November 7. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
95 
: involves a regular supply of good wood from the base 
to the top. It must be here remarked, that since the 
, Black Currant bears its principal crop on the annual j 
1 shoots, rather than on the spurs, means, of course, | 
must be taken by the pruner to excite and sustain a 
. regular sprinkling of such wood all over the tree; and 
in this case thero is not the same necessity for keeping 
j the middle of the bush open, as in the Red and White 
i Currant and Gooseberry. 
The Red and White Currants bear principally on 
the “ spurs,” as they are called; these are produced 
! abundantly on the sides of the main stems, of which j 
| there are generally nearly a dozen in a well-fonned 
j bush. So that our readers will at once see that 
the mode of pruning must differ widely from the 
Black Currant and Gooseberry. These bushes are 
generally trained, from the first, with a given number 
of branches, which are not often increased afterwards; 
if they are, it is on account of the great eligibility as to 
position that they occupy. The first business of the 
pruner is to run his knife up these main stems, wliioh 
will be found studded with spurs—some in groups, 
others scattered ; and from these the future crop must 
be obtaiued. 
Every lateral spur must be pruned back to about half- 
an-ineh, as near as possible; but whilst making use of 
the term every, which is, I confess, rather too sweeping, 
—let me observe that exceptions frequently occur. To 
understand these things, our worthy readers must just 
take a close examination for five minutes of these 
branches and their spurs. They will find, that the rule, 
with strong and healthy bushes, is, to produce abundance 
of side twigs, or lateral spray; and that, as an exception, 
little dimiuutive-looking twigs are produced amid these 
clusters of spray, which are of a sort of intermediate 
character, appearing as though nature, in forming them 
originally for shoots, had changed her mind suddenly, and 
clothed them with embryo blossom-buds. Such lengthened 
spurs are generally about two inches in length, and as 
full of blossom-buds as they can be. Some of the finest 
fruit will be produced from these, aud amid the devas¬ 
tations going on with the knife, they must, every one, 
be retained unpruned. Lastly, all the side-spurring 
being completed, the tops or leaders of the branches 
must be shortened, in order to cause them to develop 
side-spurs as they proceed, which long leaders will not 
do without the primer’s assistance; about six to eight 
inches each year may thus be left, the other, or point of 
the shoot pruned away. 
After pruning, I advise the same practice as with 
the Gooseberries (see page 74), providing they have 
been infested with the caterpillar; otherwise, it will 
suffice to give them a slight surface-dressing of any 
ordinary material containing some half-decayed vegetable 
matter, for, unless weakly, they do not require much of 
what is termed muck. It may here be observed that 
the White Dutch kind is of weaker growth than the 
Reds, and deserves a more liberal soil. Those who 
have not got Knight's Sweet Red should plant some; 
they are sweeter than others. 
R. Errington. 
MOVING EVERGREENS. —GRAFTING CONI¬ 
FERS.—PENDULOUS PLANTS. 
About the middle of last April, a correspondent asked 
if it was now too late for planting evergreens, and we 
replied, that it was then rather too early; that June is a 
better mouth for that particular work; that July and 
August are better still; and that September and October 
are the best time for the removal of all evergreens; that 
the man, or woman, who had sufficient patience to hold 
out till October, would, in two years, bo in advance of 
him or her who planted at once - at the end of spring. 
For many years, when I was in the busy world, I used 
to make a law, about Michaelmas, in each vear, that all 
planting should be finished, that year, at least, by 
Christmas. I then used to push, and tear, and strive 
with all my force; but, like more cost, more honour, the 
more 1 planted, the more it seemed to my employers 
that more planting must be done, before the improve¬ 
ments could be considered as at all like finished. Thus 
it was, and is, and will be, all over the gardening world, 
—you may begin late or early, but yon never seem to 
know the end of it. 
November is the best month, this season, for begin- 
ing general 'planting. I went over Mr. Jackson’s nursery 
grounds the other day, and, from what I saw there, I 
| made up my mind to call attention to this new fact; for 
i new it is, certainly. No one has ever heard a gardener 
! wishing to put off the planting of Evergreens, at loast, 
for a month, in the middle of October; but, if the 
I Messrs. Jackson, father and son, had offered to supply 
I me gratis with Evergreens, to try the experiment, I 
I should rather say,—“ No, I thank you; but just let them 
I be for one month longer, as I can plainly see that the 
i frost of the 24th of last April put them back one whole 
month, at least; besides, you see the Heliotropes and 
Dahlias are hardly hurt yet, and I never saw stock so 
flourishing and green at this late season; you surely do 
not mean to arrest the growth so suddenly by an earlier 
“drawing” than a month hence.” But my philosophy 
went like fiddlesticks, for they were more busily engaged 
“sending out” than they recollected to have been, so 
early, during the last forty years. Farmers, who could 
not go the length of a Laurel-bush a few years back, 
can now talk about “ Conifers and Corn-markets” in the 
same breath. They must plant, too, and they promise 
to pay punctually, or “ down upon the nail,” at once, to 
let you see they are in earnest At all events, if all be 
true, nurserymen are not likely to quarrel with bakers 
and soft-loaves this season. Therefore, seeing so many 
fresh customers in the field, or rather in the nurseries, 
I would advise a move for November planting at once. 
All kinds of trees and shrubs are better on their legs 
than I ever remember to have seen them in the autumn. 
Whether you take it in politics, in growth, or in plant¬ 
ing, this has been a very extraordinary season through¬ 
out. We shall, very likely, have not much winter till 
after the middle of January, and then we may have six 
weeks of it as hard as we had in 1830 ; but, let us hope, 
not quite so much snow at the beginning of April as we 
had that season. Now, I challenge all the almanacks 
about my estimate of next winter, and having been a 
private Murphy about the fine weather in October, I 
think I have some claim to urge on plantings of all 
kinds, and to have it all finished right off-hand before 
the 15th of January, at the furthest; also, every open 
spot in the garden, field, and nursery, ought to be 
turned upside-down, and ridged, and all the wheeling 
aud carting be put oft'till this great frost comes—if it 
will really come, as I expect it will, and just about that 
time. 
Late in the spring of 1833, I called on Mr. Godsal, 
nurseryman, at Hereford, who showed me a seedling 
Larch he had, which creeped along the surface of the 
ground like a Strawberry. We concluded it would 
make a Weeping Larch ; and now you may have it 
grafted, standard-high, in almost all the nurseries, and 
as weeping as the Weeping Ash itself. Mr. Jackson’s 
people are famous for grafting it ; and I saw fine plants 
of it there on sale. The way they graft it is different 
from the usual mode, but it seems very successful. It is 
grafted on the last year's leader, nine or ten, or more 
feet high, and on that part of the leader which is of the 
exact diameter as the graft at this part, the leader is cut 
clean off with an upright cut, the face of the cut being 
