Working Guide for the Week

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23719, 27 July 1940, Page 8 (Supplement)

Working Guide for the Week

FLOWERS All spring bedding plants should now be in their positions if they are to make a good show. Plant roses, ornamental trees and shrubs; also transplant any shrubs which are growing too large for their positions. Box edging cart be put in now, making the soil thoroughly firm after planting to keep a straight edge. Liliums should be planted as soon as the bulbs can be obtained. Plant the stem rooting kinds with at least five inches of soil over the bulbs. Insert rooted suckers of chrysanthemums in nursery rows to grown on. The Orchard Complete the plantings o*f strawberries without delay. As soon as the pruning is completed, burn the prunings and all mummified fruits which carry over disease. Prune the outdoor grapevines in good time, give a good mulch of manure afterwards. When the soil is workable, plant the fruit trees: it is a good plan to have some dry soil handy to place around the roots. Thin the centres of old gooseberry bushes, retaining the younger growths. Where fruit trees are cankered, this is usually the result of poor drainage; this can be rectified now.

By KEPOS

VEGETABLES Garden operations will depend much on the •weather conditions, but it is unwise to work the soil when it is wet and sticky. Dig and trench all vacant plots in readiness for the spring sowings. Clean up all odd .corners which are a refuge for slugs and snails. Draw some earth up to the early sown peas as soon as they are • through the ground and protect from birds by stretching black cotton along the rows. Do not add fresh manure to the plots where root crops are to be grown. Lightly fork between the beds of spring cabbage and give each a pinch of nitrate of soda or sulphate of ammonia. Plant out the autumn sown onions, also potato ( and tree onions. The Greenhouse Sow seeds of tuberous begonia, gloxinia and streptocarpus in a good heat. Start up a few tubers of begonias in trays of leafsoil, for early flower. Cinerarias, primulas and cyclamen which have filled their pots with roots should be given liquid manure. Keep the herbaceous calceolarias in a cool position, but frost free; water sparingly. Make plentiful sowings of the half hardy annuals for the summer bedding; keep close ,r.o the glass to prevent growth being spindly.