THE COTTAGE GARDENER 
March 2 
best material for securing tallies to the roots when the 
latter are placed in dry earth, sand, &c. 
A few examples frequently give a better lesson than 
the mest valuable directions, f knew an amateur, who 
told me, every summer, for some years, that he must 
send his best Dahlias for me to winter for him ; but, 
somehow or other, they never came; and I know that for 
a number of years lie had to get every plant from his 
nurseryman. I recollect, when pitting Dahlias, as used 
to be done with Potatoes, was all the rage, and no bad 
plan it is, that one gardener did not lose a single root, 
while another had scarcely a live tuber in his collection, 
though both had been equally secured against frost. In 
the latter case, the plants had been cut down when the 
tops were merely a little frosted, the tubers taken up, 
beautiful and fresh they looked, well cleaned from earth, 
properly named, and packed into their winter quarters 
at once, receiving a covering of straw and earth suffi¬ 
cient to-secure them from frost. Of course, the roots 
were full of watery juices; there was little chance for 
these escaping, and fermentation and rottenness ensued. 
The first-named were treated as advised above, and 
afterwards stood for the best part of a month in a shed, 
exposed during fine days, and with a little protection in 
cold nights, before being pitted, and nothing could have 
answered better. 
An amateur friend, who will not be at all offended 
when he sees this, some years ago obtained, at great 
expense, a collection of the choicest and newest Dah¬ 
lias, and, no doubt for the double purpose of serving 
himself and testifying his respect for me, he proposed 
that I should get the tubers in winter or spring, start 
them into growth, get one or two plants of a sort for 
him, and plant the others remaining as 1 deemed proper. 
1 saw nothing of the tubers until, I think, towards 
the end of February, and what a sight! They were 
worse than mummies, nothing but the skin being left. 
I had them wrapped in moss slightly damp, gave increase 
of temperature by degrees, did everything I could to swell 
the dried up tuber by degrees, but, after all, only two or 
three sickly plants could be obtained out of what the 
previous year cost the best part of a ten pound note. I 
knew whenever I saw them how they had been managed. 
My friend told me that he went out and found the 
foliage one night as stiff as a poker with frost. He was 
anxious to save his favourites, forthwith summoned his 
trusty man Friday, cut down the stems level with the 
surface, hoisted, with the help of a fork and the light of 
a lanthorn, as far as 1 remember, all the tubers out of 
the ground, and transferred them at once to the floor of 
his greenhouse, that floor being paved, and to a position 
on it near the flue, where they had remained until 
packed and brought to me. Here the treatment was 
different, to a very extreme, as contrasted with the case 
of pitting at once; but the two extremes met in pro¬ 
ducing a common disappointment, though varied in its 
appearance; the watery juices, in the one case, producing 
putrefaction and rottenness; and the too free exhalation 
of them, in the other, leaving nothing but a mummy 
skin behind. If the plants of our friend had remained 
longer in the ground, or if, when taken up thus sud¬ 
denly, the roots, carefully moved, had been packed in 
dryish earth (not dusty dry) on the floor of the house, 
and at a distance from the flue, the disaster would not 
have been so likely to happen. 
One case more. Two years ago, reports reached me, 
from various quarters, of the splendid effect produced 
by the dwarf Dahlia Zelinda , when grown in rows 
and beds ; and I was promised, in several cases, a good 
supply, it’ I would only go for them. 1 had known 
the Dahlia years before and thought but little of it, 
having only seen it with others, and in solitary speci¬ 
mens in borders. I saw the first rows of it a twelve¬ 
month past, last autumn. The able gardener in 
481 I 
that princely establishment whence my supply was 
promised, on the principle, that “a bird in the j 
hand is worth two in the bush,” offered me and my 
companion some plants each, as he would soon be 
taking them up, the frost having just touched a few of 
the upper leaves that morning, and, without more ado, 
turned out a-half-a dozen of roots for us. I carried them 
carefully home, potted them the next day, kept them 
neither moist nor dry, aud in a temperature of from 
40° to 45° during the winter, placed them in a higher 
temperature iu the middle of February, and kept won¬ 
dering and wondering how no vegetation was appearing, 
and on turning them out of the pot, I found the skin 
dying, and the interior of the tuber either wholly dried 
up, or like a mass of light rotten wood. I was rather 
chagrined, after all my labour, to have only this return; 
but I did not feel justified iu attributing it altogether to 
the immaturity of the tubers, until, on writing to the 
friend that accompanied me, I learned that his roots 
had served him in the same way. 
F'ronr these facts, it may be inferred that a sudden 
check to the roots, by cutting away the top when yet 
green and flourishing, is injurious to the keeping pro- > 
perties of the root; and that even when cut down with ! 
frost, it is advisable to allow the root to remain some¬ 
what longer in the soil, in order that it may be more 
matured; and that this happens in the circumstances, 
is so far evident that roots so prepared seldom go wrong 
afterwards, if secured from frost, and if packed, or un¬ 
packed, in any other material, such as earth, sand, or 
moss, &c., are not exposed to the extremes of great 
dryness or much moisture. 
After what has been said lately on propagating, I 
need not here enter upon the propagation of desirable 
kinds of Dahlias. The tubers are generally placed in a 
sweet hotbed, not over warm; and when the young shoots 
are from three to four inches long they are slipped off 
with a heel from the tuber, or the shoot is cut at a joint 
when it is desirable to get as many plants as possible, 
as the joints left below the cutting removed may bo 
expected to yield each one or two cuttings. These cut¬ 
tings are placed in light sandy soil, and inserted in the 
hotbed, when, if ail goes well, they will soon strike root. 
Now, the peculiar mode of propagating to which I 
referred, is the not only cutting across at a joint, and i 
removing the leaves there, but slipping down the knite 
on each side when doing so, and thus reviving not only 
the leaves but the buds iu their axils; aud in some \ 
sorts it has been found, that when this is done you may 
have a large, fine tuber in autumn, but no buds and 
shoots from it in spring. It is preferable, therefore, to j 
have one or both of those buds at the base of the cut¬ 
ting when it is thus cut through at a joint. So tho¬ 
roughly are first-rate Dahlia growers convinced of the 
truth of this, that when they purchase a desirable and 
expensive novelty they do not like to depend upon that 
plant for stock the following year; but as soon as the 
plant begins to grow freely they slip off a few of the 
first side-shoots, when yet hard and stubby, before they 
have acquired much succulence; they make these into 
cuttings, leaving the bottom buds, and striking them, 
and growing them ; and though they do not bloom that 
season, they furnish a stock ot fine, healthy, small 
tubers for the ensuing year. 
Of Bedding-out Dahlias, I have seen several tried, and 
others recommended, that have answered with more or 
less success. The Scarlet Zelinda is a very fair thing, 
but the Purple Zelinda, though a poor thing, individu¬ 
ally, in a florist’s oyos, makes a splendid appearance 
either in a bed or row. Foiled as respects those I had 
carried home from such a distauco, I applied to, and re¬ 
ceived a few from, Mr. Gardener last spring, I am 
almost afraid to speak of the temperature to which they 
were subjected, and the railroad pace at which they were 
