
at the north. However, we need more 
light on this subject and it is one well worthy 
of all the time and pains that may be be- 
stowed upon it. 
We quote the following from a subscrib- 
er's letter: “I want to write you a word of 
commendation for discarding some of the 
swindling advertisements from Orchard 
and Garden. I have often wondered why 
a paper which had so many good writers, 
and was really of more value than 
or , should allow such things to get 
into it. I happened to know of a case in 
which the concern swindled an 
ignorant fellow by sending him a little 
compass time keeper by the sun, for a 
watch, and then sent him only one number 
of their paper, thus swindling their own 
advertisers as well as subscribers. I would 
have written you of it, only that I have 
seen so many good periodicals corrupted, 
and willing to cheat their readers for the 
advertiser’s money, that I pretty much 
gave you up for lost among the rest. 
The and similar papers for women 
I suspect to be about the same as the agri- 
cultural ones that give away so much, all 
designed to cheat ignorant farmers’ boys 
and girls. I have no doubt that many oth- 
ers are of the same stamp. But as you 
now seem to be aware of the danger I trust 
that hereafter Orchard and Garden will 
have nothing to be ashamed of in any of 
its columns, and I for one shall certainly be 
glad to see it prosper.” 
We need scarcely say to our corres- 
pondent that these are our sentiments 
exactly, but we think he fails to appre- 
ciate the difficulties which beset publish- 
ers of newspapers in their efforts to justly 
discriminate between the advertisements 
offered, or in other words where to draw 
the line. It is an easy matter to deter- 
mine when the objectionable features of 
the advertisement appear boldly upon its 
face, but in very many cases the adver- 
tisement is well written and appears a legit- 
imate one, and a mere suspicion of fraud 
does not seem to justify its refusal when it 
comes from a reliable advertising agency 
and thei e is no time to make a further in- 
vestigation. It is in this way that ob- 
jectionable advertisements creep into the 
columns of newspapers whose publishers 
are careful to exclude all that they have 
reason to believe to be fraudulent or other- 
wise undesirable. Orchard and Garden 
aims to present clean pages to its readers 
and will be glad if its subscribers will re- 
port any cases wherein they have been 
fraudulently dealt with by advertisers in 
its columns. 
It is worthy of notice that in our villages 
and small towns, the majority of cottage 
gardens are entirely devoid of such fruit or 
vegetables as will yield annually, after the 
first planting, with but little cost of time 
or labor. Few indeed are the gardens of 
the middle classes where may be found per- 
manent plantations, be they ever so small, of 
the succulent asparagus, the wholesome acid 
rhubarb or the luscious strawberry. And 
yet these may be had in all their freshness 
and flavor with but a very small expendi- 
ture of time and money. To go still further 
we may say that there is not a month in 
the whole year when the cottager may not 
enjoy in some shape or other the proceeds 
from his little garden at an original outlay 
of but a few dollars and with no more work 
than will be good for his health. If he 
fails to revel in fruit from strawberries in 
June until grapes cease in October he is not 
living up to his privileges. The possibilities 
of even a very small garden, in this direc- 
tion, are great. 
In an essay upon The Application of 
Science to Plant Culture, read before the 
Mass. Hort. Soc., Prof.W. O. Atwater gives 
us in plain and simple terms, some of the 
fundamental principles of plant nutrition as 
applied to the ingredients of the food of 
plants, their sources and their artificial 
supply. 
“1. Plants, like animals, require food 
for life and growth. A part of the food of 
plants comes from the atmosphere; the rest 
is furnished by the soil. No ordinary cul- 
tivated plant can thrive without a sufficient 
supply of each of a number of substances 
needed for its food. With an abundance of 
all these, in forms in which the plants can use 
them, and with other circumstances lavora- 
ble, the crop will flourish and the yield be 
large. But if the available supply of any one 
of them be too small, a light yield is inevit- 
able. If all the other conditions for a profit- 
able crop of corn, potatoes, or other plants 
are fulfilled in the soil, except that potash 
is deficient, the crop will surely fail. But 
if the potash be supplied the yield will be 
abundant. 
2. The most important soil ingredients 
of plant food — the ones which the atmos- 
phere cannot supply at all, or not in suffi- 
cient quantity, and which the soil or fertili- 
zers must supply, so that the plant can ab- 
sorb them through its roots — are potash, 
lime, magnesia, iron, phosphoric acid, sul- 
phuric acid, chlorine, and some compound 
of nitrogen. Plants also take silica, soda, 
and some other materials from the soil, but 
y- 
