207 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, January 8, 1861. 
Nectarines, New White, Violette Hative, and Elruge ; and of 
Plums, Green and Purple Gage : but the best of all was the 
new White Nectarine.— A. J. Ashman. 
MUSHROOMS IN SHALLOW BEDS. 
During last winter, or rather the close of winter, I tried the 
effeet of shallow beds for Mushrooms with great success. Thus 
three inches of soil were removed from under the back wall of a 
vinery, this opening was filled up with two inches of fresh liorse- 
droppings, spawned, and allowed to stand three days, then 
earthed up, and to my delight a splendid crop of Mushrooms 
came up, just when the thermometer indicated 60° in the vinery 
about the middle of March. The spawn ran into the soil be¬ 
neath, but a very little.—A. Z. 
[We have frequently had shallow beds in summer when we 
wished a quick return on the same principle. In fact, we have 
sometimes inserted spawn into rich soil and with similar results. 
The heat of the vinery was your great auxiliary. If 10° more heat 
were given the Mushrooms would have come thin and skinny, 
and, perhaps, become maggotty. We once lived in a place 
where there was a good Mushroom-house, but we have seen 
more Mushrooms from a house half the size in a week, as from 
that in a twelvemonth. The trees of Peach-houses and vineries 
were generally supplied with horse and cowdung inside every 
year, and from these borders inside prizes were frequently ob¬ 
tained for fine Mushrooms, though they could get few or none 
in the Mushroom-house. We like all the varied information we 
can get. There are many varied modes for doing the same thing.] 
ACACIA PUBESCENS FOR THE BACK WALL 
OF A GREENHOUSE. 
SEVERITY OF THE SEASON. 
I see in your answers to correspondents, page 164, in answer 
to “ A Young- Beginner,” you recommend for covering a back 
wall of a greenhouse, Camellias and Acacia armata. Permit me 
with all deference to your superior judgment to recommend to his 
notice the following plant, which for beauty of foliage, freeness 
of blooming, rapidity of growth, the ease with which it may be 
trained to cover a wall, and if required to be trained down the 
rafters or ends of the house, I think is not surpassed; and above 
all, I have found it of the whole family that I am acquainted 
with, the most free from that pest the scale. I allude to Acacia 
pubescens (the true kind), for I have known respectable nurseries 
have another plant for it, and met with many gardeners, good 
practical men, and good general plant men, who do not even 
know it at all. I remember some seventeen or eighteen years 
since a fine plant at Clapham trained to a back wall, and to the 
ends of the house (an intermediate one), which was truly grand 
when in flower, and I also remember how glad we young blue- 
aprons (aye, and old ones too) used to be, if we were short of 
bloom and had a bouquet to make, and flowers scarce and 
snow on the ground, if we could get our kind friend, the head 
gardener, to help us with a spray or two. Why, we had our 
bouquet as wo thought almost made. I think if our practicals of 
the present day would only look round and about them, they 
would find plenty of good, sterling, well-to-do, easy-going, good- 
natured plants, which would well repay them for their trouble 
by a good show of bloom when flowers are in general scarce. 
Some day I may, with your permission, give a list in The 
Cottage Gardener of such as have come under my notice, 
with the view of drawing from others their opinions and prac¬ 
tical knowledge of such things. 
But to return to my Acacias. The following I have seen 
trained up pillars and walls, but I do not like any so well as 
A. pubescens—viz., A. armata. This in a few years gets too stiff 
and formal, and unless well cut back each year to form young 
blooming wood would soon fill a house, to say nothing of scale. 
A. lophantha : This is a strong grower, yet if well trained while 
the shoots are growing may be made to answer the purpose, and 
last for a year or two, but unless the roots are confined it soon 
runs over the place. A. pulchella : This is a nice kind for a wall 
in good hands. A. olesefolia elegans if trained up a pillar or rafter, 
and the pendulous branches allowed to hang down, looks ex¬ 
ceedingly pretty. The same may be said of angustifolia, verti- 
cillata, juniperina, grandis, lineata, and rotundifolia. I have 
seen longifolia, heterophylla, platyptera, and a few others tried, 
but I think they want a much larger house than most of the 
readers of The Cottage Gardener have to give them. 
I will, in conclusion, just say we are in the midst of a severe 
winter: it commenced on the 18th ult., snow on the 19th, with 
large flocks of wild fowl passing over from the north-east to 
south-west. Snow is six inches to eight inches deep, not drifted 
by the wind. The thermometer at 12 o’clock on the 25th in 
the shade registered 22° of frost, and snipes might be seen by 
scores at a small drain or watercourse in one of the fields 
within fifty yards of the turnpike road. At 6 o’clock that even¬ 
ing the thermometer stood at 8°, at 9 o’clock, the thermometer 
began rising—viz., 12°, wind north-east by north —Pilsby Nur¬ 
series , near Clay Cross. 
ROOT-PRUNE! ROOT-PRUNE! ROOT-PRUNE! 
The late Sir Robert Peel’s principal watchword, or wai’-cry, 
in the fierce days of political party fights was, “Register! 
Register! Register!” I am given to understand by an enthu¬ 
siastic Peelite friend of mine that this was and is the ne plus 
ultra of political wisdom. Being remarkably verdant in these 
matters, I accept it with simple unquestioning faith; and I 
thought that it would suit me admirably to introduce my subject 
of root-pruning. I say, then, to all growers of pyramid Pears, 
Plums, &c., “Boot-prune! Root-prune! Root-prune!” and now 
is the time to do it. 
As the theory of root-pruning has been so cleverly argued and 
convincingly proved in The Cottage Gardener to the perfect 
satisfaction of all, I need not stop to say anything; but as there 
may be amongst new subscribers some neophyte seeking for a 
little practical information, I thought I would detail our mode 
of proceeding. I may as well say that, not being a relative of 
the Pope of Rome, 1 do not claim infallibility for anything I 
either do or say. 
Our pyramids are some of them seven to eight feet high, and 
very tidy cone-like specimens they are, though I say it. Well, 
to begin at the beginning. We go up to a tree and look at it; 
and if the branches are in any way spreading—one of Mr. Rivers’ 
“ diffuse ” customers, for instance, we get some string and tie 
the branches inwards, so as to give us fair play. Then with the 
eye we guess a distance at which to put in the spade to dig out 
the trench ; but as guess work is noted for its uncertainty, I 
have taken actual measurements, and here they are :—from the 
bole of the tree to the outer edge of the trench 2 feet 6 inches, 
or from that to 3 feet, not more. With our left hand to the 
tree we keep digging round and round till we have got below the 
principal roots. Then with a sharp knife we cut off all the roots 
close to the soil on the left hand side of the trench; but as Pear 
stocks are rather jesuitical in their ramifications, insinuating 
themselves into every conceivable corner, we have to adopt extra 
measures. We then take the four-grained fork and begin (for 
want of a better word), to “ piggle ” underneath, all round by the 
edge of the concrete upon which the trees are planted, to see if 
we can find the cause of gross watery shoot# in the shape of a fat 
root or two, which are off into the darkness in search of some¬ 
thing. If we do find them we use the knife to persuade- them 
to stop. We cut them off, and then fill in the trench, tread¬ 
ing the soil firmly in as we proceed. By the way, ours is 
light gravelly land. “Very simple this,” I hear some one 
say. Yes, yes, my friend, but very effective as the result will 
show. 
Whilst on the subject of Pears, we have in our garden at this 
time an espalier Louise Bonne of Jersey, which has this year 
borne a crop of fruit, and on the 12th of November was in flower. 
If I was to send this information to any of the county papers it 
might shine as a lusus naturae, or as a parallel paragraph to the 
monster Turnips and gigantic Cabbages which are chronicled 
about this time; but as it is explainable in a few words, th« 
result of a very simple cause, I do not think it is worth setting 
the Thames or Trent on fire about it. 
This tree was one amongst a lot that were lifted in October, 
1858. It so happened, on account of some alterations, that they 
had to be shifted in November, 1859. This spring all the fullest 
plumpest fruit-buds burst, set their fruit, and matured them. 
The late summer being so moist the trees have kept growing; 
and thus the weak immature fruit-buds have gathered strength 
to develope themselves, and at this time open their flowers.— 
N. H. Pownall, Holme Pierrepoint, Nottingham. 
