3 2 ° 
THE GARDENING WORLD , 
May 9, 1908. 
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 I'lans . — 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. 
STOVE AMO GSEZfjHG USL 
2823. Flowering- Plants for Unheated 
Greenhouse. 
I have a greenhouse (unheated) in a very 
sunny position-, and would like a lis-t of 
plants to flo-wer during summer -to keep up 
a display. I do not want anything difficult 
to grow, but plants that will give plenty of 
flowers. (E. H. Collins, Norfolk.) 
Plants that may be gro-wn. in an un-heated 
structure and prove quite hardy there are 
Indian Az-aleas, Fuchsias, the common Hy¬ 
drangea, also H. paniculata, East Lothian 
and B romp-ton Stocks, Statice profusa, Cyti- 
sus racemo-sa (Genista), Coronilla glauca, 
tuberous Begonias, and such -things of that 
sort. If you had the m-eans of raising seed¬ 
lings of Petunias and night-scented Tobacco 
they would flo-wer in- such a house during 
summer. If yc-u woul-d like climbers yo-u 
could, no doubt, manage Plumbago caoen-sis 
and the scarlet Honeysuckle (Lon.icera sem- 
perv-i-rens). Several of the above supply any 
number of varieties, so that you could fur¬ 
nish a large house and -have a fair amount 
of variety with the above. 
2824. Growing Amaryllis. 
I have some bulbs of Amaryllis, which I 
want to grow in the greenhouse. What soil 
should I use, and w-ill they require -much 
water? (B. Westbury, Surrey.) 
You may use a compost consisting of three 
parts of loam, one part of leaf soil, -half part 
of welbdecayed cow manure, and sufficient 
sand -to make the soil po-rous. The cow 
manure, if you can get it dry, so that it can 
be rubbed through a ^ in. sieve, would mix 
batter with the soil -and prove more suitable 
for the purpose than if put in in lumps. 
Pot .rather firmly and stand the pots in a 
greenhouse. If the soil d-s fairly -moist at 
the time of potting -no water need be given 
until the soil shows signs of -getting dry. 
Indeed, only sufficient waiter will be neces¬ 
sary to kee-D the soil moist until plenty c-f 
roots -have been formed and the bulbs com¬ 
mence to grow. What you will have to bear 
in mind is to be very sparing of the water¬ 
ing pot u-ntil the plants are in full growth, 
and when that stage has been reached you 
can apply it liberally, giving a weak dose 
o-f 1-iouid manure at every second watering. 
2825. Bulbs aftei* Flowering. 
What -is the -best thing to do with Hya¬ 
cinths, Tulips and Narcissi which are flower¬ 
ing in pots and some of them gone over? 
(J. W. Ctark. Kent.) 
After the bulbs go out of flower, bulbs that 
are to be preserved should not be put out¬ 
side, nor stood under the - stages to be 
neglected. Keep them well exposed to light 
and -the soil .moist until the foliage shows 
signs of dying off, when water can be gra¬ 
dually withheld. It would be much less 
trouble .if you were .to p-ut them in a cold 
frame for a week or so to accustom the 
foliage ito the stronger light an-d air, then to 
plant .them out in good soil in the open with¬ 
out breaking the ball of soil. The bulbs 
could then complete their growth, requiring 
but little attention. If the b-ulbs are simply 
planted without breaking the balls of soil, 
the roots will -get little check and the bulbs 
will -partly recuperate after -having been 
grown in -a greenhouse. You are not likely 
to -get the Hyaoint-hs In such good condition 
as when, you had them, but yo-u may calc u ■ 
laite upon -getting the bulbs of Tuli-ps and 
Narcissi -into sufficiently -good condition after 
a year or two in -the open, to be worth while 
growing in pots again. After -the bulbs d-ie 
do-wn you can dto them up, -gradually dry 
them, a-nd -store -them away in a cool place 
until you can plant -them again -in the au¬ 
tumn. You can then give them more space, 
and the -bulbs will make rapid progress dur¬ 
ing the second season of growth. The Hya¬ 
cinths may be planted out permanently in 
any part of the garden and treated like or¬ 
dinary border plants. 
COLD FRAMES. 
2826. Rearing Sweet Williams. 
If I sow S-weet Williams no-w in a cold 
frame will they bloom this year? They are 
said to be biennial. Does that mean that 
they die after the second year? If so, can 
I save seed of them and preserve them in that 
way? Please give me some hints about 
them. (T. Lewis, Berks.) 
Sweet Williams are really perennials, an-d 
will not -bloom this year. What you should 
do is to grow them as strongly as possible 
during -the present year, and next year you 
will have -plants o-f large size that will give 
quite a number of flower -stems. They are 
really perennials, although it is usual to 
class them with biennials, a-s they are given 
the same treatment. A-nof-ber .reason for -this 
is that during the second year of flowering 
the plants -are--net always so good as during 
the first. For that reason many people raise 
a fresh supply every year. It is no-t neces¬ 
sary to preserve seeds c-f the. finer kinds as 
you can take off pieces with roots and plant 
them in fresh ground -or ro-ct cuttings in a 
cold frame during the summer. It Jshighly 
advantageous, however, to raise a fresh 
supply every year from seed, because you can 
then single out the poor varieties, leaving 
nothing but ‘the very best, and in the course 
of a few years you would have a collection 
of very choice varieties. Sow seeds in boxes 
at the -present time, and as soon as they have 
made the first pair of rough leaves you can 
transplant them into other boxes 2 in. apart 
each way and keep them in- cold frames until 
they .have attained some size. You can then 
prepare a piece of ground in the open and 
plant them out in nursery lines about 6 in. 
apar-t each way at leas-t, although r ft. be¬ 
tween the li-nes would give a better opportu¬ 
nity of -keeping the ground clean. By Octo¬ 
ber these plants should be of good size, and 
you can then, -plant them in their permanent 
positions. 
' ROOM PLANTS. 
2827. Aspidistras with insects. 
I .have some plants of Aspidistras in. pots 
that seem too small for the size of the plants, 
as they soon get dry in summer. They do 
not see-m to be -thriving -so well as they used 
to, and I find a number of small, jumping 
insects in the po-ts. Would you be kina 
enough to g-ive us yo-ur advice concerning 
them? (Constant Reader, Sussex.) 
We do not think -that the -insects you men¬ 
tion are doing -the plants- any particular 
harm, -but are merely finding suitable hid¬ 
ing places there, with moisture, and prob¬ 
ably food. If the -plants are in too small 
pots, -they may have been overlooked and al¬ 
lowed -to get dry, and that would account 
sufficiently for their n-o-t thriving -as they 
have hitherto done. Your best plan would 
be to get some clean, pots a size larger than 
those you have, drain, them well, and then 
make up a compost consisting of three parts 
of loam, one part of leaf soil, and sand to 
make the soil porous. Aspidistras are easy 
plants to -grow, b-u-t for that reason .the)- are 
often very badly treated in the -matter of 
soil. Fibrous loam is much better than or¬ 
dinary soil taken from a garden border, and 
is not likely to get so soon into bad condi¬ 
tion. Then, again, as Aspidistras do not 
require frequent re-potting, it would be as 
well to get some goc-d so-il when about it. 
2828. Azaleas Losing- Their Leaves. 
W-ill yo-u kinid-ly tell me the treatment for 
In-dian Azaleas after flowering? Mine have 
lost nearly all theiir -leaves. Please tel-l me 
the cause o-f -this. .They are kept in- a par¬ 
tially -shady window. Can I do anything to 
induce new growth? Any information will 
greatly oblige. (W. J. S., Essex.) 
If you -really -have got Indian Azaleas, 
they should not lose all their, leaves under 
favourable conditions. We suspect that you 
have -allowed them to get dry at some time or 
ether, thus causing the foliage to drop. Some 
varieties do lose more of their leaves than 
c-the-rs, an-d ,in the dry atmosphere of a room 
this would be encouraged ; but even there 
they can be kept in an. evergreen condition 
all the year round. The half-shady window 
is no-t the -best .place for them, especially 
when making their growth. You cannot ex¬ 
pect them to make any fresh gro-wth until 
the temperature rises. The season is late, 
so that you can only wait until the weather 
gets -warm, then -put your plants in the sun¬ 
niest window of your house, to encourage 
fresh growth. They will only make very 
short s-hoots, but -it will be sufficient for them 
to flower again -next year if veu give them 
suitable treatment during the summer. The 
soil must not -be -allowed -to get dry at any 
time, but kept uniformly moist. After a 
fresh set o-f leaves has been made indoors 
you can stand the plants out of doors in 
a half-sbadv position for a week until the 
young leaves get a bit hardened. You can 
then stand them in the full sunshine and 
keep them there un-til about the middle of 
