Garden Calendar for December.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume VI, Issue 965, 2 December 1879, Page 2

Garden Calendar for December.

Kitchen Garden — Sow peas, kidney beans, turnips. Plant out tomatoes. Cease cutting asparagus, that the plants may gain strength for next season ; mark such plants as you may require to save seed from. Pick out celery plants when about two inches high ; let the soil be very good, and keep them watered and shaded so that they receive no check. Keserve radishes for seed; be careful not to save more than one kind for that purpose, as the different varieties cross and eventually become useless. Stop cucumber plants to induce them to throw out fruit-bearing laterals. Fbuit Garden. — Summer pruning should now be done ; those shoots ill-placed or crowded, which cannot be rubbed off with the thumb, should be out away close with a sharp knife. Bud peaches, nectarines, apricots, almonds, plums, and cherries. Strawberries m dry situations will require abundant and constant watering. Vines will now require stopping : one eye beyond a bunch; stop lateraU also ; and regulate and thin the bunches. Cherries are ripe this month, and gooseberries towards the end of it ; if the gooseberry crop should be heavy better thin it early m the month, such will do for. tarts or for bottling ; gather the fruit for preserving before the seeds get hard. Peaches, nectarines, and apricots should be thinned out, if you wish to have fine fruit. Flower Garden. — Stake lilies, hollyhocks, foxgloves, Canterbury bells, and | other tall growing flowers. Dahlias, planted m October, will require attention ; to obtain good flowers, allow only one shoot from each plant ; keep them tied to the stake as they advance m ' growth. Roses may now be budded ; when the bud has been inserted about three weeks, it will be seen whether it has taken or not ; if it has, loosen the bandage and cut back the shoot, two eyes above the bud ; cut away all shoots from the' stock below the bud. Pinks and carnations should now be m bloom ; make layers, and pipe the choicest ; should the weather be dry, frequent waterings are necessary to the full development of the flowers. Take up ranunculuses, anemones, and Cape bulbs, as soon as they have ripened. Save ixia seeds. Strike side shoots of pansies. Stop chrysanthemums ; the tops will make nice dwarf flowering plants if struck m gentle heat. This month and the next are the best seasons for transplanting the " Silver Wattle " (yellow Acacia).