174 
PARK AND CEMETERY, 
VIEW IN THE SHRUB COLLECTION, HIGHLAND PARK, ROCHESTER, N. Y. 
Notes of Trees and Shrubs 
Shrubbery in Highland Park, Rochester, 
N. Y, 
A series of greenhouses for the culti- 
vation of rare plants is one of the im- 
provements planned for Highland Park, 
Rochester, N. Y., for the coming year. 
This department is to be under the di- 
rection of Assistant Superintendent John 
Dunbar, and will be a valuable addi- 
tion to what is already one of the best 
collections of fine trees and shrubs in 
the country. A new shelter house near 
the entrance to the park and some ex- 
tensive road building are among the 
other improvements to be made, at an 
estimated expenditure of about $io,oco. 
Additional land is to be purchased for 
the Seneca parks, east and west. 
The tract will cost $50,000. 
* * * 
The Cork Bark Elm. 
A California correspondent of the 
Weekly Florists’ Review says: “The 
common cork bark elm, which was large- 
ly planted until a few years ago, has 
lost favor on account of its succoring. 
It plays havoc with well kept lawns 
and has the faculty of breaking cement 
sidewalks anywhere in its immediate 
vicinity. Carolina poplars and white 
flowering locust have been discarded for 
the same reason. 
* * * 
Doctaring Trees. 
A new method of feeding trees and 
plants without the agency of the roots 
has been discovered by the well-known 
entomologist, M. S. A. Mokrshezki, who 
has explained his discovery in a lecture 
before the Imperial Botanical Society 
of India. He has invented an apparatus 
by which he can introduce into the 
stems of apple and pear trees salts of 
iron, either in the form of a solid or 
in solution. The effect of the chemicals 
is, on the one hand, completely to cure 
the tree of chlorose, and, on the other, 
to stimulate its growth in an important 
degree. Among other extensive re- 
searches the scientist has applied his 
theory to 800 fruit trees growing on 
the southern shore of the Crime'a. By 
introducing dry sulphate of copper into 
the stems he produced an unusual devel- 
opment of the trees, as many photo- 
graphs testified. M. Mokrshezki con- 
siders that in this way the size of a 
fruit tree can be increased, its color 
improved and varied, and its diseases 
removed. The discovery opens up a 
wide field of practical utility, and is re- 
garded as most important. — Journal of 
Horticulture. 
* * * 
Cutting Trees by Electricity. 
It is reported in the German press 
that successful experiments have been 
made in various forests of France in 
cutting trees by means of electricity. 
A platinum wire is heated to a white 
heat by an electric current and used 
like a saw. In this manner the tree 
is felled much easier and quicker than 
in the old way ; no sawdust is produced, 
and the slight carbonization caused by 
the hot wire acts as preservative of the 
wood. The new method is s£id to re- 
quire only one-eighth of the time con- 
sumed by the old sawing process. — Gar- 
dening. 
* * * 
Don't Shear Your Shrubs! 
The beauty and interest of a shrub 
surely lie in its natural habit and form, 
says Prof. L. H. Bailey in Country Life 
in America. When shrubs are sheared 
into formal shapes the shrub no longer 
exists for itself, but is only a means of 
expressing some queer conceit of the 
shearer. Of course, shrubs should be 
pruned, to make them healthy and vig- 
orous, to keep them within bounds, to 
increase the size of bloom, to check 
mere waywardness ; but all this leaves 
the shrub a shrub, with the hand of the 
pruner unseen, and does not make it 
to counterfeit a bottle or a barrel or a 
parachute. If the forsythia has super- 
lative merit, it is for the wealth of early 
spring bloom. Yet I know a yard in 
which the forsythias are annually 
sheared into shapeless shapes, and this 
is done when they are in bloom. Last 
year two-thirds of the bloom was cut 
from these bushes when it was just 
opening, and the reply of the Irishman 
who barbered them, when I remon- 
strated, was, “Indade, they hev no 
sha P e ” * * * 
Borers in Trees. 
It is not the fruit grower alone who 
has to be on the alert to prevent borers 
injuring his trees; the nurseryman has 
need to watch many of his trees as 
well, and closely, too. Besides the many 
fruit trees which they like to attack, 
many ornamental trees come in for at- 
tention as well. The mountain ash, the 
English hawthorn and the beech come 
to mind as I write as representing these 
ornamental trees. The borer is particu- 
larly partial to the mountain ash and 
the English hawthorn, and these need 
close watching to save them from harm. 
One or two year old peach trees are 
usually free from attack, so there is but 
little to do in protecting them, but 
specimen trees in orchards, which many 
firms have for the furnishing of graft- 
ing and budding supplies, require at- 
tention. Twice a year, in early July 
and in September, suspected trees 
should be looked over. The soil should 
be raked away for an inch or two below 
the surface, as in this part of the trunk 
is where the borer likes to operate. 
Sawdust will show whether the enemy 
is at work or not, and a piece of wire 
and a sharp-pointed knife will uncover 
the pest should it be present. Many a 
fine specimen of mountain ash is lost 
because borer attacks are not sus- 
pected, and the same is true of the 
double-flowered and other thorns when 
worked on the English stock . — Joseph 
Meehan, in The Florists’ Exchange. 
