February, 1920 
(Brower 
21 
new bulbs that will bloom into seed- 
lings next year. Always something 
new to look forward to. 
CHARCOAL AS FERTILIZER. 
I have noticed articles in The Flower 
Grower on the use of charcoal as a 
fertilizer. 
My experience with charcoal is that 
as a fertilizer, it is of no value. I have 
tried it in powdered form on Gladioli, 
and also garden truck, on light and 
heavy soils, have used it alone and also 
mixed with other fertilizer several sea- 
sons with no results. 
One curious thing about charcoal, it 
does not appear to decay ; have dug it 
up the following year as fresh as when 
it was put into the ground. I find it 
makes good drainage material to use 
when potting plants. Some florists 
use it in powdered form mixed with 
potting material, and claim it sweet- 
ens the soil. The charcoal we get here 
comes from Northern Ontario and Que- 
bec and is sold in bags of about two 
pecks for 25 cents, it is used chiefly for 
making a quick fire for cooking, etc. 
Charcoal must not be confused with 
wood ashes, as it (wood ashes) con- 
tains a good percentage of potash and 
makes a splendid fertilizer. 
Albert G. Perry. 
Note by the Editor— 
We have used charcoal the past season in connec- 
tion with the growing of Gladioli and although no ex- 
periments were made scientifically and no checked 
areas used, we were well enough pleased with the re- 
sults to continue the use of charcoal another year, it 
is decidedly our impression that charcoal is a purifier 
and that it has a strong tendency to prevent disease 
in growing crops. Charcoal, is largely pure carbon, 
which surely must be beneficial to crops, and it also 
contains all the elements of wood ashes and although 
it must necessarily decay slowly, yet the effect would 
be so much more lasting. 
LARGE AND SMALL CORMS. 
I read somewhere a while ago an 
advertisement, offering special large 
Gladiolus bulbs, calling them “Excelsio 
Bulbs” or something of that sort, and 
recommending them as specially desir- 
able for “increasing rapidly” expensive 
new sorts. 
Now those of us who are really 
growers, with several years’ experience 
in propagating the Gladiolus, know 
that the extra large corms are not 
nearly so good for rapid increase as 
medium sized bulbs, provided always 
that the latter are young, grown from 
the bulblet. 
It is true that these large bulbs will 
multiply directly, as I call it ; that is 
they will send up two or three stems 
and make as many new corms. But 
that is a slow way at best and it would 
take “an age” to get up much of a stock 
in that way. On the other hand, young 
bulbs will produce often only one new 
one but will have from ten to a hun- 
dred bulblets (cormels) which will 
make blooming bulbs and cormels be- 
sides, the second year and cormels 
both first and second years. Is there 
no good use, then, for large bulbs ? 
Surely. For the florist, who wants 
flowers only and for only once, the 
large bulb gives a somewhat larger 
stalk and somewhat earlier and that is 
pften an important thing for him. 
Geo. S. Woodruff. 
DANGER TO FLOWER STOCKS IN ZERO 
WEATHER. 
With so many zero days and nights I 
wonder how many growers will lose 
their crop of bulbs unless they are for- 
tunate enough to own frost-proof stor- 
age room. I note in past issues of The 
Flower Grower that the Editor ad- 
vises a thermometer in cellar, but the 
average thermometer is not very relia- 
ble and bulbs as well as many other 
things will freeze before the thermom- 
eter shows danger. 
For many years it has been our prac- 
tice to keep a small dish of wet dirt, 
just dry enough so that the top will be 
uneven, small projections sticking up 
to catch the first appearance of frost. 
Those little points will freeze long be- 
fore danger to bulbs. 
I have seen pails of water freeze 
nearly solid in the cellar and no dam- 
age done to bulbs, roots or plants. This 
suggestion may be a little late for this 
season, but pin it in your hat and have 
it for next winter. 
C. I. Hunt. 
Photographs of the vicinity where The Flower Grower is published may be of in- 
terest to readers. The above Winter ice harvesting scene is from a photograph made in 
1912. The pine grove in the middle background has grown enormously since that time. 
The Editor’s home is not more than fifteen rods from the ice pond. 
If your eyes are good you can see the building in which is located the offices of The 
Flower Grower, a little to the left of the center of the photograph. The two windows 
in the corner of the building are in the private office of the Editor. 
We hope to show Summer scenes at some future time. 
The Glad Philosopher’s 
Musings. 
iimmiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiimmimmiiiiiiimiiMimiitiHimiiiiiiiniiiiiiiiiiiiniiiiiiiMii.. 
Prompted by a sense of duty I once 
attended the funeral of a man whose 
life had not been all it should have 
been. For the occasion wealthy rela- 
tives had sent great quantities of flow- 
ers ; and huge bouquets, gorgeous set 
pieces and costly floral blankets were 
in such prodigal abundance as to be 
pronouncedly suggestive of vulgar os- 
tentation. 
A year or so later I attended the 
funeral of an aged lady, the mother of 
a good friend of mine who was a 
florist. Although he had greenhouses 
full of flowers of many kinds, only a 
single vase containing beautiful long- 
stemmed red roses stood upon a table 
close by the plain black casket. The 
effect was sublime in its simplicity, 
and although in marked contrast to 
prevailing conventional customs, ap- 
pealed as reflecting the good sense of 
the loving son who provided them as a 
tribute of his filial affection. 
Many years ago a schoolmate, a 
beautiful girl of sixteen summers, 
charmingly sweet, pure and lovely, 
beloved by all who knew her, con- 
tracted and soon succumbed to a fatal 
illness. It was well known in the com- 
munity that during all of her too brief 
life she had loved flowers passionately, 
and so flowers— principally white flow- 
ers — in lavish profusion were brought 
and sent in by friends until the spacious 
room in which she lay was completely 
filled with them. Emblematic of her 
sweet, noble character, and fittingly 
suggestive of the purity of the soul 
they honored, it would not have been 
overdone, nor would it have appeared 
to convey any suggestion of ostenta- 
tion had flowers paved the entire mile 
of roadway over which the cortege 
traveled that bore her body to its last 
earthly resting place. 
The Glad Philosopher. 
Besides Mrs. Hammond’s article on 
Ferns which appears on our front cover 
page this month, we have in hand 
some interesting material on the same 
subject which should have been in this 
issue, but from lack of space we are 
compelled to hold it over until March. 
