238 
JOURNXL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ September 17, 1891. 
AURICULAS. 
CULTURE UNDER HANDLIGHTS. 
No doubt since Mr. Bell has done it Auriculas of the higher 
types can be grown by planting them out under handlights, but I 
think that “ Auricula growing made easy ” by this method would 
only be so in an inverse ratio to the number of plants grown. As 
a collection increased so must also handlights multiply, and thus the 
method gradually become cumbrous and laborious compared with 
the old-fashioned pot culture in frames, still more so as against 
the well proved advantages of a cool span-roofed Auricula house. 
As to pot culture being obnoxious to these plants it is not so. 
They are by no means greedy of pot room, and indeed never do so 
well as when the pots are small enough for the plants to fill them 
with roots. A 3-inch to 4^-inch pot will afford any high-cla=s 
Auricula sufficient root room. If it be an object to save time and 
attention in watering the stages may be of flag or slate, with 
4 or 5 inches of coarse sand upon them in which to plunge the 
pots. I write without any experience in handlight culture of the 
Auricula, but there are several conceivable disadvantages that 
might, I fear, attend it. Even a moderate collection, say of five 
plants under each glass tent, would require an encampment of 
handlights, and what would become of them raised on pots, or 
tilted in a situation at all open to such winds as have blown during 
this summer, to say nothing of equinoctial expectations ? Perhaps 
a stake at each corner might help to keep them in position, but in 
any garden exposed like Mr. Simonite’s in Sheffield even this device 
would fail to keep the flighty and frolicsome handlight on the pre¬ 
mises in a high wind. 
In many gardens, especially suburban ones, there is certainly 
the cat and his many] friends to be reckoned with, and he may 
issue his noisy invitations to a garden party, with tilted handlights 
as one of the attractions of his entertainment. This is no remote 
contingency where there are cats about. I have grown many 
seedling Auriculas in the open ground, but have found it difficult 
under these circumstances to effectually keep down the all but 
inevitable green fly. This is most troublesome in a spell of dry 
weather. Syringing with softsoap dissolved in rain water will 
destroy all the insects visible on upper surfaces of the plants, but 
the multitudes hidden on the under side of the foliage are difficult 
to deal with on plants in the open ground. Young offsets under 
parental foliage are liable to be smothered with green fly, and 
therefore it is most important that the Auricula should be grown 
in such a way that each plant shall be under complete supervision 
and control, and easily handled. They are not large plants, and 
whether in bloom or not, they always look best, and do best, when 
not placed far from the eye. It would be very troublesome to 
attempt fumigation under a series of handlights, and, probably, in 
such small confined spaces it would not be safe. 
Another enemy, to which I think valuable Auriculas under 
handlights would be subject, is the nocturnal snail. True, that by 
setting the lights down before dark he might after that time be 
excluded ; but there remain the chances that he may have already 
walked in on a rainy afternoon, and be only waiting under leafy 
shelter till feeding time. His touch is ruin to an Auricula flower, 
and the whole plant, in its fragrance of leaf as well as of blossom, is 
. highly attractive to the snail, though to our tasting its j uices are acrid. 
In some places small birds will pick the buds of Auriculas and 
Polyanthus, but particularly the latter. Sparrows are the most 
mischievous, but here they are too wary to enter the Auricula 
house, and probably would not venture under a handlight. I would 
not, however, trust them with valuable Auricula buds in the open. 
I should fear that the heavy bumble bee of the spring, who is 
a great lover of the scented Auricula, and who will get into the 
Auricula house if he can, would require much care to exclude him 
from raised handlights. A very slight touch of his wing or legs 
will blur or scratch Auricula flowers, and of course there is no 
saving of any trustworthy seed where a bee has had ac:ess to a 
flower. It is doubtless better to grow a few Auriculas than none 
at all, and to have handlights than no protection whatever ; but if 
there be garden space enough, I should prefer frame culture for a 
small collection, and a span-roof house for mare than a frameful or 
two of Auriculas. 
Mr. Bell will find an Auricula plant of 16 inches diameter in 
summer not a very uncommon size in the lower orders of Auriculas, 
and very strong plants in the “ self ” class will at tim=s be as large, 
•especially if they are new seedlings. Such plants, however, and 
even smaller, are too big for blooming kindly— i.e., in best 
character for quality and refinement, and they may subsequently 
pull themselves to pieces by throwing up two, or even three, flower 
stems, followed by a weak or divided heart. None of the good 
edged Auriculas are likely to make such huge plants under sensible 
treatment. 
Mr. Bell includes me in his referen'e to writers on the Auricula 
who do not give their addresses as well as their names. He will, 
however, find that I have always given both for some twenty years 
past in the Journal, though in papers few and far between.— 
F. D. Horner, Barton-in-Lonsdale, Kirleby Lonsdale. 
THE PRINCIPLES OF PRUNING. 
The following is a digest of Mr. Wright’s lecture at the Crystal 
Palace on the occasion of the meeting of the British Fruit Growers’ 
Association on the 11th instant :— 
Mr. Wright did not prepare a paper, but spoke from short 
notes, making reference to a number of diagrams, and thus taught 
through the eye as well as the ear. He said he was aware he had 
amongst his audience men as capable as himself in growing and 
pruning fruit trees ; some of them could, no doubt, teach him 
something on the subject, and he should be at least as pleased to 
learn from them as he was willing to try and teach others who had 
less education in the school of experience. Hundreds, indeed 
thousands, of persons were endeavouring to grow their own fruit, 
and all would wish them success. They needed instruction in 
pruning fruit trees and bushes, as did many young men who had 
taken the charge of gardens after gaining most of their experience 
under glass. 
After describing the objects of pruning—namely, producing 
fruitful trees in required forms adapted to certain positions, also 
the different kinds of pruning—summer and wintei', root and 
branch—the lecturer said that both symmetrical garden trees, also 
informal standards and dwarf bushes, could be made essentially 
fruitful in character. They could not be made to bear full crops 
of fruit unfailingly, because gardeners could not control the weather 
and prevent frost destroying the blossom ; but if the trees were 
brought into the best condition of fruitfulness by correct manage¬ 
ment and methods of pruning, those who had brought them into 
that state had done their duty. Fruitfirl examples were shown in 
diagrams of the different forms of trees—pyramid and bush—from 
sketches made at Chiswick, and a thrifty, fruitful, open standard 
as grown at Cardiff Castle, the methods of pruning adopted in 
producing such trees being shown in each case. 
Crowding trees with a thicket of growths in summer to be cut 
out in winter, a too common habit, was strongly condemned. A 
sturdy framework was advocated by shortening the branches of 
young trees for two or three years, then having the main branches 
so thinly disposed that the sun could shine between them, and 
directly on the leaves, not near the tips of the shoots only, for 
that was of small service, but on the leaves near the base for 
rendering them structurally perfect for performing their important 
functions in storing nutrient matter in the stems, and so becoming 
spur and blossom formers and fruit manufacturers. With healthy 
l’oot action in good soil, a due balance of force between roots and 
branches, leaves of the best character by the direct action of 
light and air on their surfaces, blossom buds were bound to form 
and fruit to follow, weather being favourable to its setting and 
development. 
Particular attention was asked to the following statement .— 
“ No matter what kind of trees were in question—restricted and 
formal, or large and free—all pruning must be based on this 
fundamental fact—-namely, the roots of a tree are part of the 
stem, the hidden counterparts of the visible branches, and one part 
cannot be manipulated — weakened or strengthened — without 
influencing the other.” “ That,” he went on to say, “ is the con¬ 
crete condition on which all action in pruning must be based. The 
cultivator must not induce by mistaken practice a great 
preponderating power of roots over branches or branches over 
roots ; he should, in fact, regard roots as what they are—under¬ 
ground stems, and be able to form a clear conception of the parts 
of a tree within the ground from a critical inspection of the parts 
above it, shoots and leaves ; and until a man can do that he cannot 
be regarded as a competent, safe, profitable pruner.” The 
lecturer said he had found that a large number of successful fruit 
growers were distinctly of opinion that as much fruit was pre¬ 
vented by the abuse of the knife as was produced by its use, aud 
he did not call that pruning but butchei-ing. “ A butcher,” he 
said, “ can cut off limbs and destroy life in doing so ; a surgeon 
amputates and prolongs life by the operation. The butcher’s 
work is physical mainly, the surgeon’s intellectual, scientific ; and 
we want intellectual pruning in gardens, not butchering ; producers 
of fruitful trees, not preventers of crops of fruit.” 
Right and wrong methods of pruning were illustrated ; roots 
were shown as influenced by branch growth, and vice versa; both 
fruitless and fruitful wood were pourtrayed ; the causes that pro¬ 
duced certain effects demonstrated, and remedies for obvious evils 
pointed out. Waste of material was made clear in the form of a 
dense thicket of summer growths, rampant roo^s and no fruit on 
