396 
JOURNAL  OF  HORTICULTURE  AND  COTTAGE  GARDENER. 
A  pi  11  30,  18SI6. 
-  American  Plums  — Plums  proved  the  least  satisfactory  of  all 
fruit  crops  in  western  New  York  last  year,  and  the  reason  assigned  was 
that  the  crop  of  1894,  the  largest  ever  known,  proved  such  a  drain  on 
the  vitality  of  the  trees  that  they  did  not  have  strength  enough  for  a 
crop  the  succeeding  year.  A  marked  exception  to  this  rule  was  found 
in  trees  of  the  old  variety  Reine  Claude,  which  gave  a  full  yield  of  as 
large  and  fair  fruit  as  ever. 
-  Barnsley  “Paxton”  Society. — Programme  of  meetings  ; — 
Meetings  are  usually  held  on  the  second  and  fourth  Tuesday  in  each 
month  in  the  Society’s  rooms,  Queen’s  Hotel,  at  7.30  p.m.  May  12th. — 
"Summer  Bedding,”  Mr.  W.  Winter.  May  26th. — "A  Chat  about 
Orchids,”  Mr.  S.  Ballinger.  June  9th. — "Summer  Treatment  of  Bedding 
Plants  for  Winter  and  Spring  Use,”  Mr.  C.  H.  Ridler.  June  23rd. — 
"The  Rose  and  its  Cultivation,”  Mr.  G.  Shaw.— S.  Ballinger,  Eon  Sec, 
-  Apple  Annie  Elizabeth-.  —  Mr.  Robert  Morrow  sends  us 
from  Leominster  samples  of  this  Apple  to  Bhow  the  keeping  qualities  of 
the  fruit.  They  were  grown  by  an  amateur,  who,  when  he  picks  them, 
rolls  them  in  tissue  paper  and  keeps  them  in  a  cellar*  The  fruits  are 
as  fresh,  clear,  and  firm  as  when  gathered,  in  a  perfect  state  for  cooking* 
and  sweet  enough  for  dessert  use.  We  know  "by  experience  that  the 
method  of  storing  referred  to  is  good.  The  late  Mr.  R.  Gilbert  used  to 
keep  choice  Apples  for  use  in  April  and  May  in  a  similar  manner. 
-  Linseed  Oil  Meal — Linseed  oil  meal  is  rich  in  plant  foods, 
and  if  these  were  rated  at  their  cost  as  obtained  from  nitrate  of  soda, 
dissolved  bone-black,  and  muriate  of  potash,  a  ton  of  linseed  meal 
would  have  a  fertilising  value  of  18  dols.,  and  would  be  worth  for 
fertilising  purposes  about  26  dols.  as  the  ordinary  mixed  fertilisers  are 
sold.  A  late  bulletin  from  the  Ohio  Experiment  Station  calls  attention 
to  the  fact  that  inasmuch  as  this  meal  is  now  selling  at  16  dols.  a  ton, 
the  farmers  who  are  buying  fertilisers  can  get  plant  food  in  this  way 
at  reasonable  cost. — ("  Garden  and  Forest.”) 
-  County  Council  Horticulture. — So  full  of  interest  to 
everyone  concerned  in  education  is  the  Government  Education  Bill  now 
before  Parliament,  that  an  adventurous  reporter  of  the  “  Surrey  Comet” 
recently  interviewed  Mr.  Hugh  Macan,  Secretary  to  the  Surrey  County 
Council  Technical  Education  Committee,  and  the  excellence  and  success 
of  whose  work  in  that  county  may  have  had  something  to  do  with  the 
modelling  of  that  measure.  Amongst  other  things  Mr.  Macan  said  that  if 
thought  best  in  the  county  the  new  education  authority  under  the  Bill 
could  teach  gardening  instead  of  grammar.  Here,  no  doubt,  a  tempting 
opportunity  for  alliteration  offered,  but  the  undoubted  fact  remains  that 
whilst  gardening  means  education  for  a  livelihood,  grammar  means 
education  in  literary  polish,  and  no  more.  The  need  of  education  now 
is  that  it  shall  be  of  a  practical  kind.  Too  much  of  it  is  now  frittered 
away  in  the  learning  of  creeds  and  classics,  whilst  the  great  necessity, 
that  of  a  livelihood,  has  been  ignored.  We  hail  with  delight  the  better 
prospect  for  practical  training  in  the  future,  and  in  horticulture 
especially. — D. 
-  Lime  in  Potatoes. — During  last  season  experiments  were 
made  at  the  agricultural  station  of  Rhode  Island  on  the  application  of 
air-slacked  lime  to  soils  in  the  growth  of  Potatoes.  In  these  experi¬ 
ments  it  was  found  that  the  benefit  of  lime  was  very  considerable, 
provided  the  land  contained  a  sufficiency  of  organic  matter.  With  an 
application  of  about  2  tons  of  lime  per  acre,  each  100  lbs.  by  weight  of 
produce  obtained  consisted  of  74'2  lbs.  of  marketable  Potatoes  and 
25‘8  lbs.  of  small  tubers  ;  while  similar  plots  upon  corresponding  soil 
without  lime  yielded  in  each  100  lbs.  of  produce  63  3  lbs.  of  marketable 
Potatoes  and  36 7  lbs.  of  small  tubers.  In  forty-eight  different  experi¬ 
ments  it  was  found  that  while  the  total  yield  of  Potatoes  was  not 
increased  by  liming,  with  few  exceptions  the  per-centage  of  large 
marketable  tubers  was  increased.  In  other  experiments  the  total  yield 
of  Potatoes  was  also  increased,  apparently  as  a  result  of  liming.  It  will 
be  obvious,  therefore,  that  a  gain  of  10  per  cent,  in  large  tubers  by  the 
use  of  air-slacked  lime  would  be  a  factor  of  considerable  financial 
importance  provided  there  were  no  drawbacks  in  the  way  of  its  attain¬ 
ment.  Such  a  drawback,  however,  is  sometimes  met  with,  owing  to  the 
tendency  of  lime  in  certain  soils  to  increase  the  Potato  scab.  Under 
such  circumstances  crops  of  Potatoes  should  not  follow  each  other  at 
close  intervals,  or  a  rotation  of  crops  should  be  so  arranged  that  two  or 
three  crops  intervene  between  the  time  of  liming  and  the  growing  of 
the  Potatoes.  It  is  interesting  scientifically,  says  a  contemporary,  to 
note  that  the  experiments  at  Rhode  Island  show  most  conclusively  that 
while  the  lime  of  itself  does  not  produce  the  scab  in  Potatoes,  it  does  in 
some  way  favour  the  growth  and  development  of  the  disease  germs  upon 
the  Potato  tubers. 
-  Dielytra  spectabilis  alba. — This  white  variety  of  the 
well  known  Lyre  flower  is  already  in  flower,  but  does  not  seem  to  hold 
up  so  well  against  the  cold  wind  as  its  rosy  tinted  type.  When  obtained 
true  the  blossoms  are  of  the  purest  white,  a  chaste  and  beautiful  plant, 
but  there  are  forms  of  it  in  cultivation  with  washed-out  looking  blossoms, 
neither  white  nor  pink. — H.  R.  R. 
-  Pyrus  spectabilis. — Commonly  known  aB  the  Chinese  Apple, 
this  is  a  flowering  tree  that  is  just  now  of  unique  beauty.  For 
shrubberies  and  other  positions  this  plant,  with  its  semi-double  Apple¬ 
like  blossoms,  is  of  the  greatest  value,  and  it  is  strange  that  it  is  not 
much  more  extensively  planted.  The  tree  attains  to  some  considerable 
size  in  a  congenial  position  and  a  suitable  soil. — H.  W. 
- Cabbages  Bolting. — Although  this  is  apparently  so  prevalent 
this  season  it  is  worthy  of  remark,  perhaps,  that  out  of  a  bed  of  over  a 
thousand  plants  of  Ellam’s  Early  not  one  has  bolted,  and  we  are 
now  cutting  daily  from  them.  The  seed  was  sown  in  August,  the 
plants  later  on  pricked  off,  and  placed  in  their  present  quarters  in 
October.  A  smaller  bed  of  Wheeler’s  Imperial  is  equally  satisfactory,  the 
plants  growiug  freely,  with  as  yet  not  a  sign  of  bolting. — H.  Richards, 
Coldham  Ball. 
-  Canary  Island  Potatoes. — Small  tubers  of  these  imported 
Potatoes,  very  clean  and  handsome,  and  of  capital  seed  size,  can  now  be 
purchased  at  2d.  per  pound  in  the  shops.  There  is  not  enough  of  them 
even  at  that  low  price  to  make  any  appreciable  effect  on  the  sale  of 
old  home-grown  tubers,  which  still  keep  very  good  indeed.  These 
Canary  Island  tubers  are  grown  on  a  poor  but  volcanic  soil,  as  Mr. 
D.  Morris  told  us  in  the  admirable  paper  he  read  some  time  since  before 
the  Royal  Horticultural  Society,  and  when  they  reach  us  the  skins  are 
quite  hard  set,  and  the  tubers  apparently  ripe.  I  should  like  to  hear  of 
someone  who  had  the  space  at  disposal  who  would  at  once  obtain  a  few 
pounds  weight  of  these  tubers,  expose  them  fully  to  the  light  for  a  few 
weeks,  and  then  early  in  July  plant  them  on  a  warm  border,  just  to 
see  whether  in  that  way  it  may  be  found  possible  to  secure  young 
Potatoes  at  the  end  of  the  year.  The  experiment  is  worth  trying. — D. 
-  Mountain  Flowers. — The  flowers  which  grow  on  mountains 
almost  always  become  dwarfish,  but  their  blossoms  have  a  tendency  to 
become  larger  and  more  numerous.  The  Scurvy  Grass  growing  on  the 
muddy  shore  is  6  inches  high,  sometimes  twice  that  height ;  but  on  the 
mountain  it  seems  merely  a  large  cluster  of  white  flowers,  and  is  little 
raised  above  the  ground.  Our  common  Buttercup  becomes  a  low 
growing  but  large  and  handsome  flower  on  the  alpine  pastures.  The 
seeds,  too,  are  more  abundant  at  a  great  elevation  ;  and  the  Scurvy 
Grass,  in  places  so  barren  as  that  its  existence  would  seem  almost  impos¬ 
sible,  bears  such  dense  masses  of  its  oval  pouches  that  even  botanists  at 
first  fail  to  recognise  a  plant  familiar  to  them  when  by  the  sea.  This 
increase,  says  a  contemporary,  of  flowers  and  seeds  on  bleak  and  barren 
soil  seems  to  be  a  providential  arrangement,  in  order  that  when  hard¬ 
ship  presses  on  the  life  of  the  individual  plant,  so  that  it  is  in  constant 
danger  of  perishing  by  cold,  it  may,  by  becoming  more  fruitful,  scatter 
as  many  seeds  as  many  plants  would  do  in  a  more  sheltered  spot. 
-  Carnation  Disease. — Carnation  lovers  will  read  with  much 
interest  a  Bulletin  just  issued  from  the  Agricultural  Experiment  Station 
of  Purdue  University.  It  is  entitled  "  Bacteriosis  of  Carnations,”  and 
describes  in  great  detail  an  elaborate  investigation  which  Messrs.  Arthur 
and  Bolley  have  carried  out  on  a  disease  with  which  Carnations  are 
very  frequently  afflicted.  That  this  disease  is  caused  by  true  parasitic 
bacteria,  these  researches  appear  to  prove  beyond  doubt,  and  Messrs. 
Arthur  and  Bolley  have  succeeded  in  isolating  the  specific  microbe, 
which  they  have  named  "  Bacterium  Dianthi.”  Although  this  bacillus 
grows  readily  in  artificial  culture  media  when  rendered  acid,  producing 
a  yellow  pigment,  it  has  only  been  found  in  nature  in  leaves  of  the 
Carnation-Pink,  and  infection  experiments  seem  to  indicate  that  it  is 
parasitic  only  upon  Pinks,  and  produces  no  effect  on  the  shoots,  leaves, 
or  tubers  of  Potatoes,  or  on  other  non-caryopbyllaceous  plants.  The 
disease  seems  to  be  started  by  these  bacteria  enteriug  the  plant  from 
the  air  through  the  stomata,  or  occasionally  by  means  of  punctures 
made  by  aphides ;  whilst  their  passage  from  one  cell  to  another  is  due, 
in  the  opinion  of  the  authors,  to  the  secretion  of  an  enzyme,  by  means 
of  which  the  microbe  "dissolves  for  itself  a  passage-way.”  Although 
no  varieties  of  Carnation  are  exempt  from  the  disease,  yet  they  differ 
greatly  in  their  susceptibility  towards  it.  Delicate  varieties  and  poorly 
grown  plants  are  more  readily  affected  than  vigorous  and  well-grown 
varieties.  It  is  satisfactory  to  learn  that  such  a  simple  precaution  as 
keeping  the  foliage  dry,  and  preventing  the  presence  of  aphides,  may 
practically  banish  this  disease  from  our  Carnation  houses. — ("  Nature.  ’ 
