84 
THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN 
Nurserymen fully realize the necessity of having the 
public interest in the goods they have to sell. There is 
no better way than through the medium of an exhibition. 
A fine display of dahlias, chrysanthemums, roses, fruits 
or in fact anything that shows the possibilities of the nur¬ 
serymen’s products is the finest kind of a demonstration 
and makes enthusiasts and buyers quicker than any other 
process. 
The secretary of the society is Prof. David Lumsden, 
530 Cedar street. Takhoma Park, Washington, D. C. 
QUESTION AND ANSWER COLUMN 
Editor “National Nurseryman”, 
Easton, Md. 
Dear Sir: 
We note that you say in The National Nurseryman that our 
nurserymen who do a large business must plant the stock for 
the clients. 
For the last two years we have been planting stock for* our 
customers and have lost money from the fact that we could not 
get experienced men for the work. How is the best way to 
manage this? How much more should be charged for a tree 
when a nurseryman does the planting and to insure the tree to 
live. 
For several years we have lost a good many of our apple root 
grafts from molding. What will prevent this and what do you 
pack yours in? Would it be a good plan to sterilize sawdust, 
sand and moss with heat so as to kill all germs of diseases? 
How would be the best way to do this? If a person would spray 
the packing material with bordeau mixture would it keep down 
mold? 
How deep do you bury your shrub, privet and ornamental cut¬ 
tings in the ground and also grape cuttings? Would it not be a 
good plan to spray these with bordeau mixture to prevent 
mold? 
Please let us hear from you and oblige. 
Respectfully, 
E. W. J. 
The difficulty you are experiencing in getting workmen with 
experience to plant the stock for your patrons is a very com¬ 
mon one and presents a problem which the nurseryman has to 
face. In practically every locality nursery work is so seasonable 
the planting season being so brief that it is practically impos¬ 
sible for the nurseryman to carry sufficient skilled help during 
the dead season, to take care of his business during the active 
season. 
We believe the difficulty will be overcome in time by the en¬ 
couragement of jobbing gardeners to attend to outside work in 
their particular localities and we believe it would be a good 
policy for a nurseryman to make special effort to encourage a 
good grade of men to go into this business and help them in 
every way possible. 
We can readily understand you having lost money if you have 
not made a separate charge for the planting of stock in addition 
to the charge for the supplying of it. It is practically impossible 
to quote a tree planted that will generally apply. The better 
plan is to fix the price of a tree delivered, say within a certain 
radius, and perhaps in certain quantity, then make a separate 
estimate for the planting of it because conditions where the 
stock is to be planted are often very variable. For instance, the 
nurseryman may sell a shade tree for the side walk for Five 
Dollars but to send a truck three miles and perhaps find when 
he gets there that he has to excavate in rocks, perhaps estab¬ 
lish a grade and do so much work incidental to the planting that 
the cost of this work is out of all proportion to the value of 
the tree. 
From long experience it is never safe to quote stock planted 
without carefully going over the ground, estimating the time it 
will take and quote accordingly. 
Insuring the tree to live or rather agreeing to replace should 
it die is a subject that has long been debated by nurserymen. 
Most Nurserymen take the stand that after a tree is delivered 
to the customer in good condition his responsibility ceases. The 
Nurseryman doing a local business among, perhaps, friends and 
neighbors can not always take this stand. He has to show an 
interest in the goods he supplies and give the customer some 
assurance that he will get something for his money, other than 
possibly a dead tree. Some nurserymen replace a tree without 
cost provided the customer pays for the planting; others agree 
to replace at half price, but there is no hard and fast rule that 
can be applied in all cases. Whatever policy is followed it 
should be one which should tend to make the customer realize 
that certain responsibility belongs to him, because when the 
tree is once planted upon his grounds, it is under his care and 
he should at least be made to feel that the nurseryman has done 
his full share when he has supplied good stock planted in a 
proper manner. Any loses that the nurseryman may make good 
should not be a part of the contract so much as to show a will¬ 
ingness to share a loss that perhaps was caused by conditions 
over which neither buyer nor seller had control. 
.Mold on apple grafts is caused by poor atmospheric con¬ 
ditions, possibly too much heat with a too close and confined 
atmosphere. As a rule materials used in which to store apple 
grafts are sterile of themselves, such as sand, moss or sawdust 
and it should not be necessary to sterilize by heat. If they are 
not so they are not good material to use so that we hardly 
think it necessary to sterilize. If you will use good clean sand, 
without organic matter, in which to store them and keep the 
temperature below 40 degrees we hardly think you will be 
troubled with mold. 
Treating the grafts with Bordeau before storing them might 
be a preventative of mold but we cannot say from experience if 
it would have an injurious effect upon the grafts. It would be 
worth an experiment in a limited way. 
When burying hard wood cuttings such as privet, ornamental 
shrubs, etc., it is purely a matter of keeping them away from 
the frost. We should say that out of doors 12 inches of sand 
would be quite sufficient, the position should be well drained and 
provision made to cover with straw, boards, etc., to keep off 
excessive rains and to be available, should the weather be very 
severe, to give a little additional covering. 
If such places as caves or cellars are available, where the air 
can be kept sweet and the temperature between 35 and 40, Fah. 
usually make good places, in such places they only need a slight 
covering of sand to prevent any danger of drying. 
LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT RELATIONS 
In view of the thought and discussion being given to 
the subject of nursery trade relations with professional 
landscape architects by American nurserymen, it is inter¬ 
esting to note the British nurserymen are struggling with 
the same problem. Judging from the following, clipped 
from “The Horticultural Trade Journal'’ (British), they 
have arrived at about the same conclusions, namely: 
that professional landscape architects should stand on 
their own feet and not lean for support on the nursery 
trade: 
Is an architect entitled to Trade prices for trees, shrubs, and 
other garden requirements? A member of that profession argues 
with me that an architect is entitled to trade terms for anything 
which is included in plans and specifications he prepares, or al¬ 
ternatively to commission from the firms with whom orders are 
placed, when such orders are based upon his plans and specifi¬ 
cations. 
On the other hand, a private gentleman tells me that he con¬ 
siders that when he has paid an architect’s fee for drawing up a 
plan, that plan becomes his property, and that an architect hav¬ 
ing been paid for his work has no further interest in its develop¬ 
ments. 
The question is perhaps a little more involved when an archi¬ 
tect is commissioned to see to the carrying out of the whole job; 
but it is, to my mind, an unreasonable thing for nurserymen to 
be asked to put an architect on Wholesale terms. 
If dealt with on the footing of commission I suppose we may 
take it that the architect, acting for a client is that client’s ser- 
