"Che RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
941 
Various Garden Questions 
1. I set out some ever-bearing straw¬ 
berries late last season; should the run¬ 
ners be kept strictly off and the ground 
loose around the plants? 2. I have some 
nice plants of rhubarb, but after the first 
cutting it goes to thin stalks. Can you 
remedy this for me? How can I suc¬ 
cessfully grow it in the cellar in the Win¬ 
ter time? 3. Pea vines get yellow in 
color for a way above the ground. What 
is the reason for this? A. N. 
New York. 
1. No; allow the runners to remain as 
they are from the young plants. Y"ou will 
get the late fruit. 2. Dig in around the 
plants either in Fall or Si)ring an abiin- 
(laiiee of well-rotted stable manure, 
ithubarb is a gross feeder, and if its re¬ 
quirements are not abundantly sppplied 
many of the stalks will bo of inferior 
size. To grow rhubarb in the cellar suc¬ 
cessfully, two or three-year-old clumps 
should be used. These should bo dug 
with a ball of earth just before freezing 
weather sets in. Allow tlnun to he where 
dug until hard frozen, in which condition 
growth is much better this year than 
last, but the root crops are doing nothing 
at all. Kadishe.s, beets, caiTots. turnips, 
are all running to tops. I.ettuce and en¬ 
dive is df)ing well. With this description 
can you tell me w'hat the trouble is, and 
what to do to remedy it? M. 
•Tudging from the description this soil 
needs potash and phosphoric acid. Evi¬ 
dently it was very poor to start with. 
The manure and street sweepings added 
considerable nitrogen and a little of pot¬ 
ash and phorphorus. Nitrogen promotes 
growth and its effect is noticed in the 
way crops develop above ground. Thus 
potatoes or root crops feed largely on 
nitrogen and make large vines and tops 
but poor tubers and roots. The use of 
wood ashes would help in such a case. 
Potash is very expensive but acid i)hos- 
phate or fine ground bone would help. 
We generally use acid phosi)hate at the 
rate of 800 pounds per acre. Proadcast 
and w'orked into the soil or scattered 
along the rows this acid pho.sphate will 
make your garden look like new. 
Liming a Lawn 
I have made a new lawn this Spring, 
using top soil from a piece of ground 
that for years was woodl.and. I have 
just tested this soil and found it sour. 
Would you advise applying lime now or 
in the Fall, and how should it be .^pplied? 
Hawthorne, N. ,T. l. c. b. 
We assume this lawn was seeded last 
Spring. You cannot obtain the full value 
of the lime now. It should have been 
fully worked in before seeding, but you 
will obtain some benefit by spreading at 
once and raking it in with light iron 
rakes. We should not wait until Fall. 
Handling Strawberry Plants 
As to strawberries, you say you expect 
to get 4,000 plants and 75 crates of 
berries_ next .season from the 3,.500 plants 
sot this Spring, so I conclude you do 
not keej) the runners cut off, which I 
thought was Pie proper thing to do the 
first season if you wanted extra fine 
berries. We set out 25 each of Senator 
Dunlap, (Jlen iNIary, Nic Ohmer (chose 
that variety because Mr. Oluner was a 
friend of my father's) and Superb. The 
last named has made fine plants that con¬ 
tinually send out blossom shoots, that I 
promptly nip off. Perhaps now it would 
be all right to let them fruit for late 
Summer and perhaps we ought to leave 
some of the runners on now to form new 
plants. .Tust give us a word of advice 
please. c. u. ir. 
Ohio. 
If we were working entirely for a gre.at 
bm-ry crop for next year we should cut 
off every runner and throw the entire 
strength into the parent plant. In our 
case we have a plant trade which brings 
in about as much as the berries and so 
we let some of the runners go. With 
this wet season we are likely to handle 
10,000 plants and we still figure on the 
big crop of fruit next year. We lot 
the Superb plants bloom fruit the first 
season and plan to set out new plants 
each year. 
Tomatoes on the Ground 
The man who likes his tomatoes on the 
ground may have them that way. We 
prefer them staked up every time and 
cultivated by hor.se power. For each i)er- 
fectly ripened tomato you find on the 
ground you will throw away three or four 
musty ones. They ripen earlier on stakes 
and you see at a glance about how many 
are ready for market. Our rows to-day 
tied up with strips of raw white muslin 
look like a “white cross’’ brigade, the 
knot.s_ forming little crosses. 
Ohio. CAKKIB D. niGii. 
they can be handled easily and quickly 
without injury. When frozen remove to 
the cellar and arrange close together in 
rows filling in all vacant spaces with 
soil. Water occasionally if necessary. 
The yellowing of the vines is but nat¬ 
ural. and is a signal nature ha.s for warn¬ 
ing the grower they have commmenced to 
decline and in a r.hort time will die out. 
At this stage of the game, plans should 
be made to succeed the pea cro|) with 
.some other such as beans, late cabbage, 
celery, beets, etc. 
Handling Seedling Asparagus 
1. In May I plautetd quite a bed of a.s- 
paragus .seed. It is up four im-hes and 
doing nicely. Is it time to fill in the 
t''enches? Do I cover up the four-inch 
shoots entirely? Gould I fill iq) the 
liamches with fine chicken coop litter and 
dust, or would that bui-n them? 2. I 
have a bed of one-.vear-old plants set out 
this Spring; up ]() inches high. How 
should I treat them? g. ir. s. 
New York. 
1. Do not fill in the trenches all at 
once; do it gradually, drawing a little 
soil to the plants at each cultivation as 
tln*y increa.se in size, and at no tiim; 
cover any i)art of the foliage with .soil. 
If the.se pl.ants are to be transplanted to 
the field later, it was labor lo-st to trench 
for them, as it is no more necessary to 
trench for growing asparagus seedlings 
than it is for celery .seedlings, both .shoual 
be sown on level ground and given level 
cultivation, until set in field. In the 
opinion of many of our most succe.ssful 
gT'owers, both celery and asparagus may 
be successfully and certainly much more 
(•heaply grown without any trenching 
whatever. 
2. Give good cultivation, and if in 
trenches, fill in gradually as the plants 
grow, completing the filling (if not 
finislu'd) when growth ceases in the Fall. 
IC. 
Spring Planting of Privet 
I h.qve a quantity of privet cuttings ])ut 
out a year ago, that took root and have 
grown well up to the pre.sent time. 
Should they be put in their permanent 
loc.ation this Fall, or would it be better 
to wait till Spring of 1918? 
^lassachusetts. a. w. L. 
Galifornia privet is not altogether of 
ironclad hardiness, often being injured 
and sometimes kilh'd outright when the 
temperature goes below twenty degrees 
below zero. Fall-set idants cannot be- 
<‘ome established bd'ore Winter sets in 
ajid are mqre subject to injury from cold 
than e.stablished plants. Therefore you 
would better defer planting until next 
Sju-ing. K. 
Phosphorus Needed in the Garden 
I live in a section of the city quite 
near the lake, the soil of which is there¬ 
fore originally sand. ]\Iy lot has been 
filled up with ground excavated from the 
top of lots where flats occupy the entire 
surface, and contained, until I removed 
it, a coll(K-tion of tin cans, old boots and 
shoe.s, bricks, etc., not a very good basis 
for a garden. East year I manured heav- 
il.v with fre.sh horse manure, and the 
sweej)ings from an asphalt street, sup- 
ifiemented with lawn clippings. The 
h9Cing 
Drillingi 
Cultivating; 
Fo‘rV.?^®y catalog 
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