MOSSY LAWNS

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 153, 25 March 1937, Page 20

MOSSY LAWNS

How to Treat Them Moss is a general trouble in lawns. Moist situations, shady spots, and bad-ly-drained patches will all generate moss if the soil is poor, so the first thing to do—after clearing the moss—is to strengthen the soil. Moss can be raked out of any lawn, no matter how bad it has become, but it will involve continual raking and cross-raking for the next month. Once the lawn is clear, give it a dressing of hydrated lime, used, exactly as directions instruct you. Failing this, you will probably have the same trouble again next year. All moss-infected patches will need a strong feed in spring, after the lime has done its work. Before then, however, give these spots a dressing of an eighth of an inch of crushed charcoal or sand. THE GLADIOLUS When to Lift and How to Store Gladioli are all but hardy, and in light land which is well drained most of the corms which are left in the ground all the winter will come up and Hower the following year. But this is not the true gardener’s method, and gladioli really deserve a little more attention. When the foliage turns yellow, before the leaves dies down the corms should be carefully lifted. The best plan is to loosen the soil round the roots with a fork, and then you can pull the plants up Quite easily. The stalks should not be cut off straight away, but the plants should be tied up in bundles, like onions, and bung up in some airy and dry place for a few weeks. If you only go in for a mixed lor. and don’t mind what colours come next to each other the following year, there is nothing simpler than to pull the plants up and tie them together; but if you want to keep one variety separate from another, and have marked down certain colours to be grown together next year, you have to be careful as you harvest the corms not to get them mixed. A good plan is to go round with a basket or two. or two or three boxes, and make a start by collecting first of all the special plants which you have marked as being extra fine, and putting them together in one of the boxes. When these have heen collected, tie them up and label them —don’t just stick a wooden label into the bundle, but tie it on —and then proceed to dig up and place in separate boxes the different named varieties, leaving the mixed corms till last. When the foliage has died, as it will in a few weeks, have your separate boxes ready again, and put the corms from each labelled bundle into a box of its own. Don’t put two lots into one box even though there seems to be plenty of room, for the corms are almost certain to get mixed. It is not altogether easy for an amateur with limited space, limited time, and limited labour to make entirely satisfactory arrangements for keeping tlie corms separate and in suitable quarters, and he must be prepared to go to a little trouble if he wants to find things in order next September. If a dry but airy cupboard is available, the dry corms may be left in boxes on a shelf all the winter; but perhaps a better method is to store them in dry sand.' If (he sand, however, is not quite dry root action will begin before spring, and then there is a real danger of rot setting in and spoiling a lot of the corms. On the other hand, if the root action is not 100 far advanced and dampness had caused no damage to the corms, the plants will flower two or three weeks earlier than those corms which are planted dry before any roots hare formed. But the practice is a risky one. When the dead loaves are cut from the corms, or pulled off, it will he found that besides an increase in the number of Inrge-siz.ed corms, there will be quite a quantity of small ones and any amount of tiny cormlets, varying considerably in size. All these smaller ones will flower in time if you have the patience to nurse them ; but unless you are prepared to wait two or three years it is best io get rid of the tiny cormlets and only keep those as big round as your finger-nail. Nearly all these will flower next summer, though the flower spikes will lie later than and not so large as those from the bigger corms.