34,2 
AMERICAN AGR1C ULTURIST. 
[September, 
early crop, which is to sow the seed in the fall, , 
winter over the young onions, or sets, in the : 
ground, and allow them to continue then- 
growth the next spring. This plan is not a 
new one, it being frequently followed in Eng¬ 
land, but in consequence of the severity of our 
northern winters, causing occasional failure, it 
has almost been abandoned. 
But now, in view of the high price of “ sets,” 
it is again being resorted to, more care being 
observed to protect the young bulbs in winter. 
It is not easy to say, without some experiment, 
at what is the best time for sowing the seed, 
and the safest method will be to dry different 
dates, until it is seen which answers best. For 
this section, near New York, I would recom¬ 
mend the first, fifteenth and thirtieth of Sep¬ 
tember. The ground should be prepared in 
the usual way, as if for sowing in spring, giv¬ 
ing it thorough pulverization and manuring. 
The seed should be sown with a seed-drill, at 
■distances of one foot between rows; this would 
take about 3 to 4 lbs. of seed to the acre. The 
kinds that prove hardiest are the red and yel¬ 
low varieties. The soil must be thoroughly 
drained, either naturally or artificially, to pre¬ 
vent “ heaving out ” in winter. A Long Island j 
market gardener informed me that even at the 
very low rates that green onions have brought ! 
the past summer, his fall sown crop netted him 
•over $1,000 per acre, the product in number of 
hunches being more than double that usually 
obtained from the planting of sets in spring. 
He sowed in a warm sheltered situation on 
rather light soil about the middle of September, 
thoroughly hoeing and weeding, so that he had 
a fine growth by the end of October. In Decem¬ 
ber, before severe frosts had come, he covered 
the whole space between the rows two or three 
inches deep with leaves from the woods, 
choosing a day when snow was falling, so that 
the leaves were pressed down by the snow and 
prevented from blowing off. If the services of 
the snow could not be made available, branches 
thrown over the leaves would answer the pur¬ 
pose. When leaves are not at hand, salt or 
marsh hay, straw, or corn-stalks, would answer 
nearly as good a purpose, the object being to 
protect the crop from the severity of winter, as 
it is not sufficiently hardy to stand in our lati¬ 
tude without such protection. In all sections 
where the thermometer does not fall lower 
than 15 degrees above zero, such protection 
would be unnecessary. I would advise those 
residing in very cold localities, to experiment 
first with a small lot, until it can be ascertained 
whether they will winter over even with the 
protection of leaves or straw. 
The Hollyhock Fungus—Cotton in Danger. 
This disease among hollyhocks, which has 
spread in Europe with fatal activity, has al¬ 
ready been briefly noticed. But little is known 
about it, save that it came from South America, 
and that it appears suddenly in widely separated 
districts, and causes the death not only of hol¬ 
lyhocks, but other plants of the Mallow Family. 
The disease shows itself in small spots upon 
the leaf, which, when magnified, are seen to be 
groups of minute fungi. The engraving here 
given, reduced from one published in a recent 
number of Gardener’s Chronicle, shows the 
spots as they appear upon the leaf (A) of the 
common Round Mallow (.1 lalva rotundifolia), 
and the fungus largely magnified. The long 
horn-like projections (B) are the hairs upon the 
mallow leaf. The spread of this pest seems to 
be mysterious, it appearing at once in all parts 
of a large plantation; and yet Prof. W. G. 
Smith has entirely failed to propagate it, al¬ 
though he has wrapped the diseased leaves 
around the stems of healthy hollyhocks, and 
buried others in the soil at the root of the 
plant; this failure may be accounted for by the 
fact that the spores were not yet ripe and ready 
to germinate. Thus far no application of sul¬ 
phur, or other fungus destroyers, have been of 
use, and the only known remedy is to root up 
every affected plant. 
The venerable Mr. 
Chater, a distin¬ 
guished florist, who 
has devoted half a 
century to the im¬ 
provement of the 
hollyhock, and to 
whom we are in¬ 
debted for the pres¬ 
ent perfection of 
the flower, may 
well be despondent 
at the loss of the 
favorites he has 
so long cherished. 
While this disease 
prevails, no malva- 
ceous plants should 
be imported to this 
country from Eng¬ 
land or the Con¬ 
tinent. Our import¬ 
ing florists should 
bear this in mind, 
and let all the new 
varieties of Abuti- 
lon, Hibiscus, and 
everything else of the Mallow Family, re¬ 
main with the ocean between them and us. 
This warning should be heeded, for if the 
fungus is once introduced, it will no doubt 
prove a greater enemy to the cotton crop than 
all of its insect enemies together. As it, so far 
as known, attacks all of the Mallow Family in¬ 
discriminately, there is every reason to believe 
that cotton will prove no exception. Its intro¬ 
duction would be a national calamity, and one 
that can not be too zealously guarded against. 
Rose-Growing in Winter—Conflict of 
Opinion. 
BY PETER HENDERSON. 
The matter of growing Roses for winter¬ 
flowering is now engrossing much attention, and 
I have more than once written upon it in the 
columns of the Agriculturist; but the subject 
is now getting to be of such general interest in 
every section of the country where there are 
greenhouses, that anything that will tend to a 
further knowledge of the subject will, I know, 
be read with interest by many hundreds of 
your readers. There are three different systems 
in use; first, that of growing the plants in large 
pots, or tubs; second, planting out on prepared 
solid borders of soil, from 1 to 2 feet in depth, 
and another by planting out on raised benches 
or tables, in 6 or 7 inches of soil. Each of 
these systems has its advocates, who claim that 
one or the other is the best, and the novice in 
rose-growing (and it must be remembered that 
we have hundreds beginning every year) is 
puzzled to decide which system to adopt. I 
have tried them all with fair success in each, 
and have come to the conclusion that, taking 
all points into consideration, particularly where 
Roses are not grown exclusively, but only form 
a part of the general stock, that the plan of 
planting out on raised wooden benches, in 0 or 
7 inches of soil, is the most profitable. I am 
now preparing the center benches in two of my 
largest greenhouses, making a space of 690 feet 
long by 8 feet wide, or nearly 5,000 square 
feet, whereon to plant Roses. The plants used 
will be those struck from cuttings last Febru¬ 
ary, and grown on in pots, so that by September 
they will be plants from 12 to 18 inches in 
highth. The soil in which they will be planted 
is now being prepared, and consists of 6 parts 
thinly cut sod, from a rather heavy soil, to this 
is added 1 part rotted cow-stable manure, and 
1 part sandy lime rubbish and oyster shells, all 
thoroughly chopped up and mixed together. 
The grassy fiber may hardly be decomposed 
before we use it, but that will matter but little, 
only it will be necessary to cover this compost 
when placed on the bench with an inch or two 
of soil, so that any of the sod roots that may 
be alive will be unable to grow through it. 
This soil will not be put on the benches before 
the middle of September, when the Roses, al¬ 
ready prepared, will be planted about 12 or 15 
inches apart. We shall use about 4,000 plants, 
which will be apportioned in number, as far as 
our knowledge goes of their merits, thus : 
1,250 Bon Silene (deep carmine); requires the 
warmest part of the house. 
1,250 Safrano (saffron yellow). 
750 Isabella Sprunt (canary yellow). 
250 Douglas (purplish crimson); requires the 
coolest part of the house. 
250 Duchess de Brabant (salmon and rose 
color). 
100 Bella (pure white). 
100 La Nankin, new, (lower part of bud 
orange yellow, upper part pure white). 
50 La Jonquil, new, (clear golden yellow). 
Should no accident occur, we anticipate that 
this number of Roses so planted will average 
us 3,000 rose-buds per week from October 1st 
to June 1st. I need not detail here the after- 
treatment, that having already been fully done 
in my previous articles, other than to briefly 
say that a night temperature of from 55° to 65° 
must be steadily maintained, with a day tem¬ 
perature of 15° or 20° higher. The plants must 
be freely syringed at least once a day, but wa¬ 
tered at the roots only when dry, and then freely. 
This method of planting roses on raised 
benches necessitates their renewal at least once 
in every two years, as the soil in which they 
are grown becomes “ washed out ” by the fre¬ 
quent waterings; we ourselves intend to renew 
the soil every season. The roses planted in 
September will be flowered to their fullest ex¬ 
tent during winter, until the first of June. 
Each plant will have then formed a mass of 
fibrous roots, so matted that the soil is held by 
them, and which can be lifted by passing a 
spade under them; when these are potted in pots 
or tubs suited to the size of the plant, no check 
to the growth is given. We lifted in this way 
from benches the past season roses which were 
four feet high by as much in diameter, planted 
them in pots 15 inches wide, with hardly the 
loss of a leaf. By lifting every season in June, 
the plants can be set out-doors, and the whole 
care of watering and syringing the greenhouse 
can be dispensed with for the three hot sum¬ 
mer months ; this is a matter of very great im¬ 
portance, for in most locations there is never 
water enough, and even if there is, unless it is 
unremittingly applied, the roses are certain to 
