THE GARDEN M A G A Z I N E 
35 
February, 1915 
to plant the same as potatoes. I had been used 
to planting potatoes after the plow when a boy, so 
I put my dahlias about the same distance as I had 
put the potatoes, viz., one foot in rows. 
When they were nicely up another friend called 
in one day and informed me that I had them far too 
close and advised me to transplant at least two 
out of three and leave them 2j to 3 feet apart. I 
did so and got good flowers. 
The same season I bought a dozen gladiolus 
bulbs and, not wishing to get caught again with 
too close planting, I put them in a bed 6 x 9 ft. or 
3 feet apart each way. They bloomed nicely, too, 
but you can imagine the appearance of that bed ! 
My third experience, not to be repeated, was 
after I had built a 9 x 15 ft. greenhouse. My 
plants became covered with small green lice. I had 
seen sulphur burned in a room to disinfect it so I 
tried it in the greenhouse; but I gave too heavy a 
dose and left it about four hours with a strong sun 
shining, with the result 
that every plant lost all 
its leaves and the lice 
their lives. I have since 
learned how to use to- 
bacco stems and so save 
the plants when killing 
the lice. 
If I had had a guide 
like The Garden 
Magazine when I began 
gardening I would have 
saved myself many an 
error, as I have found 
since taking The Gar- 
den Magazine (and I 
have only missed the 
first three numbers) 
that it is a great help 
to the amateur gardener. 
F. R. Perkins. 
Toronto, Ont. 
A Hill of Roses 
O NE day last au- 
tumn at the Coun- 
try Club at Greenwich, 
Conn., while we were 
sitting around the table 
“playing the tenth 
hole,” I thoughtlessly 
made the statement 
that one of the rose 
bushes on my California 
place was twenty-five 
feet high and all of forty 
feet across. 
A silence fell; the gentlemen looked knowingly 
at one another, and as we went out on to the links 
again, I observed that my associates treated me with 
a sort of tender consideration and patience us- 
ually accorded to the derelict. 
It was easy enough to see that they did not care 
to charge me with being a liar, and the only alter- 
native was that paresis had set in. There seemed 
to be nothing that could be said or done, so I con- 
cluded to wait until I could come back from my 
winter home in Santa Barbara and bring with me 
the evidence of the camera. 
The photograph shows a comer of a little, un- 
used cottage on my moderate sized estate. The 
roof is covered fully six feet thick with closely inter- 
woven rose branches. The old Spanish name of the 
estate is pronounced, in English, La Lomenta de 
Roses meaning the little hill of roses. The name 
was not suggested because of this particular rose 
covered cottage, but because the land is on a very 
slight elevation and the soil seems to be especially 
adapted to roses, there being, I am told, one hundred 
and ten or eleven different varieties. However, the 
name seems to fit very well to this particular cottage 
and its decorations. 
The entire growth comes from two rose bushes, 
the Cherokee, and Beauty of Glazenwood. It 
would be impossible to give the number of roses in 
bloom at one time, but it would be safe to say over 
a thousand, and within the reach of possibilities to 
say three or four thousand. They bloom all winter 
and take a moderate resting spell during August. 
Michigan. C. W. Post. 
How to Make a Radish Bed 
A SOIL that will raise quick-growth radishes 
through the summer and early fall can be 
made by carefully following the directions here given : 
Select a semi-shaded spot. Just within the ver- 
tical shade limits of young fruit trees is a good place; 
my own most successful bed was made under the 
raspberry canes. Over each square yard of the 
ground selected spread two coal bucketfuls of loose 
sand. Over this sprinkle two fire shovelfuls of 
fresh air-slaked lime, being careful to pick out 
all lumps larger than a marble. 
With a long bladed garden mattock mix the sand 
and lime with three or four inches of the top soil 
and spread again evenly. At evening soak the 
mixture well with water and allow the bed to lay 
forty-eight hours before planting the seed. By 
that time every particle of lime will have slaked 
thoroughly. 
Such a bed will not be troubled by slugs, worms 
and other soil vermin and will raise quick-growth, 
crisp, solid radishes. 
Pennsylvania. Edgar H. Trick. 
Using Ferns as a Vegetable 
L AST spring a friend of ours brought us some 
common wild brake, or ferns, instructing 
us to cook them as we would asparagus or greens. 
As we had never before heard of using them for 
food we were very skeptical but, on trial, found 
them delicious. They taste very much like aspar- 
agus, the brake is gathered just as the shoots first 
show themselves above ground before the first 
frondlet or leaf has unfolded — later than that they 
are too tough for use. I think, perhaps, this idea 
may be as new to others as it was to us. 
Traverse City, Mich. Mary Rutner. 
Apples for Pennsylvania 
O N PAGE 204 of the January, 1915, Garden 
Magazine, under the title of “What Apples 
Shall I Grow,” the Baldwin, Northern Spy, Stay- 
man, Winesap, Ben Davis and Rhode Island Green- 
ing are recommended for Pennsylvania. With the 
exception of Stayman, these varieties will, no doubt, 
succeed in the northern half of the state. But it 
would not be advisable to plant them in the southern 
part. The Baldwin, when grown in southern 
Pennsylvania, unless sprayed very frequently, is a 
fall apple, frequently not keeping much after Christ- 
mas. When sprayed three or four times the fol- 
iage is healthier, the apples hang on until mature 
and keep much better. But even then it is 
seriously affected by the Baldwin spot, over which 
we have no control, unless perhaps the sugges- 
tions of Professor Stewart of State College may 
be of some avail. They are to not grow fruit of 
extra size and to pick early. Nearly every North- 
ern Spy tree that I have seen in southern Penn- 
sylvania produces apples lasting about as well as 
the Baldwin. 
An instance of how they keep may be best told as 
follows: A friend gave me a bushel in October, 
which I shipped home. They were two weeks on 
the road, and although none but perfect apples 
started, fully a third of them were specked or wholly 
rotted when they arrived home, and before Christ- 
mas they were all gone from rot. 
I have seen very few Rhode Island Greenings in 
the southern part of the state, and those who are 
growing them are not 
wildly enthusiastic over 
the results. 
I would not recom- 
mend anybody to plant 
the Ben Davis. If I 
bought a farm on which 
the Ben Davis was 
growing I would neither 
cut them down nor top 
work them. If a nur- 
sery furnished me trees 
which later proved to be 
untrue to name and 
turned out to be Ben 
Davis, I would not cut 
them down when they 
come into bearing, 
neither would I top 
work them, simply be- 
cause I would lose too 
much time by it. Prob- 
ably the Ben Davis will 
prove profitable to those 
who are now growing it 
as long as they are in- 
terested in the trees, 
but I think it a mis- 
take for anybody to 
plant them when there 
are other varieties of 
much better quality 
both from a market and 
culinary standpoint. 
For the southern part 
of the state I would 
limit my planting in a 
commercial orchard to 
three, or four possibly, winter varieties as fol- 
lows: 
Grimes Golden is an excellent early winter apple, 
the only drawback being that it is short-lived on 
account of the collar blight, which can be overcome 
to some extent by topworking it on some more re- 
sistant variety, such as Arkansas. Washington, D. 
C., is the best market in the United States for this 
variety. 
Stayman has all the good qualities of the Baldwin, 
is better adapted to the southern part of this state, 
and is not troubled with the spotting as is the Bald- 
win. 
Rome Beauty is a highly colored attractive apple 
of medium quality that is an annual cropper; and 
it is easy to grow perfect fruit at a minimum of 
labor. 
For the fourth I believe that Stark is the best 
choice. It is a very late keeping variety. It does 
not mature until the late winter. It is fair to me- 
dium in quality, crisp and juicy. One drawback is 
that it does not always color up well, being a dark 
green with a blush cheek, although I have seen it 
in this vicinity well colored. It can be kept when 
grown for home use until the Yellow Transparent is 
ready. The New York Agricultural Experiment 
Station, in their storage tests, find that it keeps until 
June in cellar storage. And I know one grower of 
it in southern Pennsylvania who keeps it until 
May. 
All of these varieties are good either for commer- 
cial or for home purposes. 
Southern Pennsylvania. Harold Clarke. 
Something like a rose bower! A little cottage in Santa Barbara, Calif., covered with a 6-foot mat of rose branches 
