399 
THE COTTAGE HARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, March 30, 1858. 
worthless. Not a heavy cropper; with moderate haulm; 
liable to disease. This variety I should not recommend. 
Bond’s Kidney, or Early Stockton. —This is a valuable 
early variety, with short haulm, and curly foliage. It is an 
excellent cropper. Tubers white, full size, good shape, and 
generally free from disease. This variety is suitable for light 
or sandy soils. 
Irish Apple. —A few years since this variety was exten¬ 
sively grown about Worcester, in consequence of its freedom 
from disease ; it is, however, nearly superseded by the Fluke. 
It is a large, hollow-eyed, mottled Potato; of strong growth, 
a good cropper, and tolerable good flavour. 
White Irish Apple, orEARMER’s G-lory. —This variety, 
on some soils, is excellent. It is a deep-eyed, full-sized, round, 
white Potato; a good cropper, and an excellent keeper; but 
I strong grower.—E. Bennett, Perdiswell. 
(To be continued.) 
PLACING A SWARM IN THE STOCKS 
PLACE. 
Ip those who place the swarm, where the parent stock stood, 
keep in view the one legitimate result of that procedure, viz., 
the strengthening of the swarm, by drawing more or less upon 
the stock, I feel warranted, from my experience in the matter, 
in affirming that the method will be found to realise their ex¬ 
pectations. When failures arise, they are apt to occur in those 
instances where other ends are sought to be obtained, over 
and above its true and only one. 
In one of my earliest communications to The Cottage 
Hardener, Yol. XVII., page 81, some slight allusion is made 
to this subject, in connection with capturing the queen ; and, 
in some strictures which Mr. Wighton made thereon, he con¬ 
demned the principle, on the ground of its reducing the stock 
to an useless skeleton. Now, the reduction of the stock to 
some extent, is both admitted and desired, but that it reduces 
it to the shadow of what it once was, the experience, not 
only of myself but others, contradicts, as it can by no means be 
relied on as a preventive of second swarms (vide Mr. Teget- 
meier, a few numbers back) ; and if this practice is followed in 
the hope of accomplishing this, failures will result. But it is 
not the plan, but the expectations, that are at fault, in such 
a case. 
I have had cases where no after swarms took place, but it 
is very doubtful how much this system had to do with this 
result. Neither is it more certain that they would have 
swarmed, had they been simply let alone. To reduce the 
prevention of second swarms to a physical certainty, nothing 
short of the excision of the royal brood will, in my opinion, 
be effectual. 
Mr. Ferguson says, that the practice with him and others 
has been attended by a great increase of drones. That an 
extra quantity of drones have been observed by him, in hives 
thus treated, I do not question, but I cannot trace a closer 
connection between cause and effect here, than there is be¬ 
tween Tenterden Steeple and Hoodwin Sands. 
I adopt this practice, and with good results, when striking 
unicomb hives. I capture the queen of a first swarm, either at 
the moment of flight (as noticed at volume and page afore¬ 
said), or take her out of the hive when hived. In the last 
case, after the queen is secured, the parent stock is removed, 
and the unicomb put in its place ; the swarm is then shaken 
out, and as they begin to return the queen is lodged in her 
new palace. I have found this plan to simplify and make easy 
this otherwise troublesome and difficult operation.—D. H. 
MLellan, Rutherglen, near Glasgow. 
QUERIES AND ANSWERS. 
PROPAHATINH CENOTHERA RIPARIA alias 
PROSTRATA. 
“ I left, last autumn, some plants of the CEnothera riparia 
in the bed, where they had grown all the summer, and I find 
that they have put up a quantity of suckers from the old roots. 
I wish to increase my stock of it, and will you, therefore, 
kindly tell me whether the roots will bear dividing, and when 
they ought to be divided ? and whether they should be planted 
again at once in the open ground, or in a frame ? What is 
the right name of this little CEnothera ? I have seen it called 
riparia , reparia, vivipara. and viperii. Which is correct ? ” 
—H. B. 
[The garden name of this CEnothera is prostrata (trailing), 
and the other name is spelt riparia , and means a plant grow¬ 
ing on a bank. Oaks grow on banks; therefore, as the word 
riparia gives no idea of the plant, prostrata is the better name. 
It is the most accommodating plant in England. In six 
weeks, from the 1st of April, you may make 600 plants from 
one old plant, which has six shoots, or suckers, rising from 
the roots, and all these plants will flower not more than ten 
days later than an old plant would do. If you defer making 
the cuttings till the shoots from the old plant have formed 
flower-buds, towards the end of May, and then make cuttings 
of the flowering tops, they will root in seven or eight days, 
and will be in full bloom before you part them. That is the 
secret of getting this CEnothera prostrata to do where the soil 
is too rich, or too damp, for it, causing it to go too much to leaf. 
It has been recently proved in the Experimental Harden that 
CEnothera prostrata may be grown on or in a Celery trench, 
in the kitchen garden, and bloom most abundantly to the end 
of September, by making cuttings of flowering shoots on the 
old plants, towards the 20th of May. Three or four hundred 
cuttings were so treated last May. Every joint of the shoots 
on your plant will root in a few days. Then you may cut up 
the roots just as you would chop Parsley, and sow them as 
you would Lobelia seeds; and if you do that any day before 
the 25th of April, every plant of them will bloom from the 
1st of June, provided your soil suits it. But to make sure of 
it, suppose you have 500 plants rooted and established by 
the 20th of May, top them all, and make the tops into cut¬ 
tings, and the last plants will bloom as freely on a ridge of 
rotten dung as the April-struck plants would do on rock- 
work.] 
OUTSIDE BLINDS FOR A GREENHOUSE. 
“ Will you be kind enough to tell me the best material to 
use for outside blinds to my greenhouse ? I find that, with 
exposure to the sun and wet, what I have hitherto used perish 
very quickly. The plan I adopt, for letting them up and 
down, I like better than any I have seen. It is this—my 
house is twenty-four feet long, and is a lean-to. The wall is 
ten feet high. I have two rollers fixed at the front, with a 
small handle at each end to turn them round. Three cords 
are attached to each blind—one in the middle, the others at 
each end, and pass through pulleys fixed at the top of the 
wall. To these are hung heavy weights, which, when the 
handle is set at liberty, pull up the blind to the height re¬ 
quired. The strain keeps the blind secure in Avindy weather, 
and the whole is so simple, it cannot get out of order. My 
Aveights rim down the back of the wall, but they might be 
brought inside the house if required, and boxed up. I find 
the copper cordage the best for this purpose. 
“ I will also give you a very simple plan I adopt for my 
shelves, which prevents any drip from one shelf to another. 
I cut an eleven-inch deal in two, and fasten them on the 
brackets, leaving a space of three quarters of an inch between 
the two from end to end. I then nail two thin laths in the 
shape of a V under this opening, taking care to give a slight 
fall to one end; at this end I attach a small piece of gas¬ 
piping, and either carry it down to the shelf beloAv, or through 
the wall, and thus at once get rid of all the superfluous water 
and grit that will drain from the pots, and is so detrimental to 
the foliage and flowers beneath. The bracket should be bevelled, 
so as to allow a slight fall to the centre space. 
“ Perhaps you Avill also tell me, what is the best material to 
use for plunging pots in over an iron tank ? ”—C. E. Lucas, 
Louth. 
[We do not know anything that would suit better for 
shading, than Tiffany, or Frigi Domo ; both are good, but the 
Avearing will depend on the treatment and care. For your 
plan, you would require stoutish canvass, or calico. We are 
obliged for your plan of shading, but it has been described in 
this serial, and is more fitted for large houses, than for one so 
I 
