Cultural Suggestions— Commercial and Exhibition Types 

SOIL PREPARATION. Prepare the beds early by spading in 
well decayed cattle manure or bone meal working in thoroughly 
to a depth of 12 to 15 inches. Use peat if the soil is too sandy 
or too heavy. 
FERTILIZING. Few applications of commercial fertilizers such 
as ‘“'Gaviota,” ‘‘Vigoro” or other complete fertilizers should be 
used during the summer months. The feeding should be avoided 
during the periods of extreme heat or when the soil is too dry. 
Water the soil before applying if it is necessary. It should be 
stopped when the buds are large enough to make the final 
selection Fig. 2 below). 
STOPPING. When the plant is established in your garden 
and when it has developed 2 or 3 pairs of matured leaves, the 
center or the main growth is nipped off. Then the plant should 
be restricted to two or three shoots in order to obtain larger 
blooms. For the late blooming variety, the main growths of these 
new shoots may be nipped off again around July 15th in order 
to regulate the height, allowing only the original number of new 
shoots to rise per stem. 
For the large anemones and pompons, allow 6 to 8 growths 
to a plant. Other cultures for these being similar with those of 
the larger flowering varieties. 
DISBUDDING (see drawing above). Immediately after the new 
shoots of your selection begin to send out side laterals, they 
should be removed very close at the base (see lowest lateral of 
figure 1) at regular intervals about once a week. The basal 
shoots should be removed also as they appear. This procedure 
should be adhered to very religiously in order to obtain suc- 
cessful results. 
Culture for Bush 
Under these types are pompons and buttons, anemones, singles 
and hardy Koreans. These varieties are most effective in the 
gardens when grown low with as much growth as possible. This 
The first bud produced by the plant is called the “Crown” 
bud and is distinguished by being surrounded by leaves. The 
“terminal’’ bud appears later in clusters surrounded with sev- 
eral flower buds. 
The procedure of ‘taken buds’’ depends very largely on the 
variety and no fast rules can be given, but we recommend 
reserving terminal buds for the majority of the early flowering 
commercial and exhibition types in Southern California. The 
safest rule, we find, is not to save buds formed before August 
20th in our district. The retention of too early crown buds often 
results with large percentage of crippled flowers, especially when 
large amount of nitrogen fertilizer remains in the soil uncon- 
sumed by the plant. Again, the hottest period of the year 
usually comes during the month of September and early October, 
the hazards of burning of petals and fading of colors are too 
frequent when early crown is retained in this district. 
The final selection of bud should not be made too hastily nor 
when buds are very small (see figure 1). It is also advisable to 
allow on alternate bud (see figure 2) to remain until one is 
certain of all defects when final selection is being made (figure 
3). 
PESTS. Common pests and diseases are thrips, aphids, leaf- 
tyers, cut worms, mildews, etc. Plants should be examined fre- 
quently and sprayed with proper insecticides as recommended 
by dealers as soon as they are detected. After September Ist 
we recommend spraying the plants twice a month until buds 
begin to show color. 
STAKING. Every individual stem should be supported with 
stake or by other means to hold the blooms upright. 
or Garden Varieties 
is obtained by pinching off the center of all the laterals two or 
three times up to the Ist or 10th of August. This method will pre- 
vent the plants from toppling too freely with minimum support. 
sable Ose 
