June 8, 1907. 
THE GARDENING WORLD 
387 
Address: The Editor, The Gardening 
vVorld, 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 
‘.he 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 filed, with the 
name and address of the sender, and will be 
consulted by the Editor whenever an enquiry 
is sent. 
FLOWER GARDEN. 
1890. Carnations Unhealthy. 
Will you be good enough to tell me what 
is the matter with the enclosed Carnation 
leaves and the remedy, if any. The plants 
are out of doors. (Whitto, Surrey). 
We have examined the Carnation leaves 
which vou sent us, but fail to see that there 
is anything the matter with them. They 
are merely the old leaves of last year, which 
frequently die off just as the plants are 
making fresh growth in spring. Although 
evergreen, these leaves cannot live always. 
Some of them are a bit discoloured, but that 
is simply the result of the material in them 
being transferred to the stem and j-oung 
leaves, so that it would merely be the colour 
of the dying leaves. Where they happen 
to be unsightly the best plan is to pick them 
off. 
1891. G:-ey Fungus in Soil and Violas. 
Can you tell me the cause of a grey fun¬ 
gus in the garden soil similar to what forms 
on manure when heated too quickly. Would 
it harm Viola? if planted in affected soil? 
(Whitto, Surrey). 
It all depends upon the species of fungus 
as to the harm or otherwise which it would 
do in the soil. There are, of course, a great 
number of them. Speaking generally, we 
1 think that no harm can result as it may be 
merely one of the moulds living upon de¬ 
caying matter in the soil, a species of mucor. 
There is a fungus which sometimes attacks 
Violas which have been grown in the same 
soil for a number of years. The best wav 
of dealing with these things, however, is 
to cultivate the soil well and thereby keep 
it clean and well aerated. When we at¬ 
tempt growing such things liable to be at¬ 
tacked by fungi we make a point of trench¬ 
ing the soil annually in the autumn or win¬ 
ter. That gets rid of many spores by bury¬ 
ing them deeply, and at the same time it 
destroys various insect pests by the same 
means. You could sweeten the soil by 
pointing in some lime into the top spit. 
Newly-ground or newly-burned lime is more 
effective than lime that has been air slacked. 
You are very late now in planting Violas, 
because if drv and warm weather sets in 
presently the Violas will have a hard strug¬ 
gle to make growth and flower. To get 
most satisfaction from this class of flowers 
in the south and east of England it is neces¬ 
sary to plant them some time in March. 
Thev can then make roots and get estab¬ 
lished before hot weather sets in. 
1892. Laying out a Gar-den. 
I should be glad if you would advise how 
to plant and lay out the garden indicated 
on the top of this letter. There is a very 
well-developed wood at the back, so that it 
is very well sheltered. I thought of having 
trellis work put up at the crosses to hide 
an objectionable building. What climbers 
could I have—a flowering one, if possible? 
The entrance I should like where the arch 
is on the accompanying plan. A hedge all 
round the border is necessary, but what 
should this be? I should like Sweet Brier, 
but have no idea as to the cost, etc. Per¬ 
haps you will help. (John Staffoed, Es¬ 
sex). 
There are various subjects which you 
might use to cover the trellis work in order 
to hide the building, but we think nothing 
would look more handsome in summer than 
a covering of such rambling Roses as 
Dorothy Perkins, Lady Gay and Crimson 
Rambler. If planted about 3 ft. or 4 ft. 
apart the strong shoots that come up from 
the base of them may be spread out so as 
to cover the trellis, and this they would do 
in the course of two or three jears, after 
which you would have a regular mass of 
Roses, the chiet attention to which would be 
the cutting out of dead wood and the tying 
in of the young stems to take the place of 
old ones. Other plants you could use would 
be Wistaria chinensis, W. multijuga, Jas- 
minum officinale or the evergreen Coton- 
easter microphylla or C. Simonsii. _ The 
Wistaria would soon cover the trellis if 
planted 6 ft. or 8 ft. apart. The Jasminum 
is also a free grower and the finely-divided 
leaves serve to set off the white flowers. 
The Cotoneasters would hide the buildings 
at all times of the year, and the berries 
would be handsome in autumn so long as 
you keep the birds away. If you resolve 
to make the boundary hedge of Sweet Briers 
you can get plants about 6d. each or qs. 
per dozen, or zqs. per hundred. You should 
not attempt to plant these before the be¬ 
ginning of November, as growers would not 
likely have a stock of these in pots. If you 
prefer the Penzance Hybrid Briers you 
could get them about od. or is. each, and 
in large quantitv probably at less price. 
Golden Privet would mgke a very neat 
hedge and not be expensive, but it would 
not flower if trimmed neatly. Rosa rugosa 
is a very strong-growing species and would 
make a broad hedge flowering in summer 
and fruiting in autumn. It does not re¬ 
quire much pruning beyond cutting out dead 
wood and shortening back straggling shoots 
with a knife. The fruits are as large as 
Gooseberries. There are two very important 
particulars you have omitted to mention in 
relation to the plan, namely, the dimensions 
of the garden and what you want to use it 
for. The arrangement in planting would 
largely depend upon that, and we cannot 
imagine what you desire to grow. If the 
garden is of some size, as we presume it is 
from the plan, you would require two cross 
walks cutting it into four pieces, the first 
one to run from the arch right across the 
garden, and the other at right angles to it. 
This would be the best way of dividing the 
ground for convenience of getting at it, 
for wheeling manure and for arranging a 
rotation of crops, that is if you desire to 
grow vegetables. If you want to have fruit 
trees and flowers as well, the flowers could 
form borders abutting on the walks and 
bush, or pyramid trees might be planted just 
beyond these borders. The vegetable quar¬ 
ters could be inside each of the four plots. 
If the garden is only a small one, it might 
be convenient to have a walk just inside the 
boundary hedge with or without a border 
for flowers against the hedge. If you de¬ 
sire the garden as a playground on grass, 
then no walks would be necessary, while a 
very pretty arrangement could be made by 
having the whole of it in grass except a 
border of greater or less width for flowers 
just inside the hedge. We can give you 
further particulars if you let us know the 
size of the garden and what you intend to 
grow. 
1893. Transplanting Tulips. 
I have a bed of white double Tulips and 
I wish to transfer them to another bed in 
the autumn. Could I leave them where they 
are till then and then transfer them to the 
new bed without doing them any harm ? I 
should be thankful for this information. 
(Novice, Dundee). 
If you can leave them till the foliage 
dies down you can then lift the bulhs and 
dry them in a cool, airy situation, such as 
a shed which is open at the sides, or you 
might find space under a tree to dry them. 
When they have parted with their super¬ 
fluous moisture you should clean the bulbs, 
rubbing off loose skins, but not the firm 
brown one. Store them in boxes or pots 
where the mice will not get at them until 
planting time. If you leave them in the 
ground until you can transplant them into 
the other bed the chances are that the bulbs 
will have made fresh roots, and unless you 
exercise a great amount of care you would 
destroy a lot of these roots, thereby wasting 
the substance of the bulbs, which is an im¬ 
portant matter. They could lie in the 
ground, however, till some time in August, 
but if rain comes, any time after that they 
would start into fresh growth. 
ROSES. 
1894. Rose Leaves Withering Up. 
Mv garden is infested with black ants. 
Will you kindly inform me whether they 
are injurious to the garden. I have a few 
Rose trees and they do not seem to be thriv¬ 
ing very well. They all seem to be wither¬ 
ing up (the leaves I mean). Do you think 
it is the ants, or is it the cold winds, as 
my garden faces east? I can see nothing 
on the leaves? (Black .Ants, Essex). 
Black ants are very common in all gar¬ 
dens in the south, and although we have had 
them every year for a very large number 
of years we merely reduce them when they 
get too numerous. They are not particu¬ 
larly injurious unless they get very nu¬ 
merous about the roots of small plants and 
injure them by the numerous burrows they 
make as well as the soil which they throw 
up. They do sometimes encourage the in- 
