July 4, i 9 ° 8 - 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
45 1 
, 0 ve indicated. We should advise you to 
ve air rather earlier in the day if this has 
, en overlooked, so'that the moisture'may 
It evaporated before the sun gets too high. 
;e also that there is no source of ammonia 
caping into the house, as Vine leaves have 
metimes got. scalded in this way owing to 
e presence of a heavy mulching of manure 
i the border. 
996. Making a New Strawberry Bed. 
Would vou kindly tell me how to set about 
aking a new Strawberry bed ? My present 
ie is three or four years old and still bears 
ell, but I want it in a different place. 
Ivstery, Somerset.) 
Vour first duty is to set about layering 
ie Strawberry runners, so as to furnish 
ioted plants for planting some time in Au- 
.tst or early in September. There are 
;veral ways of doing this. The best is to 
wer them in pots. Y’ou will find an illus¬ 
ion of this in last week’s issue, p. 429. 
his shows how some pots should be crocked, 
lied with soil and sunk in the ground be- 
de the Strawberry plants. The little ro- 
:tte of leaves is laid on to the soil in the 
it and either pegged down or a stone laid 
pon it to hold it in the pot until roots are 
irmed. The plants are kept watered in the 
ots until the ground has been trenched and 
lanured for them whenever you can spare 
ie ground. They get no check when thus 
ut out of pots. There is a simpler method, 
owever, namely, to get a trowel or small 
and-fork, loosening the surface of a small 
it of soil and putting the runner upon it, 
r ith a stone to hold it in place. This causes 
lem to root much more quicker than when 
lown about by the wind on the surface, 
•Inch is sometimes very hard, especially in 
ry seasons. You will understand the value 
f these processes by the vigour of the young 
lants you get by planting time. The 
round for the new bed should really be 
renched as Strawberries root deeply. Plant 
he Strawberries in lines about 2 ft. apart 
nd the plants 18 in. apart in the lines. 
997. Grape Vine in a Cold Greenhouse. 
Would it be possible to grow a Grape 
'ine in a small cold greenhouse 9 f by 
ft. and 7 ft. 3 in., and what kind ' uld 
buy, and when and how plant ? T ■_ ..ouse 
aces south-east. (Mystery, Sc::-.) 
There should be no difficulty in growing 
everal of the varieties of Vine in a cold 
reenbouse. A very good one for the pur- 
>ose is Black Hamburgh, aatd a red, Reir.c 
)lga. If you would prefer a white one, 
hen you could either get Buckiand Sweet¬ 
water or Foster’s Seedling. All of these 
re good Grapes and succeed in a green- 
ouse. You should prepare either an outside 
order for the Vine or inside, but in the lat- 
tr case you will require to give the Vine 
mch more attention in watering than if 
he roots pass through beneath the front of 
he greenhouse into a border exposed to all 
•eathers. Even if you import no fresh soil 
he material should be trenched 2^ ft. deep 
j? enable the Vine to make good growth, 
his preparation can be done at any time 
n winter, and the Vine should be planted 
ome time in March, which would be a suit- 
■ble time for you, although if you get a 
’0t Vine it could be done later. By plant- 
ng in March you would be able to take the 
ine out of the pot, shaking the roots quite 
lear of soil,, and then spread the roots 
j <4ually all over the border about 9 in. below 
I 'hat would be the level of the border when 
mished. The Vine should be grown either 
I a single rod to the top of the house, or 
f there are two rods they should be spaced 
: t least 3 ft. apart so as to give room for 
he tying out of the laterals between them, 
mpposing the Vine runs to the top of the 
■ousa during the first season, you should 
ut it back to 4 ft. after the leaves are all 
off the Vine in early winter. This will cause 
the rod in spring to throw out laterals from 
the buds along the rod. The bunches of 
berries are obtained from these laterals, and 
in spring as soon as you can see where the 
flower bunches are to be, you should stop 
these shoots just beyond the second leaf from 
the bunch. Other side shoots will be given 
off during the summer from the branch bear¬ 
ing the Grapes, but these ought to be stopped 
just beyond the first leaf. When Vines are 
well established they make an immense lot 
of growth every season, and this gets con¬ 
fused and entangled, while the leaves cannot 
get sufficient exposure to sunlight, but by 
following the above directions the number of 
leaves can be restricted to the space at com¬ 
mand. There are hints on Vines from week 
to week in The Gardening World, but if 
you meet with difficulties you can let us 
know. 
2998. Vine Leaves Losing Colour. 
'Can you tell me what is the matter with 
my Vine leaves? They have all gone like 
the enclosed within the last day or two. 
Previous to that they looked the picture of 
health, and I have never seen anything like 
it before. Is it disease or insects, and what 
is the remedy? (W. Green, Sussex.) 
Your Vine leaves have been scalded owing 
to an improper method of regulating the 
ventilators and the moisture in the house. 
During the night the moisture gets condensed 
upon the foliage, and very frequently the 
cultivator forgets to ventilate sufficiently 
early in the day. The result is that the sun 
shines directly upon the glass until the tem¬ 
perature gets too high within ; then the 
ventilators are suddenly opened with the 
result that evaporation under the influence 
of sunshine is very rapid, killing the tissues 
of the leaves. Something very similar is 
also produced by putting a heavy mulching 
of fresh manure on the border, causing am¬ 
monia to arise during the process of fer¬ 
mentation. This ammonia is very destruc¬ 
tive to plants of various kinds, but these are 
suggestions we make so that you can find 
out on the spot if this unsuitable treatment 
has taken place. 
GARDEN ENEMIES. 
2999. Carnations with White Froth. 
My border Carnations are very much in¬ 
fested with masses of white froth, and be¬ 
neath it is a pale green insect or grub. Can 
you tell me what it ig, and, if injurious, 
how am I to get rid of it? (H. Paget, 
Beds.) 
The grub beneath the white froth on your 
Carnations is due to the frog hopper, which 
is very plentiful this year. The white froth 
acts as a protection to the grub beneath it, 
out if by any means you could clear this 
froth away from the grub, thus exposing it 
to bright sunshine you would very soon de¬ 
stroy it. If your border 'Carnations are nu¬ 
merous it would be worth while getting a 
light broom of slender birch twigs, and with 
that go over the Carnations during the 
middle of the day when the sun is shining 
brightly, dispersing the froth without in¬ 
jury to the plants, and in proportion as you 
succeed in dispersing the spittle-like froth, so 
will you succeed in destroying the maggots 
of the frog hopper. 
3000. Ants and Sweet Peas. 
I thank you for your reply to my en¬ 
quiry, No. 2980, “ Ants and Sweet Peas.” I 
am afraid I did not .make it clear to jam that 
it was only just the shoot that was attacked 
and eaten, not the lower part of the stem or 
leaves, so that whatever it is it must climb 
up and eat off the top. Would wireworms, 
caterpillars or pea‘weevils do this? I was 
under the impression they wculd only attack 
the lower parts or roots. (H. C. B.. Lei¬ 
cestershire.) 
YYe know that ants are sometimes blamed 
for cutting plants, but we doubt very much 
if they are blameworthy. There have been 
nests of ants in our garden for many years 
past, and we have never found them guilty 
of cutting plants of any sort. Vou also, 
state that they have been well protected from 
birds in }rour previous question. It is pos¬ 
sible that sparrows may be the culprits if 
they could stand on the wire netting and 
peck the tender young stems through the. 
meshes of the netting. They are very mis¬ 
chievous birds, and eat the juicy young 
stems of Sweet Peas, garden Peas, and many 
other things. Unless you are certain they 
could not get at the Peas through the meshes, 
we should be inclined to blame them. By 
examining the Peas every day or at frequent 
intervals, we trunk it is possible to get at 
the true cause of the mischief. It Is im¬ 
possible to be certain as to what is the real 
enemy in the absence of proof. Besides 
sparrows, there are snails to be reckoned 
with, those creatures in the shells which 
crawl up flower stems, walls and over any 
rough surface till they get in contact with 
tender and juicy young shoots of plants. 
One snail would do a deal of mischief in a 
single night. They require looking for, as 
they hide in the most unsuspected places dur¬ 
ing the day and come out to feed at night. 
They dislike immensely to crawl over such 
insecticides'as “ Kilogrub ” and " Alphol,” 
so that if snails are the depredators in this 
case, it would be possible to isolate the Peas 
by putting a. band of some of these insecti¬ 
cides round the area on which the Peas are 
planted. There is also the question of mice 
in the garden. It seldom happens they 
come to so close quarters, but if they have 
plenty of shelter, such as tree roots or rocks 
under which they can hide, they would come' 
into the garden. They eat 'all sorts of 
plants, and in the case of plants like Holly, 
they destroy the bark. YViieworms do net 
climb on plants, though, caterpillars or Pea 
weevils do. 
3001. Grubs in Carnation Leaves. 
I should feel much obliged if you wculd 
kindly tell me what is the matter with the 
foliage of my border Carnations, some of 
which I enclose. They were planted out in 
March, after having been kept in a frame 
during the winter, and have grown very 
strongly and sent out several flowering stems 
which are full of buds. A week ago, how¬ 
ever, I noticed greenfly, and I used tobacco 
water and soft soap as a remedy, but a day 
or two after the young leaves began to droop 
and lose the rich colour, as if the plants 
were in need of water and also go like the 
enclosed. I find on examining these white 
blisters that there is a small maggot inside. 
Do you think there is any possibility of sav¬ 
ing these layers (as there are so many of 
them), seeing it has only just commenced? 
Any information will be much valued. 
(Raby Castle, Essex.) 
Your Carnations are -badly affected with 
the 'Carnation maggot (Hylemyia nigres- 
cens) rather earlier in the season than usual, 
but it is quite likely that more than one 
brood is hatched out in a season. Usually 
they are very destructive to Carnations after 
they have been layered in August. The 
specimens ) r ou sent us showed that they are 
still confined to the leaves., and if you make 
an effort to eradicate them in this stage, you 
will save a deal of trouble afterwards. It 
may be a somewhat tedious operation, but 
you should look carefully over the plants, 
and wherever you find evidence of a grub, 
you should find its position in the leaf and 
squeeze it between the finger and thumb. 
This will destroy the maggot and save the 
disfiguration of the plants -by picking off 
the leaves. Where a leaf is already very 
