July, 1920 Slower (Brower 
The Gladiolus 
Digging Gladiolus Bulbs. 
By Geo. S. Woodruff. 
I [Written expressly for The Flower Grower. ] 
I have been asked to tell how best to 
dig Gladiolus bulbs. Something de- 
pends on the size of the bulbs planted 
and something on whether they are 
high-priced varieties which must have 
all cormels (“bulblets”) carefully saved. 
Bulblet-grown stock should be dug, if 
possible, while the tops are still strong 
and green. Make a sieve of narrow 
boards and a bottom of “galvanized” 
wire cloth about § inch mesh. Loosen 
the soil with a garden fork by driving 
the fork, held perpendicular, a little 
lower than the bulbs and then throwing 
the hand down. Then grasp a bunch of 
the tops and pull up and hold over the 
sieve and break off the bulbs with the 
other hand, or rather strip them off. 
Some may have grown so large that you 
will have to snap them off with a quick 
motion. From time to time shake the 
sieve so as to get rid of most of the soil 
and empty it into a box or bag. Go 
through the whole row with the fork 
before pulling, so as to have both hands 
for the pulling and breaking off. 
If the tops are dead or small they may 
be taken off before digging by using a 
sharp hoe or spade and removing the 
soil as deep as you dare without cutting 
the bulbs. Then loosen as before, very 
close to the little bulbs, on one side 
with the fork and the other with a 
sharp spade, making a V shaped trough. 
It will be quite easy then to scoop out 
bulbs, soil and all and drop into the 
sieve. A tool on the principle of the 
“Gilson Weeder” could be made to 
draw under the ground, making a U 
shaped cut under and on both sides of 
the row. Mr. G. D. Black contrived a 
bulblet digger by taking a two-wheel 
hand cultivator frame and making a U 
shaped band of steel to cut under and 
around the bulblets, while a knife above 
cuts off the tops. Then with a narrow 
scoop the soil and bulblets together are 
scooped out and put into the sieve. 
This works well in sandy loam at least. 
In digging large bulbs of odd lots the 
fork is used as before said, one person 
going ahead to do nothing but loosen. 
The others follow and pull up. But 
this is too slow and expensive on a large 
scale. To take the place of the fork a 
digger is made by removing the mold 
board from a one-horse wooden beam 
plow and shifting the handles so that 
the “land side” points a little to the 
right. A blacksmith can do this by 
taking off the plow and twisting the 
shank. The point of the plow should 
have a good “suck ” and a depth gauge 
is made by bolting loosely to the for- 
ward part of the beam a piece of old 
wagon tire, running down and back in 
sled runner fashion past the plow on 
the land side. An upright piece is 
welded to this with holes at proper in- 
tervals to regulate the depth with a 
bolt passing through the beam. It 
takes a little management to get this to 
work just right but it is an immense 
labor and time saver. It may be found 
necessary to extend “ the lay ” a little 
so as to take it under the row far enough. 
Doubtless a better thing can be made 
from the new by attaching to a plow 
beam a stout band of steel to go straight 
down and then bend so as to cut under 
the row. This, too, would need a wheel 
or some other depth regulator which 
could be regulated by experiment. 
The horse walks, of course, on the 
left or “land” side of the row. If the 
rows were far enough apart a two-horse 
tree digger would be just the thing. 
The object sought is to loosen and 
slightly lift the bulbs without turning 
them under at all. The digger is fol- 
lowed by men, boys or women (what- 
ever you can get!) who pull up all 
they can grasp and break off into bas- 
kets at once. Do not wait until tops 
are wilted and tough. 
In 1917 Mr. Black wrote me under 
date of Oct. 25th “ I have been delayed 
by the scarcity of help and the weather. 
I am using the lifter plow and today we 
were stopped by the rain and snow at 
four o’clock but we dug 46 bags (30 
rows 35 rods long) myself and man and 
four women.” That was going some. 
(Lucky to have Scandinavian women 
who are not afraid to work.) 
I do not know how the very large 
growers work it and would like to hear. 
In using a lifting plow one needs a 
steady horse which will not rush and 
fret. 
Digging Bulblet Grown Gladioli. 
[ W ritten expressly for The Flower Grower. ] 
Cormels should be planted as early 
as possible and in consequence will be 
the first part of the crop to show signs 
of ripening, but this varies greatly in 
different varieties ; Peace very seldom 
ripening until chilled and checked by 
frost, while Pendleton will be ready to 
dig about the middle of August. 
We never wait for the foliage to be- 
come brown and dead for at that stage 
the small bulbs separate very easily 
from the stem and the labor of digging 
is doubled. 
As soon as brown stems become at 
all noticeable in the cormel rows of the 
early sorts we start digging. I do not 
know of any machine that can be used 
in this process. We use a spading 
fork with four flat tines to loosen the 
row on one side, and sometimes it is 
necessary to go on both sides. Then 
the workman gathers a little of the 
foliage in one hand, shoves the other 
hand into the soil back of the little 
bulbs and by gently pulling and lifting 
brings the bulbs to the surface and 
places them in a box, tops all one way. 
Now pull the soil back to find any 
loose bulbs which have broken from 
the stems and then repeat the process. 
The work of stripping the bulbs 
from the stems can be done at any con- 
venient time within three or four days, 
under the shade of a tree on a hot 
103 
afternoon or in the bulb house during 
a storm. 
A fine sieve is used to remove all the 
soil and then the bulbs are spread in 
shallow boxes to dry. 
All my sieves are made square and 
of the right size to slide on the top of 
any of the bulb boxes, and I find this 
a very convenient arrangement. 
By the time the small stock is dug 
the early plots of blooming bulbs will 
be ripening, and with these the process 
is very similar. If not allowed to stay 
too long in the ground nearly all bulbs 
will come up with the stalks, the few 
which break off are dug out and then 
the question of how much time to 
spend hunting for stray bulblets de- 
pends on the value of that particular 
variety. 
Most of the smaller sized bulbs are 
broken off with the hands and the ones 
that are too large or too tough are cut 
off with sharp pruning shears. 
On large fields planted with cheap 
varieties it may be practical to use 
some labor saving machine like a po- 
tato digger, but when the plots are 
small and the stock valuable the old 
method, slow and tedious as it surely 
is, would seem to be more economical. 
S. E. Spencer. 
Love Tragedy in a Gladiolus Garden. 
A love tragedy, sad, strange and unique in 
character, was enacted in a Toronto garden ; 
the actors in which were two of nature’s 
most beautiful children— a Humming bird 
and a Gladiolus flower. 
The tall, slender stem of the plant, with its 
upright shoots, surmounted by a chalice-like 
pink and crimson tinted flower, was swaying 
coyly in the morning sunlight, throwing kisses 
to the world about it, when along came a 
tiny, fairy-like creature, humming with infinite 
happiness and love for all beautiful things. 
Desiring to share in the kisses the little lover 
thrust itself into the heart of the flower, and, 
having, drunk its fill of the nectar, was with- 
drawing itself when its head was caught be- 
tween one of the sword like shoots and the 
stem of the plant. Struggling to free itself 
the wee bird slipped downward and its neck 
became more and more tightly fixed between 
the sword and the stem and was choked. 
No one witnessed the tragedy, but Mr. 
Gilchrist of Runnymede road, in whose gar- 
den it occurred, found the little lover hanging 
limp by the neck as if the flower had clasped 
her fairy wooer to her bosom and hugged 
him to death. 
Mr. Gilchrist is one of the most notable 
growers of Gladioli on this side of the Atlan- 
tic. When at work on his “flower farm” at 
Lambton he sees many Humming birds, and 
the little visitors frequently suck nectar from 
the Gladioli in his arms after they are cut, 
but never before has he seen an incident such 
as that of yesterday. — Toronto Globe. 
j American Gladiolus Society. | 
The Boston meeting and exhibit 
promises to be one of the greatest in 
our history. 
If you have not already sent in a prize 
offer for the schedule will you not do 
so at once? 
As a matter of mutual benefit your 
firm should be represented on the list. 
H. E. Meader, Pres’t. 
