THE Garden

Otago Witness, Issue 3912, 5 March 1929, Page 11

THE Garden

-'WORK FOR THE WEEKdH

NOTES BY

D. TANNOCK,

F.R.H.s:-.

the greenhouse and NURSERY. 1 I have frequently stressed the need for free ventilation during the autumn months to secure a firm, sturdy growth which will stand the winter conditions which follow. Both top and bottom ventilators can be left a little bit open all night, except when a cold wind is blowing, and fire heat is necessary only on dull, cold days. Plants growing in cold frames should also be accustomed to open-air conditions, and the sashes should be pulled off during duil days and ptill warm nights. Continue to pot on the cinerarias to their final pots or tins, pot or box up bulbs for forcing, shake' out and pot up the old cyclamen croms, find spray both the seedlings and the old plants occasionally with nicoticide to prevent attacks of mite. Cyclamen are very useful plants for furnishing the greenhouse in winter and early spring, and as they can be grown on quite well under cool conditions, they are very suitable for the amateur’s greenhouse and they can be flowered in a cold frame. Seeds of native plants, Such as celmisias, ranunculus, and olearias, as also hardy perennial and alpine plants, can be sown either on prepared beds or in pots or boxes of light soil, placing them in a cool, moist position shaded from the sun. Germination may not take place for some time, but the seeds are better in the ground than in packets. Tomatoes are often attacked by blight, which causes spots to appear on the leaves, but if the crop is fully developed and ripening well forward it is not worth bothering about it. Continue to ventilate freely and to maintain a dry, warm atmosphere. THE FLOWER GARDEN. The main work in the flower garden at the present time will be hoeing, picking and watering. To keep the dahlias and sweet peas in a flowering state it is necessary to prevent them from forming seed which is their natural desire, and all dead flowers and seed pods should be picked off regularly. *ln light soils watering may be necessary, but a good soaking is better than frequent sprayings, and if the surface soil is kept scuffled or mulching with manure or leaves carried out, a good watering will last for some time. Dahlias, sweet peas, and Michaelmas daisies also like liquid manure, and this is applied after a watering with clean water, not when the soil is dry. Continue to layer carnations, to tie up chrysanthemums, and to tie in the young selected growths on the rambler roses.

THE VEGETABLE AND FRUIT GARDEN.

Continue to harvest onions, and to dig and store away potatoes. If there are only sufficient tubers for immediate use it will be quite suitable to store them away in boxes or bags in a dark airy cellar or in a shed, but if sufficient for the winter are grown they keep much better when stored in clamps or pits. When digging be careful to put the fork well under the plants, taking care not to damage the ftibers, throw aside the second-size tubers for seed, throw out the very small, diseased, and damaged ones, and collect the large ones in boxes or sacks. Select a well-drained site for the clamp, and build up the tubers into a pyramid with a base three feet in diameter and about three feet in height, but the size will depend entirely on the crop. Thatch the clamp with straw or grass, and then cover with about six inches of soil which has been dug from round the base. This forms a trench which ensures good drainage should we have wet ■weather. To prevent the tubers from heating it is usual to put a ventilator in the top formed by twisting a bunch of straw or hay, placing it in position at the top of the pyramid, and fixing it with the soil. The tubers selected for seed should be spread out thinly in boxes and exposed to the weather until they are set up on their ends in sprouting trays. In districts where frosts are severe they would require to be placed in a cool, airy shed or cellar as soon as greened. Growing crops of winter greens will require watering occasionally wh’’e the dry weather continues, but it is a mistake to splash them overhead with a hose. Remove spent crops and collect apples and pears as they ripen. LOBELIA. For providing a permanent display during the summer and autumn there is nothing better than the various kinds of geraniums, and as an edging for geranium beds and borders there is nothing better than blue lobelia and the dwarf variegated geranium. There are several kinds of lobelias, but probably the best known are the dwarf varieties of Lobelia Erinus, a natuve of the Cape of Good Hope. It is really a perennial, and in mild districts it survives the winter, and the plants can be lifted and divided up in the spring. At one time we could not depend on the dwarf varieties com-, ing true from seed, and it was the custom to lift a few plants in the autumn, cut off the flowers and place them in boxes which were kept in the greenhouse during the winter. In the spring, when growth commenced, the young shoots were taken off and inserted as cuttings in sandy soil. In this way we were quite

certain to obtain plants of uniform growth and colour. As the varieties are now so well fixed, we can depend on getting them true from seed, and this is the method we adopt. The seed is sown in boxes which are placed in gentle heat, and as soon as the plants are large enough to handle they are pricked out into other boxes, and after the young plants have grown and are hardened off they can be planted out along with the other summer bedding plants. In addition to the dwarf compact kinds suitable for edgings and ribbon borders, there is a loose growing, spreading variety suitable for growing in hanging baskets, for edging window boxes, or growing over banks or rocky edgings. There are crimson, white, and other coloured varieties, but the blue is the most popular and most useful of the dwarf kinds. Lobelia tenuior, a native of Western Australia, is a taller plant, growing to a height of 9 to 12 inches, with large deep blue flowers with a white eye. This lobelia is sometimes grown as a pot plant, and is very useful when grown in good big patches in either the herbaceous or the blue border. It can be raised from seed as easily as the dwarf kinds. Lobelia syphilitica, a native of North America, is a herbaceous perennial with blue flowers which likes a nice, moist position in the mixed border or near a pond. Lobelia cardinalis, Cardinal Flower, is also a native of North America. It is a bog plant in its native country, and should be planted in a cool, moist position, slight shade being required in some districts. It is not quite hardy in some districts, and it may be desirable to lift the plants in the autumn, break them up, and plant them in boxes which are placed in a cold frame for the winter. It has bright scarlet flowers, and is a very desirable plant. Lobelia fulgens var, Queen Victoria, is a most desirable perennial, a native .of Mexico, and therefore not quite hardy in some districts, though it stands the winter with us. This is also more satisfactory when planted in a cool, moist position in the mixed border or beside a pond. It also likes plenty of manure; which should be dug in in the early spring. Where winter frosts are severe it is better to lift the plants, and after dividing them up to the best advantage to plant them in boxes which will winter in a cold frame. The variety Queen Victoria has deep purple leaves and the flowers are brilliant crimson-red. When well grown this plant will attain a height of five feet. Lobelia' Tupa, a native of Chile, is a bold, handsome plant suitable for the mixed and the shrubbery border. It is a little tender, but will winter in most New Zealand gardens, and when doing well will attain a height of six to eight feet. The brick-red flowers are produced in large racemes. There are now a number of hardy hybrids of the perennial kinds which exhibit- a wonderful variety of brilliant shades of pink, carmine, rosy-magenta, crimson, and purple. These can be raised quite easily from seed, and a sowing in early spring will produce plants which will flower the same season.

I have been very much struck with the bright displays made by grouping geraniums in borders against walls and fences. In such a position they become almost shrubby and survive the winters quite well. They stand up to dry conditions better than most plants, and if pruned hard back in spring, after frosts are over, and topdressed with some good sandy loam to which a quantity of bone meal has been added, they will soon make fresh growth and flower freely through the summer and autumn. Soldier’s Tunic and Paul Crampel are the best of the scarlet flowered kinds, and Charles Turner and Mme. Crousse the most reliable of the ivy-leaved varieties. Geranium hedges are quite possible near the sea, and the ivy-leaved kinds are very effective when trained as climbers on wall, fence, or hedge. AUTUMN FLOWERING SHRUBS. Though most shrubs are spring or early summer flowering, there are a few which flower in the autumn, and these are valuable for maintaining the display and interest in the shrubbery border. Clethera arborea, from Madeira, one of the lily of the valley trees, may not be quite hardy in some districts, but is quite at home with us, and thrives in positions suitable for rhododendrons. Its evergreen glossy foliage and panicles of bell-shaped flowers make this a very desirable shrub. Indigofera decora is a low deciduous shrub, native of China and Japan. It has pinnate leaves four to six inches long, and racemes six inches long of reddish pea-like flowers produced in the leaf axils. This is a very pretty shrub, suitable for the large rock garden or a dry, sunny bank. Hardy heaths are very useful in the autumn shrubbery, and as they are so very accommodating, they can be used effectively for edging rhododendron borders, grouping in front of the shrubbery, and for covering a dry bank.

The Scotch heather, Calluna vulgaris, covers thousands of acres in the North of England and Scotland, and in addition to the ordinary species there are a great many garden varieties, varying chiefly in the colours of the flowers. These can be raised from seed which come more or less true, and from either

cuttings or layers. White heather has always been much sought after, and as it is quite as hardy as the common kinds it could be grown in every garden. Erica cinerea, grey heath, is a low shrub six inches to a foot and a-half high, with rather stiff, much-divided branches and young downy shoots. Flowers are produced in terminal umbels of four to eight, bright purple and very pretty. Erica vagans, Cornish heath, is a low spreading shrub from one and a-half up to five feet in height. Flowers are borne on a leafy cylindrical raceme four to seven inches long, pinkish purple in colour.