February 20- 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
401 
against the expanded petals, quite a novel flower may be 
obtained, which will remain so till it falls off.—,T. M.” 
[For the very strongest and best show Geraniums buy 
Magnet, Basilisk, Optima, Zaria, Virginia, Topsy, Purple 
Perfection, Pearl, Cloth of Gold, Conspieuum, Oscellatuvn, 
Governor General, Enchantress, Carlos, Juliet, Mochana, 
Rowena, Ajax, Fete Noir, Andover, and Gain's Conqueror, 
with Turner’s Petruchio, and, our word for it, you will have 
a score of the very best and very strongest Geraniums in all 
England. You must certainly call them Pelargoniums , for 
they are not common enough yet to be called Geraniums. 
Verbenas —King of Purples, or Purple King, was bred and 
born in London smoke, and is the best purple ; Ellen is a 
beauty, and as strong nearly as Defiance, the colour is 
mulberry; Andre is a strong red purple; Lady Holland, a 
strong light sort; Cleopatra, a crimson; and Alba magna, a 
large white; Defiance is the best scarlet for London. 
Calceolarias —Ajax is the strongest, a large yellow and 
brown. We had a fine specimen of it in November, from 
Mr. Pince, of Exeter, with a promise of its merits ; Kentish 
Hero and Sultan are two good sorts; Amplexicaulis and 
Coe’s Yellow are very good. 
We do not know the “ Pagoda Fuchsia.” The Duchess of 
Lancaster is the best white pot Fuchsia we have seen ; but 
there are new white ones this season which promise novelty.] 
KENNEDYA RUBICUNDA AND ACACIA FALCATA. 
“ A Constant Reader of The Cottage Gardener would 
be much obliged by being informed of the names of the 
leaves enclosed, Nos. 1, 2, 0. 
“No. lisa climber. Please to inform me if the spots 
under the leaf are blight. 
“ No. 2 is taken from a plant five or six feet high.” 
[No. 1 is a species of Kennedya, with Pea-shaped flowers, 
probably Rubicunda, but cannot be decided by one small 
leaf. The “blight” is really the dry white scale, and, for 
a climber, there is no remedy to cure it, except cutting 
down the plant to the surface of the ground, painting all 
the place it covered, and watching that a fresh colony of 
scale does not come up from the roots ; and if it does, the 
only remedy is the entire destruction of the plant, or rather 
the climber. Many kinds of plants can be cured of the dry 
scale by first pruning off all the young wood and leaves, 
then casing them for awhile in clay paint. 
No. 2 is the leaf of a very pretty yellow flower, which 
comes always in the spring— Acacia falcata, or one very 
near falcata; but there are some hundreds of kinds, and 
it is not easy to say, to a certainty, the exact kind, but 
we are almost sure of your plant; and we see by the leaf 
tho place is too dry for it, or you keep it too dry at the 
roots. These Acacias require regular watering, and good 
loamy soil. 
No. 3 may be twenty kinds of plants we know. It is a 
general leaf. It may be of a Chinese Azalea, or a Silver-tree 
from the Cape, or a dozen of New Holland plants. It is 
only the merest chance to know a plant from the small leaf, 
and it seems like “ Love’s labour lost” to send leaves only : 
if a flower cannot be sent, at least a small branch might.] 
SUN-FLOWER SEED. 
“ Having seen by The Cottage Gardener, and also by 
the Dictionary, that you recommend the Sunflower to he 
cultivated in the field, I am disposed to try, say one acre. 
Now, what I want to know is, what particular use the oil is 
of; and who I should get to extract it, and make cake, for I 
should think that way would pay best? Any other inform¬ 
ation respecting it, and its market value, will oblige.— 
T. A. S.” 
[There are in London parties who by trade are “ Seed- 
crushers and Oil-pressers." They would give you every 
information as to that part of your object. We do not 
know the qualities of Sunflower oil, but the same parties 
would probably tell you its market value. Tho cake, we 
have no doubt, would be as valuable as oil-cake for cattle 
fatting. The seed is very nutritious and stimulating when 
given to poultry. In an early volume of “ The Gardeners’ 
Magazine,” we find it stated, that in Portugal the young 
side-slioots are eaten seasoned with oil and salt; bread is 
made of the seeds, and also a sort of groats; that a useful 
and edible oil may be expressed from them, and that they 
are good for fattening poultry. The leaves of the plant 
form an excellent forage, especially for cows and sheep. 
1 he stems will do for props for twining or climbing plants ; 
afterwards they make good fuel, and their ashes afford 
potash. In some parts of America they roast the seeds 
and use them as coffee. 
The oil is said to be as delicate in flavour as that from 
the Olive, and is much used by the Russians in their 
cookery. Their mode of extracting the oil, we read, is to 
put toe seeds into bags, steep them in warm water, and then 
to submit them to the press. The oil so expressed is said 
to be as sweet as butter.] 
BROCOLI FOR A SUCCESSIVE SUPPLY. 
“ You will greatly oblige by informing me which are the 
best Brocoli for one year’s supply for a small family. Also 
the time to sow each sort, and the time of cutting.—R. S.” 
[Sow Purple Cape and Grange's Early in the second week 
of April and the first week of May. They will produce 
heads from October until the middle of December. Sow 
Knight's Protecting in the first week of April, the heads will 
be useable from November to the end of January. Sow 
Brimstone, or Elletson’s Mammoth in the second week of 
April ; the heads will be in use from February until the end 
of April. Sow Brimstone and Spring White in the second 
week of April; their heads will be ready for use during the 
following April and May. With the above you combine 
variety with succession; but it is much easier to keep up a 
constant succession with one variety only, the Walcliercn, 
if true to name. If sown first during the first fortnight of 
March, and at intervals of four weeks until about the middle 
of June, good heads may be obtained in succession from 
October until the beginning of May.] 
DIPLADENIA CRASSINODA DYING DOWN. 
“I have a Dipladenia crassinoda which has died back to 
its roots. Will it break again? I have examined its roots, 
and find they are all healthy. Will the tubers make plants 
if they are divided and potted singly ? Is it deciduous ? 
An answer, with a few hints of its culture, will oblige.—A 
Subscriber." 
[The plant, we suspect, has been too cold; it should not 
be lower than from 55° to C0°, and at that temperature, 
during the winter, it should be kept dry rather than wet, 
and a few leaves may fall. The best thing you can do is to 
plunge the pot, by-and-by, into a sweet bottom-heat, and if 
the roots, or that part called the collar is alive, shoots will be 
produced. When these are a few inches long repot in fresh 
compost, aired and warmed previously, consisting of two 
parts peat-earth, one of fibry loam, one of leaf-mould, and 
one of silver-sand and bits of charcoal; keep in a growing 
temperature of from 00° to 85°, and in summer a less close 
place will suit it. Towards the middle of September, take it 
back to a plant-stove, and keep it, as said above, in a heat 
of from 55° to 60° in winter. When starting into growth 
again give a moist heat, and bottom-heat will be relished.] 
WHITE CAMELLIA PETALS BECOME RUSTY AT 
THEIR EDGES. 
“ As my Camellias all become tinged as the flower ex¬ 
pands, and many of them in the bud, I hope that you can 
assign a cause, or throw some light upon the subject. 
“ The plants are grown in pots (and are perfectly healthy) 
in a span-roofed greenhouse. The house has been erected a 
year, is heated with hot-water, but only occasionally to keep 
out frost. They turn the same, whether the house is heated 
or not, and in all weathers. They do not change in a lean-to 
greenhouse about twenty yards from the house mentioned. 
—T. M.” 
[AYe have found the effect noticed produced in a span- 
roofed house by too much sunshine striking the buds when 
they were wet with drippings from the roof, and more espe¬ 
cially if there was iron in the roof. 
