GARDEN FIELD

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 7241, 22 August 1933, Page 9

GARDEN FIELD

Specially written for the Times by “Lorna.”

Routine Work in the Borders. Continue with tho planting of roses, shubs, trees and hedge plants and shelter belts. Plant out all hardy things in the borders. Complete plantings of perennial lupins, oriental poppies, etc. Take offsets from chrysanthemum plants and dib out in the reserve garden. Those troubled with delphinium mildew should check tho trouble by spraying with Bordeaux mixture as soon as growth proceeds. Drench the soil woll around the roots at the same time. Continue to sow seeds of hardy annuals, and half-hardy plants may be sown if glass is available. Sow sweet-peas for summer blooms. Thin out the autumn sown sweet peas to at least six inches apart. ' Dib in cuttings of pansies, violas, pinks aand carnations. Plant ferns and water lilies. Plant lilium bulbs and gladioli conns. Also all kinds of rock garden and edging plants. Plant generously of aubrictia for a wonderful display of colour each spring Loosen the soil among the tulips and work in some well-rotted manure. Give carnations a good dressing of lime. Whenever possible, loosen the soil among anemones, ranunculi, and exhibition narcissi. Work-in some fertiliser among the frecsias—they are partial to rich soil. The Vegetable Garden. Plant potatoes, and supply the soil with potash; wood ashes will do if they are available, using a handful to each seed. Sow first early peas and broad beans. Sow French or butter beans only in favoured, well sheltered spots. Prepare the onion bed for main crop. Plant cabbage, cauliflower, lettuce, and eschallots. Sow lettuce, cress, radish and endive. Plant strawberries, rhubarb and asparagus. Topdress existing beds with Totted manure. Plant all kinds of small fruit bushes, apples, pears, apricots, etc. Flowering Crab Apples. Ornamental crab apples, which go under tho namo of the Pyrus family, nro extremely pretty and attractive in the spring of the year and again in tho autumn. A. healthy spoennen oven in a small garden is delightful, but grouped in a wild part of tho garden, preferably in a hollow, they are seen in tho height of their glofy—a cloud of glorious pinks and whites. Tho fruits in the autumn are striking, some with purple, some with brilliant red or scailet, and others yellow. Whcro only one tree is grown, a standard tree appears to great advantage, but ordinary trees arc best whore a number aro grouped. The usual method of fruit tree planting should be followed, but being grown for effect tho sito is all important If there is a dark background of conifers or a tall evergreen hedge, they show up to perfection. In most districts they are perfectly hardy and may bo grown in grass. Pyrus malus floribunda makes a brilliant show with its deep pink flowers borno on semi-pendulous stems. Elsie Bathe is somewhat similar, but not so rosy Ted when in flower. Pyrus augustifolia is a delightful pink with a delicious perfume, while pyrus parkmanni is a semi-double with rosy ,pink flowers. The varieties listed above are the showiest of tho section as far ns blooming goes, but for the best effect in autumn, tho following varieties are beautiful: Gorgeous, with crimson scar-

let fruits, the trees being so heavilyladen as to often need props. This is a splendid variety for jelly and for pickles. Pyrus Dartmouth, John Downie and Prolific are all desirable, bearing prolific crops. Diseased Beans. Last season many failures -wore reported -with dwarf beans, the plants being affected -with the bacterial disease known as chocolate spot, a disease closely allied to that known as stripo in touuAoes and streak in peas. The disease is often serious on light land, especially when such land is acid and short of available potash. On such, land it is best to pull the plants up and burn them, rather than go to the trouble and expense of spraying them. Thoso who were troubled with the disease last year would do well to try a dressing of sulphate of potash at the rate of ljozs. per square yard, over the garden, and especially the plots intended for peas and beans. The sulphate of potash should be additional to the usual mammal programme. Heavy Soils. In dealing with clay soils the first essential is to provide drainage. Where there is a fall in the ground leading to a pool or ditch this problem is easily solved, and the drains may be piped, or the channels filled with broken stones, broken bricks or similar material. In laying drain pipes or in using other material, suitable covering should be provided, old sacking material, etc., so that tho crevices do not become clogged with soil. Such ground Should not bo dug or cultivated when on the wet side. Planting should also be carried out in suitablo weather, using a little gritty soil around the roots. Trees and Shrubs. Such trees as mountain ash, laurel, spindlo tree, oak, beech, dogwood, lilac, borberis, hawthorn, forsythia, roses, apples, laburnum, and many others do exceedingly well. Plants. In grooving herbaceous plants, those of sarong constitution should bo chosen, which include hollyhocks, mic-h a cl-mas daisies, delphiniums, phlox, heleniums, perennial sunflowers, rudbekia, oriental poppy, lupin, shasta daisy, campanulas, etc. It is the correct or incorrect working of heavy clay soil that decides very largely tho number of kinds of plants that can bo grown. Chrysanthemum Culture. Those who intend growing chrysanthemums for the exhibition table should make a start in preparing tho plot. Early preparation of the soil is very essential. Most growers prefer to make a bed on a concrete or iron foundation with nino by one boards for the sides. A bed three feet wide allows for two rows of plants. A good dusting -of lime is a good thing to commence with, but in preference to filling in with soil straight away, leave tho whole mixture in a heap where it can be easily turned each fortnight. The chrysanthemum loves fibrous rooted turf. This, finely chopped up with a spade, some old farmyard manure and a pot of bouedust to each barrow-load makes a fine combination; some wood ashes added, too, will be an improvement. Leave the mixture until the time draws near for setting out the plants and then fill the bed, treading it firm. Chrysanthemums like a fairly heavy, retentive soil, and where the soil is on the light side tho bed should not bo raised above ground level, but the soil dug out to tho desired depth and refilled with prepared loam. Where watering is a problem, the bed is best on the level as the chrysanthemum is not a deep-rooting plant, but like most exhibition flowers requires plenty of moisture to assist in producing largo blooms. This plant, too, will not bo assisted by placing large quanttics of manuro well down. Tho manure is needed in tho top six inches of soil. They also lovo a fresh site each year, and a place where the drainage is good. Another useful method is to grow a few of the late varieties in tins or large pots, as these can be taken into shelter before frosts appear and continue to bloom well into tho winter. Those are best started in small pots and shifted at intervals into larger ones, using the same compost as advised for the bed. After planting, when they have attained a height of six. inches or so the tips should bo nipped but, and when side shocks have developed to tho same height theso also should be nipped to get the plant nice and bushy. All growths may be safely treated in this way until the end of December, when they can be left to mature their buds, which should be limited to <?no on each growth. In preparing blooms for market, too, the disbudded blooms are always marketable, being preferred to the spray typo. Campanulas. Those gardeners partial to blue flowers should cultivate plenty of campanulas. The tall, herbaceous varieties when grown in the mass are among the most attractive things for garden display, soft, pleasing, and restful. The colourings range from pale, silvery blue to deeper tones and then on to almost purple. Although the plant, as far as foliage goes, is very low growing, a multitude of flowering spikes are thrown up and tho massed effect is really fine. Any ordinary garden soil suits thorn and they aro among tho few things which really do well in a semishaded spot., Here, with the dwarf rock garden types fronting thorn, a very beautiful and permanent border can be made. The bed is best -raised with boulders, Or pieces of rock, so that tho dwarf types can trail over. Among the tall varieties aro both doublo and single types, some with wide, flat, expanded bells and others cup-shaped. Campanulas are all lovers of lime and well drained soil. The tall campanulas also appear to advantage with alternating groups of aquilegias.