478 
THE GARDENING WORLD. July 13, 1907 
Northern Hemisphere, including Britain. 
In Britain the plant grows wild in copses, 
which are liable to be cut down, and when 
this is the ease the tiowers have a greener 
hue than usual, especially in the half-de¬ 
veloped state, but as they reach maturity 
they assume a whiter hue. U nder shade, or 
when grown closely together in gardens, the 
tiowers are also better coloured. The plant 
is often forced in winter, and the flowers 
are then in the whitest and best form though 
the tips remain more or less green to the 
end. We have another plant which grows 
only one foot high, and has. white flowers 
with a green tip, but constricted near the 
base. It is T. othcinale, and not much cul¬ 
tivated. P. biflorum is a North American 
species bearing two, rarely three, greenish 
flowers in a cluster in May. The leaves.are 
ovate, or lanceolate-oblong, usually pube¬ 
scent and glaucus beneath. The stems range 
from one to three feet in height, according 
to conditions. We presume the fine one you 
mention is P. multiJiorum, as it is the most 
popular with the general cultivator. 
1999. Propagating Pyrethrum. 
1 have some double Pyrethrum which 1 
would like to increase. What is the best way 
of doing it, and when is the best time? (b. 
Stevens, Soms.) 
When the autumn rains arrive would be a 
good time to propagate the Pyrethrum, but 
as the weather is so cool and moist, it could 
be done at the present time, and the young 
plants would get better established before 
winter than if you left it until later. If 
you have a cold frame there would be no 
difficulty whatever because you can practi¬ 
cally make a climate to suit hardy plants 
whenever you choose. If you require to 
make the most of your plants we should ad¬ 
vise you to Lift the whole plant, shaking the 
soil carefully away. You can then pull the 
clumps into pieces with the hand. Each 
crown would make a young plant, and if 
you cannot readily puli them off with a few 
roots attached, you may be able to separate 
them by making a cut occasionally with a 
knife. Each of these crowns may be potted 
singly in a pot of small size, and set in a 
cold frame. Give them a good watering im¬ 
mediately and close the frame till the small 
plants commence to grow. You can then 
have them ready for planting out by the 
middle of September, and they will be quite 
established in their fresh quarters before 
winter. Use plenty of sand and leaf-mould 
in the soil that you use for filling the pots. 
2000. Name of Plant and How to Pre¬ 
serve it. 
Can you tell me what the enclosed plant is, 
and what treatment it requires? Some of 
the plants seem to be dying away after 
flowering, as if it were an annual. Bor 
some time it was very showy and I should 
like to grow it next year. (S. Stevens, 
Soms.) 
The plant is an annual, namely, Liimnan- 
thes Douglasii. It is allied to Tropaeolum, 
and requires to be sown every year. The 
plant as a rule ripens seed freely, and if 
these seeds are not gathered in time they 
scatter themselves about on the ground and 
come up again next year, so that unless you 
dig them down tco deeply you would get a 
crop again on the same ground. A better 
plan, however, would be to gather the seeds 
and either sow them in August for an early 
display, or in March or Apxil for a succes¬ 
sion. If your plants do not ripen in seeds 
some of the seedsmen who advertise in our 
pages offer seeds, and you should have no 
difficulty in maintaining a display. 
HEDGES . 
2001. Privet Hedge Dying-. 
Mrs. White would be glad of the Gar¬ 
dening World’s advice of the best way to 
treat a Privet hedge that looks very like dy¬ 
ing, under Cupressus. Twenty shrubs fac¬ 
ing the house look healthy, but as the Cup¬ 
ressus are 30 feet -high, it is a pity to cut 
them down. I am well watering the hedge, 
and if it does not improve by autumn had. I 
better plant Euonymus, or what will do best 
under the Cupressus to form a good hedge? 
The soil consists of two feet of mould and 
red clay, then chalk. (X. Y. Z., Kent.) 
We quite agree with you that it would be 
a pity and a mistake to cut down the Cup¬ 
ressus 30 feet high. A better plan would be 
to move the hedge backward if possible, so 
that it would not be under the trees. Some 
of the longer shoots of the Cupressus can be 
cut bacic it that is possible without spoiling 
tfle shape of the trees. The reason that the 
hedge is in such a poor way is owing to the 
lack of light. The Cupressus, as ail ever¬ 
greens, produce a dense shade beneath them 
at all seasons of the year, so that other 
plants have no chance to make good growth. 
Even one hedge of Privet is capable of de¬ 
stroying another if allowed to grow over it 
in such a way as to obstruct the light. Judg¬ 
ing by the plan which you sent us, ii you 
wish to save the smaller plants on the side 
next to the lawn, there is plenty of room to 
do so if you are willing to sacrifice a por¬ 
tion of the lawn for the sake of the plants. 
As the Privet hedge is on the side of the 
Cupressus away from the house, you might 
manage to cut back the longer shoots of the 
Cupressus for the sake of the hedge. If you 
can do this a good way to renew the hedge 
would be to cut it down within 18 inches or 
2 ft. of the ground. This had best be done 
during winter or early spring, not later than 
the beginning of March. The old stems 
will then shoot out and form a closer hedge 
provided the Cupressus allow sufficient light 
to fall upon the hedge. We would also sug¬ 
gest that the Rose border is too near the Line 
of deciduous trees to make good growth. It 
is only a western aspect, and that, together 
with the roots of the trees, are unfavourable 
to Roses. They not only keep the soil too 
dry, but they absorb all the nourishment that 
may be placed there for the Roses, thereby 
keeping them always in a state of starvation. 
We should prefer to make a large bed on 
the lawn and put the Roses there, because 
they would get some chance of better light 
and be away from the influence of the roots 
of trees. If you dislike to do this another 
plan would be to dig out a trench between 
the Roses and the Hawthorns, Elms, etc., 
and cut back all the long rambling roots 
that run into the Rose border. It would be 
necessary to repeat this at intervals of two 
or three years, to give the Roses anything 
like a chance. 
ROSES . 
2002. Rose Leaves Curling. 
A friend of mine is very much distressed 
by a kind of epidemic which has attacked 
quite a number of his Rose trees, and he is 
quite unable to account for T. I enclose a 
couple of leaves as an example, and the 
leaves of the trees attacked have been strip¬ 
ped off and destroyed to prevent further 
devastation. To show the extent of this 
havoc nearly a bucketful were burnt. Will 
you please give cause and cure in your next 
Tuesday’s issue, under the heading of 
(Spenser, Yorks)? 
We carefully examined the leaves of the 
Roses you sent us, and fail to find any fun- 
god disease which would cause an epi¬ 
demic. We find plenty of green fly, how¬ 
ever, and the remains of them in the folds 
of the curled leaves. We think this is quite 
sufficient to account for the curling of the 
leaves. Aphides must have been clustering 
thickly on the buds and half-open leaves and 
in this stage they were liable to puncture 
them very badly. A close examination of 
the leaves showed this to be the case. When, 
young leaves are punctured the little holes 
grow larger as the leaves attain their full 
size, and give them a crippled appearance. 
Your best plan would be to attack the 
aphides with some of the washes, such as 
Aboi Mo-effic or strong soapsuds with the 
addition of tobacco water. To be perfectly 
effective this should be done upon the first 
signs of the aphides, and before they have 
had time to establish themselves on the 
young and tender leaves. Indeed the same 
thing happens with Apple trees and Plum 
trees when they are attacked by their own 
special kind of aphides. After the leaves 
get curled up it is, however, difficult or im¬ 
possible to reach the pests with any effect. 
You should keep a close watch, therefore, 
upon your Roses during May and June when 
they are making rapid growth, which is just 
the time when these pests are also multiply¬ 
ing enormously day by day. 
TREES AND SHRUBS . 
2 003. Shrubs for Undergrowth. 
Please mention the best shrubs to plant 
towards the front or as undergrowth in the 
spaces shown on the accompanying plan. 
Bethlehem Star, I fancy, would do. Some 
small Berberis of nearly two feet high are 
quite dead, and I like all sorts 0 i 
-Barberries. (X.Y.Z., Kent.) 
We mention a number of shrubs that usually 
succeed well in a shady situation, but we do 
not for a moment suppose that they would 
succeed well under Cupressus if the branches 
are close to the ground. The shade would 
be too dense all the year round for any¬ 
thing to succeed. If the lower branches are 
fairly high up, so as to admit a fair amount 
of light, then there would be some hope for 
them. Those that we recommend are :—Ber¬ 
beris vulgaris, B Aquifolium, B. repens, 
Aucubas, Common Privet, Oval-leaved Pri¬ 
vet, Butcher’s Broom, Euonymus europaeus, 
and Mezeron. In order to get the most satis¬ 
faction from the above-mentioned shrubs, 
they should be planted in situations where 
they will get a fair amount of light during 
the summer months, and the Privets and 
Euonymus should be cut back annually to 
make them dwarf and bushy. None of 
these under the trees can be expected to 
flower even if they succeed at all, so that in 
growing them for Ihe sake of the leaves you 
should endeavour to get them dwarfed by 
cutting back the more rampant and strag¬ 
gling shoots in early spring. If the soil 
is naturally hard it would be worth your 
while to fork it over once or twice a year to 
get it loose and enable it to absorb the rain 
that falls; indeed, lack of moisture, we be¬ 
lieve, is as much against your shrubs as the 
lack of light. The dense evergreen variety 
of the Cupressus throws the water beyond 
the tips of the branches, leaving the ground 
beneath relatively dry even during a heavy 
rainfall. Star of Bethlehem would succeed 
if not too heavily shaded, and the English 
Bluebell, Spanish Bluebell, Daffodils, Snow¬ 
drops, Primroses and Polyanthuses, would 
give you some variety. The Polyanthuses 
grow in very dense shade, but they do not 
flower unless there is a fair amount of light. 
They would indeed succeed better under the 
Hawthorns, Elms and Beeches, than under 
Cupresses, because they get the advantage 
of light in spring before the leaves of those 
trees are expanded. 
2004. Transplanting: a Shrub. 
Please name the enclosed cutting. _ Is it a 
form of Dogwood? I am told it will have: 
a red berry. It is 6 ft. high. I want to. 
move it in September or October. If there 
is a tap root or difficulties in the way, 
please warn me. (X.Y.Z., Kent.) 
