THE GARDENING WORLD. 
May ii, 1907. 
7 
jg . TJiri-ps on 1 me leaves shown at 
A, A, A, about natural size. 
pipes, a few degrees rise from sun heat 
will be beneficial. 
Always keep a large can of water in the 
house so that you may have tepid water 
for syringing the rods with twice each 
day until the young shoots are i inch 
long, then cease syringing them. Damp 
the floor of the house two or three times 
ever} - day, especially if the sun is shining, 
and'daily fill up the evaporating troughs 
on the pipes. The damping and first 
svringing should be done about 9 o’clock 
in the morning, and the last syringing at 
noon when first starting the Vines, as it 
is important that the rods be quite dry 
by sunset. The syringing softens the 
wood around the buds, and enables the 
latter to grow more freely. 
When the bunches can be clearly seen, 
increase the temperature to 65 degrees 
by day and 58 degrees by night. 
• JLo, t 
so. Brown scale on Vine rods shown 
A, A, A. 
Disbudding. — More shoots will grow 
than are required, but you must wait 
until they are sufficiently advanced so 
that you can see which shoots are bear¬ 
ing the plumpest bunches before you dis¬ 
bud them. Usually this can be done 
when the young shoots are about 3 inches 
long. 
One shoot to each spur will be enough 
to retain, and if the branches are trained 
about 18 inches apart on each side of the 
rod, the one shoot to each spur will fill 
up the space, and so the roof will be 
evenly covered with foliage. G. 
(To be continued.) 
-t+4- 
Blackbirds and Strawberries. 
A gardener writing to the “ Daily 
News” says “I wa’s long puzzled how to 
preserve my Strawberries from blackbirds. 
Netting was no good, as the birds came in 
parties and pressed down the netting while 
one of them in turn ate as much as he 
required. Now it so happened that my 
mistress had cured a dog of killing 
cZ./. 
21. Shows mealy bug clustering around, 
the stem of a berry. These are very objec¬ 
tionable insects. 
chickens by tying a dead chicken smeared 
with pepper and mustard inside the dogs 
muzzle and leaving it there for two or 
three days. I hit on the expedient of 
filling some of the worst Strawberries with 
the same concoction and leaving them 
about on the ground. Since then the 
blackbirds have never attempted to eat 
mv Strawberries. 
- +++ - 
Reading and District Gardeners’ Mutual 
Improvement Association. 
The last fortnightly meeting of the 
Association was held in the Abbey Hall, 
and Mr. W. Turnham presided over a 
splendid attendance of members. The 
subject for the evening was “Budding 
and Grafting,” and this was introduced 
in a very practical yet “racy” manner by 
Mr A. F. Bailev, Leopold House Gar¬ 
dens, Reading. ' His paper was very 
short, but his practical demonstrations 
amply atoned for any shortcoming in this 
respect. With regard to budding, he 
explained methods of taking the buds, 
and pointed out the way which, in his 
opinion, was the best. The various 
styles of grafting were shown, and. after¬ 
wards a very animated discussion 
followed, A hearty vote of thaplts was 
accorded Mr. Bailey for the many useful 
hints he had given the members and for 
the interesting way in which his subject 
had been presented. 
Rock and Alpine Gardening. 
Those of our readers who are fond of 
rock and alpine gardening will be in¬ 
terested to hear that a small book is 
being prepared on this popular subject 
by JNIr. Henry Hemsley, and will shortly 
be published. Mr. Hemsley, whom 
many of our readers will recognise as the 
hon. secretary of the Crawley and Dis¬ 
trict Mutual Improvement Association, 
has earned a wide reputation for his 
beautiful alpine rock work. He holds 
an appointment with Messrs. J. Cheal and 
Sons, of Crawley, and examples of his 
artistic and realistic handiwork are 
familiar to visitors to the leading flower 
shows. The forthcoming book will con¬ 
tain a description of alpine and other 
rock plants and the conditions under 
which they are found growing in their 
wild habitats; and there will be full in¬ 
structions as to the building and design¬ 
ing of rockeries and rock-gardens; a list 
of plants suitable for massing and carpet¬ 
ing, and for dry,_ sunny, shady, or moist 
situations, together with directions as to 
soil and cultural hints. 
-- 
TRADE NOTICE. 
Wood’s Patent Garden Stakes. 
The stakes above indicated are planed and 
rabbetted for the purpose of taking in panes 
of glass to form a shelter for plants in the 
open ground. These stakes are of three sizes 
or patterns, differently rabbetted according 
to the shape of the glass case they are in¬ 
tended to make. Some of these cases or shel¬ 
ters are square, and others triangular. A 
third form makes a hexagonal case, and a 
fourth is for the purpose of setting up long 
ridges of ’glass like the roof of a house, only 
of one pane in depth. This latter is for the 
purpose of protecting long lines of anything 
in the open ground, such as rows of Peas, 
Cauliflowers or other crops being protected 
from cold and sheltered from vermin._ The 
other forms of case,are intended ifor isolat¬ 
ing plants in the open ground, and might be 
used for protecting Vegetable Marrows, 
Ridge Cucumbers, Cauliflowers, and similar 
early crops in the early part of the season. 
The pieces of wood that are rabbetted to take 
these panes of glass may afterwards be used 
as stakes for Dahlias and other garden 
plants that require staking. The makers 
presume that they will only be wanted as 
supports to the glass in spring, and can 
then be turned to other uses in the garden 
during the remaining part of the season. 
These stakes are obtainable from Wood’s 
Patent Garden Appliances, 32, Warwick 
Road, Birmingham. 
How to Obtain the Highest 
Results in the Garden. 
The development of all plants depends 
upon the amount and quality of the food 
they obtain from the soil. In many cases 
the soil is deficient in one or the other of 
the essential elements of Plant Life. 
FERTILO supplies that deficiency. It 
imparts to the soil those exact properties 
on which the plant thrives and acting as a 
Fertilizer through the soil it strengthens 
and develops all plants. Note its inex¬ 
pensiveness : 41b,, 1/4 ; 71b., 2/-; 141b., 3/-, 
a8lb., 4/6; 561b., 8/-; icwt., 15/-, all car¬ 
riage paid. Useful Pocket Diary, free. 
J. P, Harvey & Co,, Dept. 6, Kidderminster. 
