Ingenious Devices 
Labor-saving Schemes and Short Cuts 
in the House and in the Garden 
Garden Watering 
EAR before last during a 
prolonged drought we 
watered our garden every night 
by hose sprinkling, but as the 
garden is a large one we found, 
the next year, that our plants 
thrived much better and revived more 
quickly when we thoroughly watered 
a single section of it, one evening and 
another section the next. In this way 
we demonstrated to our satisfaction that 
it is better to give every plant a suffi¬ 
cient satisfying drink once every so often 
than to give every plant merely a half 
watering every night. We are little more 
than beginners in gardening, but this 
hint may prove of service to other be¬ 
ginners. W. P. 
Flower Holders 
A N excellent substitute for the Jap¬ 
anese flower holders for keeping 
iris, narcissi, daffodils and other bulb 
flowers upright in a shallow earthenware 
dish may be had by taking flat ribbons 
of lead about an inch wide which your 
plumber can supply and twisting them 
nient flower holders 
into shapes to hold the stems. The 
weight of the lead will hold these forms in 
place when they are laid edge down. 
Here is a diagram sketch to show how 
they may be bent. F. T 
The Garden Herbarium 
AST year I made a collection of 
specimens of all the flowering 
plants in our garden, which I carefully 
pressed, arranged, and mounted on uni¬ 
formly sized sheets of thick white mount¬ 
ing board. Then I carefully labeled each 
specimen with botanical and common 
garden names in the lower left-hand 
corner. In the upper left-hand corner I 
mounted specimen seeds, and in the 
upper right-hand comer I indicated by a 
space one inch square the color of the 
flowers as nearly as possible by a wash 
of water-color. Then in the lower right- 
hand comer I put a memorandum of the 
date of planting, the date of the first 
appearance of the seedling above ground, 
the date of flowering, and the date of 
seed maturity. This was less work by 
far than the telling of it seems, and as my 
entire collection fit nicely into a library 
Here is an automatic chicken-feeder to save 
corn. The hopper drops kernels when 
the chickens peck at the hanging dummy 
ear 
pamphlet case, you will see that I had 
an invaluable record of my flower-gar¬ 
den. Indeed my neighbors have con¬ 
sulted it freely in planning this winter 
for next season’s gardens, and perhaps 
some of House & Garden’s subscribers 
would like to try something like it them¬ 
selves. M. S. J. 
A Handy Remedy for Rattling 
Windows 
D O not allow yourself to be made 
wakeful and nervous by rattling 
windows or doors when the comb on your 
dresser makes a perfect wedge, easily 
inserted and as easily removed. Espe¬ 
cially annoying are such noises in hotels 
or other strange bedrooms, but even there 
the comb is at hand and equal to all sizes 
of cracks. L. McC. 
Plan for Hotbed Growth 
HAVE often observed that beginners 
plant in hotbeds with little refer¬ 
ence to the heights of various plants. 
When I start my hotbed planting I 
j * <-• c" bos roo£> “ c o ? 
c ? < = * « Castor Beans 
. ^ .•’•zinnia^--"-” •*. - •> - • 
Stocks j 
« » * .> » • »William • ■* • * * > - 
•> „ Torget-rpa-nots •-•»>•>«* 
Candytuft 
In sowing seeds in the hotbed, plan to have 
the taller-growing plants at the higher end 
of the bed 
always make a diagram of the seed posi¬ 
tions. In this way there can be no mis¬ 
take, and tall seedlings will not push up 
against the low front top of the sash 
nor low seedlings become lost in their 
shade at the back of the bed. The 
following diagram will indicate what is 
meant. 
Testing Seed Germination 
A HOME-MADE seed tester 
may be made by taking a 
couple of soup-plates, some 
sand and two sheets of blot¬ 
ting-paper the size of the plates. 
Put sand in each plate to the 
level of its edge, wet till thoroughly sat¬ 
urated, place one sheet of blotting pa¬ 
per over it. Then a dozen or more 
seeds are placed on top of the blot¬ 
ting paper and the second cover put 
over them with a little sand sprinkled 
over that and the whole carefully cov¬ 
ered with the second plate. Keep at 
a temperature of 50 0 to 6o° day and 40 0 
to 50 0 night temperature for tests of cab¬ 
bage, beet, pea, onion, and radish seed; 
and 70 0 to 8o° day and 6o° to 70 0 night 
temperature for corn, bean, pepper, and 
cucumber seeds. E. D. R. 
A Home-made Lawn Sprinkler 
T HE accompanying diagram illus¬ 
trates the essential points of a 
lawn sprinkler that not only is cheap, but 
economical in water besides, and you can 
An adjustable lawn sprinkler that can be ap¬ 
proached and moved about without turning 
off the water 
make it from a few pipe fittings in no 
time. 
In the diagram A indicates a | or | 
in. gas pipe tee, according to the size of 
hose used; B, nipples of gas pipe 6 in. 
long; C, cup for gas pipe; F, hose coup¬ 
ling; G, air holes, drilled into the nipples 
BB, three in each, and not more than 
1-16 in. in diameter. 
In putting this together do not screw 
the nipples BB very tight into the tee A — ■ 
this allows the row of holes to be turned 
at any angle. Likewise with the cups C, 
as the holes may become clogged and need 
cleaning. You will notice that you can 
easily get the necessary fittings at any 
plumbing shop and in most places of this 
kind they will drill the holes for you; 
other than this there is no labor. You 
will also note how one can walk right up 
behind the spray and move it from place 
to place. I have used two of these de¬ 
vices for the past two years and they 
work splendidly. 
W. T. 
Theo. L. Valerius. 
