54 
HOUSE & GARDEN 
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1 1 Your All-Year Garden 
(Continued from page 50) 
JUST A TALK 
about a 
HOBBY OF MINE 
T HIS will be my last opportunity to talk to 
you this year on a subject that has been 
clear to me for twenty-three years and in 
which I am today more deeply interested than 
ever—THE PEONY. 
Each Spring so many people express their 
regrets to me because they allowed the previous 
Fall to go by without making a peony planting. 
I feel, therefore, that I cannot let this month go 
by without a final reminder. And there is plenty 
of time yet to plant, since 1 consider early October 
the very best time of all. As a matter of fact, 
I do none of my own planting until after mid- 
October and wherever exhibited my flowers 
usually take most of the first prizes. 
My appeal to you on behalf of the Peony is 
not merely a business one. We already have the 
largest and most select peony business in this 
country, if not in the world, and with a barrel 
of flour in the larder, coal in the cellar and a 
Berkshire hog (thanks to a fellow peony enthu¬ 
siast) fattening for Christmas, why should I 
care ? 
If you knew the Peony as I know it, you would 
love it as I love it. The brush of a Corot, master 
of colors as he was, would falter before the mod¬ 
ern Peony's wondrous range and delicacy of 
shades. De Longpre, the greatest flower painter 
of our time, threw down his brush in despair as 
he failed to catch.the elusive tints—the wondrous 
sheen of the Peony. 
And who can drink in the delicious perfume 
of today’s varieties without wondering what a 
Roger & Gallet—a Colgate, would give to match 
what Nature gives us so freely in the Peony. 
And speaking of Nature, did you ever stop to 
think how you and Nature working hand in hand 
can produce living pictures of beauty, such as no 
Rubens, no Corot, no Angelo ever achieved ? 
Do you “get me’’? 
A very dear old lady, who herself gave most 
freely of her time and wealth to the betterment 
of humanity, once asked me if I realized how my 
own efforts were making mankind happier and 
more blessed. 
Time passes—opportunity slips by. Soon it 
will be a year too late. Send today for a free 
copy of 
“THE FLOWER BEAUTIFUL” 
which tells you the whole storv. 
George H. Peterson 
Rose and Peony Specialist 
Box 30 FAIR LAWN, N. J. 
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to have the mulch furnish the double 
purpose of supplying some plant food 
as well as giving protection during 
the winter, a mulch of manure may 
be used, but the manure either should 
be so well rotted as to be dry and 
spongy, or contain a large percentage 
of straw. Fresh manure or wet, sog¬ 
gy manure should never be used. 
Do you belong to the large army 
of careless gardeners who abandon 
to unkind winter a large percentage 
have grown ? 
Cosmos, the last of the flow¬ 
ers to bloom before frost 
of the things they 
There is some ex¬ 
cuse, possibly, for 
the inexperienced 
gardener who starts 
out in April with a 
great deal more 
than he can handle, 
and in the follow¬ 
ing months neglects 
it; but there is none 
for him who after 
months of hard 
work and consider¬ 
able expense allows 
his garden of veg¬ 
etables to fall under 
the heavy hand of 
winter. Prepare for 
harvesting with the 
same thoroughness 
as you did for your 
spring planting. 
Any barrels, boxes 
or crates of con¬ 
venient size that 
you may be able to 
obtain from your 
grocer will come in 
handy as receptacles 
for storing your 
harvest. For many things the slatted 
or open work boxes and barrels 
will prove better than the tight 
ones. If you have a special place or 
room, either in your cellar or other 
convenient part of the house, for 
putting away your vegetables, give 
it a thorough cleaning and prefer¬ 
ably a coat or two of whitewash be¬ 
fore you begin using it. If you use 
your cellar for this purpose, it will 
well repay you to partition off a part 
of it for the keeping of vegetables, 
pickles, preserves, etc. A convenient 
and effectively erected partition may 
be made by using 3" x 4" studding 
and covering them on both sides with 
wall boards. This makes it possible 
to have a cool room even with a 
heater in a moderate sized cellar, as 
the dead air space between the two 
walls is an effective non-conductor 
of heat. There should be, however, 
an opening for direct ventilation to 
the fresh outside air. 
Storing Vegetables 
Two of the most important points 
in connection with the storing of 
fruits and vegetables are the select¬ 
ing of specimens which are perfectly 
clean and sound, and the handling of 
them, both in gathering and in stor¬ 
ing, with the utmost care to prevent 
bruises. Any fruit or vegetable that 
is at all specked or imperfect is pretty 
sure to decay before it is in storage 
very long. If the damage was con¬ 
fined to the specimens originally bad 
it might not be so serious a matter, 
but every bad fruit will form a 
nucleus from which decay spreads 
rapidly in the bin, box or barrel in 
which it may happen to be. Bruises 
that are so slight as to be imper¬ 
ceptible when they are made by care¬ 
less handling will begin to decay al¬ 
most as quickly as evident bad spots 
and with just as serious results. As 
a general rule a fairly moist atmos¬ 
phere and a rather low temperature 
—between 35° and 40° Fahrenheit— 
will make the best conditions in 
which to keep the winter’s supplies; 
but there are some exceptions to this 
rule — sweet potatoes and squash 
which keep well in the high tempera¬ 
ture and dry atmosphere which is 
usually found in an attic or a closet 
near a chimney. Some of the fruit 
crops, such as melons, eggplant, pep¬ 
pers, tomatoes, can be kept for a 
short time in a fairly warm place, but 
they are not really lasting. 
Winter varieties of apples and 
pears do not ripen until some time 
after they are gath¬ 
ered ; although they 
may seem “hard as 
a rock” when you 
pick them, they will 
bruise very easily if 
not handled with 
the greatest of care. 
If you have a quan¬ 
tity of fruit to keep, 
it is better to' pack 
it carefully in apple 
boxes, or in cracker 
boxes, than in bar¬ 
rels or bins, as 
there is less pres¬ 
sure on the bottom 
layers from the 
weight of the fruit 
itself and less op¬ 
portunity for dis¬ 
ease to spread. 
The root crops, 
such as beets, car¬ 
rots, parsnips and 
turnips if left ex¬ 
posed to the air will 
gradually wither 
and become tough. 
To keep them in 
good condition they should be packed 
in some material to retain moisture 
Sand is ordinarily used, but a light 
sandy loam will do if sand cannot be 
obtained. The sand should be sifted 
down among the roots as they are 
packed in boxes or bins. Sand, how¬ 
ever, is very heavy and also is in¬ 
convenient, and in many cases sphag¬ 
num moss, which is light and retains 
moisture for a long time, can be used 
for the packing material. It can be 
gathered in swamps in many locali¬ 
ties or bought at a very reasonable 
price from florists or seedsmen. 
Careful Shrub Planting 
Even if you yourself cannot do 
the actual planting of such shrubs, 
bulbs and perennials as you may 
have to set out this fall, the loss will 
be yours if the work is not properly 
done. It will be well worth your 
while to watch it carefully. While 
the planting of most of these things 
can be delayed until quite late in the 
season, all preparations for planting 
should be made at once if you have 
not as yet had them done. Every¬ 
thing should be well settled in place 
before the ground freezes. 
As the planting of shrubs and 
perennials will be for several years’ 
duration, provision should be made 
at the time of planting to supply 
them with plant food for a long 
period. For this purpose thoroughly 
rotted manure, which will furnish 
humus as well as plant food, and 
bone, should be used. It is better if 
the bone is a combination of fine and 
coarse ground, as the latter contains 
particles of a considerable size which 
will be several years in disintegrat¬ 
ing and releasing the plant food 
which they contain. It is a great 
mistake to dig the holes for the roots 
only just large enough to take the 
ball and roots. They should be 
packed around with a mass of rich, 
pulverized soil in which the plants 
can revel as soon as they make 
growth this fall and next spring 
