140 
September, 1920 
WAYSIDE 
[ Written expressly for The Flower Grower . ] 
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GROWING GLADIOLI AS AN 
AVOCATION FOR CITY PASTORS. 
I have been interested in what The Flower 
Grower has had to say about bogies, un- 
derstanding by “ bogey ” some fascinating 
reasonable hobby that captures one’s atten- 
tion, and later much besides, and am 
tempted to write why I came to make the 
Gladiolus mine. This was not my first bogey. 
When younger I gave my spare time to 
drawing and painting, but my work is that 
of a city pastor, and with but one short 
month’s intermission has been for twenty- 
five years, and that is a work that has no 
starting time, and no quitting time, and in 
which there is always more to be done than 
one can accomplish. It also calls for much 
reading, and I soon found that even in vaca- 
tion time my eyes needed rest, and I should 
do something more active than bending over 
a canvas. Then I took up photography, 
and enjoyed that much, especially in the 
wilds of the Rockies where I was able to go 
for a number of summers. But I needed 
some hobby not merely for vacations but 
every month in the year, and needed it most 
when most taxed. I had no thought at first 
of its ever becoming a hobby, but I have al- 
ways enjoyed gardening, and I was constantly 
needing flowers — for I know of nothing more 
useful in cheering the sick, or for brighten- 
ing the home of one shut in, or able to give 
a sweeter sense of welcome to a stranger in 
a community — or more comforting to be- 
reaved souls, than a few thoroughly choice 
flowers given in a spirit of real friendliness 
and well-wishing, by one who really loves 
them. 
The city where I lived at the time, Port- 
land, Ore., was noted for its Rose culture, 
but I, as a pastor, liable any year to move, and 
even while there living in a rented house, if 
I would grow such perennials, needed more 
room than such homes provided, and also at 
any move must lose all I had planted. This 
led me to think of bulb culture, and among 
other things especially the Gladiolus. At 
first I had but very few of some choice va- 
rieties, together with a few that had been 
given me, but they pleased me so well and 
thrived so well, and responded to care even un- 
der such adverse conditions (last year I had to 
transplant nearly four hundred after they 
were twelve to eighteen inches high, in 
scorching weather, and yet they nearly all 
bloomed) that I gave almost all my attention 
to the one flower, and now I have them by 
the thousands. Then, too, I have found 
among my own seedlings pets that I admire 
as much as any I have found on the market, 
and ’tis a great pleasure to be able to send a 
friend a beautiful specimen that he can get 
from no one but you. 
Season after season they have enabled me 
to broaden my circle of acquaintance, and 
helped to change many of these into fast 
friends, and for months each year, when 
most needed, I have had choice flowers in 
abundance to share with any they may help 
to cheer, and through all the hot days of 
summer almost every evening after supper 
everything else is forgotten for a happy hour 
among my rows of pets, and in the early 
morning they seem to answer with their 
thank-you. No, I cannot be sorry that I 
adopted the Gladiolus “Bogey,” or it adopted 
me. I can only commend it, specially to any 
who are called to minister to the sick or 
discouraged, or shut-ins, or among children ; 
and who need something to rest them close 
at home, but that shall take them out under 
the open sky, commend it as offering a 
wonderful opportunity. 
W. J. B., San Diego, Calif. 
/lower <Brower 
RAMBLINGS 
SECURING HIGH GERMINATION 
OF GLADIOLUS CORMELS. 
In answer to “A. F. R.” in the July Flower 
Grower, I would give my experience which 
may be of value to him and others : 
I store cormels in paper bags in an attic 
room just over the kitchen where the tem- 
perature is about 40° to 60° and they come 
through O K in the spring. 
I have planted cormels both peeled and 
unpeeled, half-and-half in flat trays, 3 inches 
deep, 20 inches long, 14 inches wide, using \ 
sand, \ rotted manure and J fine sifted 
top garden soil. I set the boxes in an old hot 
bed which had very little heat left and cov- 
ered with glass so as to help hold some heat 
in. There is very little difference in the 
germination whether peeled or unpeeled, in 
fact about 96 out of every 100 grew. I give 
plenty of water while in the hot bed, and 
after they are well up I transplant about 
4 in. apart in rows 8 in. apart; most of them 
will bloom the first year. 
I am quite sure a slight bottom heat is very 
essential to success in germinating cormels. 
This past spring I planted two boxes in the 
attic room above the kitchen in fiat boxes 
so thick as to nearly touch each other, 
covered them 2 inches, and in three weeks 
nearly all were up and growing, so I think 
bottom heat is helpful in starting them. 
Here is a fact not generally known, but is 
it worth anything ? If cormels are kept over 
one whole season, that is \\ years, nearly 
every one will grow, but I do not do this any 
longer since I have had so much success with 
my method as given. A. J. E. 
HEMEROCALLIS. 
There is no hardier plant than the Hem- 
erocallis, and none that will bloom well 
when neglected than some varieties of it. I 
have grown a few varieties for a number of 
years, and two years ago began to get a col- 
lection of them. To begin with I ordered 
a number of varieties of a firm in the East 
one October, and received them the 20th of 
the following June. Every plant lived even 
at this late date. When they bloomed I 
found one variety under three names, and I 
had not ordered this variety either — Gold 
Dust. 
Florhan and Thunbergi bloomed this sea- 
son about the middle of July, and are both 
fine varieties. They are still in bloom, (Aug. 
9th). Dumortieri is the earliest to bloom, 
and is more dwarf than any other variety — 
about one foot high. Gold Dust soon follows 
and is a good variety. Fulva is a robust 
grower, and will not do for small gardens 
for it will crowd out other plants near it. 
Kwanso flore pleno is a double form of 
Fulva. This variety blooms late in July. 
There are many new hybrids of which 
Sir Michael Foster is one of the finest yet 
raised. 
Willis E. Fryer. 
SAVING PEONY SEED- DISBUDDING. 
Mrs. Pleas is most marvelously naive. She 
says, “Had I pollenized seeds, and feared 
their being pilfered, I should enclose them in 
netting and label, ‘For Self.’ ” If she only 
knew it, that is just the way to make sure 
the precious ones will be the ones stolen, if 
any, and may be an incentive to stealing 
when otherwise it would not have been 
thought of. 
As to disbudding Peonies, a person who 
grows them in quantities to ship is not going 
many times to neglect disbudding. Clus- 
ters have their good points, but that is no 
evidence that the disbudding has none. 
When it’ comes to shipping and storage, 
clusters are not wholly admirable. 
An undisbudded stem of Madame Crousse < 
is anything but graceful, so, too, I think, of 
Duchesse de Nemours , and doubtless there 
are others just as bad. As I grow for com- 
mercial flowers, I always disbud, and there 
are usually enough side-buds overlooked to 
put me out of humor with side-buds under 
all circumstances. I agree with Mrs. Pleas, ; 
however, that, when the spray is a good 
one, it is prettier than the center flower 
alone would have been. It is my impression 
that a really good spray is a rare article ex- 1 
cept with but very few varieties. 
Benjamin C. Auten. 
— 
FRAGRANCE IN GLADIOLI. 
I note in the July number of The Flower 
Grower an inquiry as to fragrance in Gladi- 
oli. Cornell Extension Bulletin 9 mentions 
several African species that are sweet 
scented, G. recurvus in particular being de- 
scribed as “very fragrant, with a scent .... 
similar to that of Violets or Orris root.” The 
statement is also made that “the flowers of 
the hybrid, G. Colvillei are fragrant,” as well 
as those of G. fragrans, a hybrid between G. 
recurvus and G. tristis. 
However, the answer to the inquiry of “H. 
L. C.” is probably correct, so far as it applies 
to varieties now in cultivation. 
Thomas M. Proctor. 
POMEGRANATE. 
My father, who is now 76 years old, wishes 
me to make an inquiry of you as to the 
identity of a plant that he used to see in 
Wisconsin when he lived there before he was 
14 years old. It was called by the people 
* there “ Pomegranate,” but was a vine, and 
related, he fancies, to the musk melon. It | 
was planted where it would run up on hazel 
brush or something like that ; was very fra- 
grant — that seems to be what he best re- 
members of it — was somewhat striped in 
color, greenish and yellow. It was consid- 
ered a great treasure. An old farmer living 
near me says that his mother, who came 
from Illinois, used to speak of Pomegranates ? 
as growing there, but he remembers no de- 
scription. I doubt not it is the same thing 1 
that my father saw, for the name is so dis- 
tinctive that it would be more than a coin- 
cidence that the report should come from 
both Wisconsin and Illinois. And yet, 
obviously, it cannot be the botanical Pome- 
granate. If you can throw any light on this j 
little mystery, we should be greatly obliged 
to you. 
Arthur C. Nutt. 
WHITE IRIS. 
Your Iris writer speaks of trying to get a 
white Iris of the type of Madame Chereau. 
What is the matter with Fairy? It is white, 1 
in no way inferior to Madame Chereau, is of 
the same type, and has exquisite and power- ; 
ful fragrance. So far as I know the type, 
better could not be expected from it. 
B. C. Auten. 
GLADIOLUS — BLACK HAWK. 
I notice on page 134 of the August Flower 
Grower a list of Gladioli which the writer 
wishes to know the introducers’ names. The 
variety, Black Hawk, is a Kunderd produc- 
tion. 
A. E. Kunderd. 
Last month in the Queries and Answers 
Department the origin of certain varieties 
was asked for. Mr. Kunderd has given the 
information about Black Hawk as above. 
Will not some of our other readers give us 
information on other varieties? We be- 
lieve that Mrs. James Lancashire was origi- 
nated by E. E. Stewart. 
