April ii, 1908. 
THE GARDENING WORLD . 
251 
Address: The Editor, The Gardening 
World, 37 and 38, Shoe Lane, London, E.C. 
The Editor invites enquiries, which may 
cover any branch of gardening. Questions 
should be as brief as -possible and written on 
one side of the paper only; a separate sheet 
of paper should be used for each question. 
Replies cannot be sent by post. 
Garden Plans .—Gardeners who would make 
the best use of this column are invited to 
prepare and forward to us a rough outline 
drawing or plan of their gardens, indicating 
the position of beds and lawns, the charac¬ 
ter and height of the fence or wall; posi¬ 
tion of vegetable garden, orchard, etc. The 
north side of the garden and any over¬ 
shadowing buildings should be denoted. It 
should also be stated whether the garden is 
-flat or on a declivity, and all large trees 
should be marked. Particulars of the na¬ 
ture of the soil will also help us to give 
satisfactory replies. When such plans are 
received they will be carefully fled, with 
the name and address of the sender, and 
will be consulted by the Editor whenever an 
enquiry is sent. 
'rrrrrrrrrrrrrrr^ 
STOVE AND GREENHOUSE. 
2754. Tulips Failing to Flower. 
I venture again to ask your advice, thank¬ 
ing you ait the same time for your answer to 
my last enquiry. I now send you some of 
the Tulip bulbs which have failed. They 
are, I think, some Dutch bulbs, Mon Tresor. 
They were put into boxes in the autumn and 
plunged in ashes, then taken into a shed and 
later in January brought on in a cool green¬ 
house, where they have had plenty of light 
and a certain amount of heat. Not one of 
the bulbs in three boxes have flowered, and 
you will see the state of the leaves. You 
suggest this may be the work of some Tulip 
disease. I shall be glad if, after examining 
the bulbs, you will tell me what you think. 
I was surprised to hear what you say about 
the Hyacinths not being lifted from soil and 
used for bowls in the house. I know florists 
often do this, and the leaves do not seem to 
suffer in the way mine have done. (A. E. C., 
Guernsey.) 
We have examined the bulbs you sent us, 
and they appeared quite large enough to 
bloom, but we failed to find any fungoid 
disease attacking them. Usually that shows 
upon the foliage and also the flower at a 
later date of the season, and presumably the 
present is in advance of the time for the 
fungus to act. When the old scales of the 
bulbs are removed the inner ones appear 
quite fresh. There were, however, a con¬ 
siderable number of animal pests between 
the scales of the bulbs, the outer ones of 
which were decaying. For instance, there 
were small slugs, a worm allied to the 
earthworm, but not the same, some nematoid 
1 worms without colour and a few acari or 
mites. The roots were mostly dead or had 
stopped growing. On the whole we think 
it is something wrong with the soil. Either 
it has been used several times, or the ashes 
are dirty by having come in contact with 
plants previously. We think it would be to 
your advantage to see that the plunging ma¬ 
terial and the soil in which the bulbs are 
planted or potted is clean or free from ver¬ 
min. All garden soils in which there is 
much decaying matter usually harbour a 
great many of these animal pests of plant 
life, and it would be a good plan to set 
about cleaning them. In the open garden 
'Various plans are adopted for that, but 
amongst the various remedies that have come 
under our attention we think that “Vaporite” 
is the most powerful. It is not injurious to 
plant life if simply mixed with the soil, so 
that when you commence potting or boxing 
bulbs next autumn, or rather some weeks 
previous to this, you should give the soil a 
good dusting with “Vaporite” and 
thoroughly mix the same. After a, time this 
material gives off fumes that are very in¬ 
jurious and distasteful to insects, either 
killing them or driving them out of the soil 
in which they are hiding. When you take 
the boxes out of the plunging material it 
would be a better plan to put them in a cold 
frame, so as to thoroughly expose them to 
light. We cannot lay too much stress upon 
the importance of exposing bulbs to light 
in their earlier stages. In a state of nature 
the bulbs commence growing with the au¬ 
tumn rains, and the leaves of Tulips and 
Hyacinths appear above the ground early in 
winter. They do not make very much 
growth, but all the time the leaves are being 
acted upon by sunlight and storing up ma¬ 
terial for the strengthening of the flower 
stem later on, that being the lafest move on 
the part of the bulb to perform its mission. 
If the plants were close to the glass, fully 
exposed to light after taking them into the 
greenhouse, that was proper and right for 
their welfare, but they were in a shed too 
long. We are aware that florists lift a 
variety of bulbs and put them into pots so 
as to make sure of their being uniform, but 
we think you will find that thev are either 
in flower or so close on the point of it that 
little more remains to be done, and their 
welfare and blooming is then entirely de¬ 
pendent upon the bulbs. The operation of 
lifting breaks many of the rcots, including 
the young and active root tips, which alone 
are capable of absorbing plant food for the 
use of the foliage. In any case, even if the 
plants flower properlv the lifting has the 
effect of greatly deteriorating the bulbs for 
any use to which they may be put after¬ 
wards. Florists do not care if they are 
thrown, away after thev have bloomed. 
Daffodils are very troublesome subjects to 
lift, but particularly Narcissus poeticus and 
its allies. Usuallv thev come blind when 
disturbed during their growing period. 
COLD FRAMES . 
2755. Sowing Auricula Seed. 
If you could give a series of articles on 
the Auricula in vour valuable paper it would 
be much appreciated. (T. H. Hurt, Bir¬ 
mingham.) 
As the present is a suitable time for sow¬ 
ing seed of the Auricula, a r.aragraph to 
that aspect of cultivation might be of as¬ 
sistance to other readers as well as you. As 
the seed may take some time to germinate, 
it is well to carefully drain as many pots or 
seed pans as may be required. Cover the 
crocks with some rough pieces of compost, 
moss, or rough leaves. The Auricula grows 
in a variety of soils, but you might mix two 
parts of loam to one of leaf-mould and half¬ 
part sand. Sift the whole that you may 
use the finer material on the top, of which 
there should be a depth at least of 2 in. 
This allows the seedlings free play to ger¬ 
minate, and the seedlings can also more 
readily be removed from such a soil with¬ 
out disturbing others that may not be suffi¬ 
ciently far advanced. Press this soil fairly 
firm, and level it. Sow the seeds thinly all 
over the surface, and cover them with a thin 
layer of the same fine soil used immediately 
beneath them. Stand the pans in a cold 
frame facing the north. To save any neces¬ 
sity for watering at the early stages, a pane 
of glass could be put over each pan. When 
the seedlings commence to come up a little 
air must be given by tilting the glass, other¬ 
wise the seedlings may damp off. This can 
be done by putting four pegs in the pan, so 
as to support the glass at the desired height. 
Before the seedlings get crowded, transplant 
them carefully into other seed pans or boxes. 
Use a stout but thin peg to lift them out 
with all the roots intact if possible. Give 
sufficient room to allow of the seedlings mak¬ 
ing rosettes of some size, because at the next 
transplanting they should be potted up 
singly in thumb pots. The smaller seedlings, 
which may be due to late germination, 
should be left in the soil after mak¬ 
ing it level, and possibly some of them 
may prove to be of considerable value. Very 
frequently the best ones are slow in ger¬ 
minating. The boxes into which thev are 
transplanted should be returned to the cold 
frame and kept rather close for a week until 
the rcots begin to move in the fresh soil. 
After this they should have plenty of ven¬ 
tilation, being kept cool and looked after 
each day for any necessary watering. 
2756. Rearing Schizanthus Grahami 
in Pots. 
Could you tell me how to rear Schizan¬ 
thus Grahami in pots, so that I could put 
them into the conservatory when coming into 
bloom? Will they be in bloom by August 
if sown now? (Jno. Pratt, Cambs.) 
You can easily have this plant in bloom 
by August, or before that, even if the seed¬ 
lings are only brought along in a cold frame. 
The seeds may be sown in pots or pans of 
loam, leaf-mould, and sand in equal propor¬ 
tions. When they have made the first rough 
leaf you can transfer them to boxes till they 
have made little plants iJ, in. to 2 in. high. 
You could, indeed, pot them singly from the 
first, but possibly it would be less trouble to 
you to get them to some size by growing 
them in boxes for a while. The seed pans 
should at first be put into a cold frame, and 
the boxes likewise after the seedlings are 
transplanted. Keep the frame close for a 
day or two after disturbance^, and shade them 
if the sun should be bright, but after that 
they should be freely exposed to light and 
air. The frame should be tilted up at the 
back. By this time you will see which of 
the plants are likely to grow strong and 
vigorously; then vou can pot them off singly 
in thumb pots. Return the pots to the cold 
frame, and stand them as thickly together 
as the pots will allow. You can then water 
them with a rosed watering can. At the 
next shift you can put them in 3-in. pots, and 
use some well-rotted cow dung rubbed up 
fine for that potting. You can use a larger 
quantity at the second and final potting, so 
as to make the soil rich. They can be 
flowered in q in. or 6 in. pots, according to 
the size of the plant. If the plants seem to 
be comfnsr on too fast, the antidote for a 
while will be to give them more air, and 
when the weather becomes warm you can 
stand them cut of doors on a bed of ashes in 
