Gardening Notes

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 77, Issue 6974, 6 October 1948, Page 5

Gardening Notes

WORK FOR THE WEEK Flower Garden Gardening at this season of the year can be a very congenial and fascinating job or recreation. It is in tune with the rapid expansion of growth and because of that fact, becomes a labour of love to most people, women especially. Men arc more concerned with the economical aspects of the vegetable garden, and that is as it should be, for it is to women that the higher attributes of garden beauty carry a stronger appeal. Plans for the summer display can now be put into practice and the borders filled with plants. There is really no limit to the variety—that is largely governed by space available but early flowering sorts should be first choice. Ten weeks or beauty stocks, Iceland poppy, nemesia, lobelia, viola, calendula, schizanthus, and viscaria should all provide a bright display over the holidays. The more permanent things for succession would include pansies, carnation, petunias, antirrhinum scabious, hollyhock, phlox and verbenas. The shrubby calceolaria and Paris true daisy in pink, yellow and white, should find a place. The double pink and white forms of the daisy are very popular, Wellpark Beauty and Mrs Sanders especially.

Gladioli and chrysanthemums are due for planting. Both will thrive in good ordinary soil with reasonable shelter. Individual tastes will determine the character of the latter, but for ordinary garden purposes such decorative sorts as Alice Dunevan, Beautiful Lady, White Wings, Hiawatha, Herbert Sutcliffe, Edith Cavell, and some singles and pompones are very reliable.

Gladioli are best planted in clumps or rows. Single corms are not so effective.

Herbaceous perennials should not be overlooked, gerberas, blue scabious, Daisy Esther Read, phlox, delphinium, red poker plant, astilbes and rudbeckia, are some unexcelled in the provision of flowers for cutting. For those who wish to present striking flashes in their gardens during the Royal visit the above should form a good foundation. iSome flowering shrubs can still be planted, notably azaleas,, rhododendron, hydrangeas, arbutus, coloured brooms, acacia, flowering gums and boronia, but this type of planting should be hastened.

Sow all kinds of flower seeds—hardy sorts out of door, choicer, things under glass. In this way good stocks can be had for .future use at a much cheaper rate than buying the plants. Spring flowerings bulbs have dc/.c well this season. For better results next year loosen the soil around the bulbs and give a good dressing of fertilisergarden or fish manure—watering it in. Look xor signs of eelworm in narcissus. It will be revealed by leaves striped yellow and bending over sideways. The only sure control is boiling the bulbs in hot water in December. Any previous clumps showing signs of the disease should be marked for treatment.

Carry on with lawn making. Conditions are so favourable, that this work should present no difficulties on well cultivated ground. On a new section, however, there is plenty to be said tor taking off a crop of potatoes and deferring sowing until April. Moss on lawn and fairy ring can be controlled by watering sulphate of iron at one ounce to the gallon of water. Grass grub can be cleaned up with arsenate of lead, while broad leaved weeds will be missing from a lawn sprayed with a hormone weed killer. All of them are easy to apply. Vegetable Garden This part should fast be losing its winter bareness and showing ribbons of orderly green where the young seedlings are growing apace. It is cheering to see germination quick and regular, giving spur to additional sowings. There- is little limit now to what can go in and where the indispensable root crops, peas, lettuce, and other salads have been provided for. attention can be given to vegetable marrow, pumpkin, squash. and cucumber. These are best sown on raised mounds of manure or compost, spaced about six feet apart, with three or four seeds on each.

Sweet corn should be sown in dopble lows, seeds about six inches apart. Later provision can be made for tying up. Celery, celeriac, salsify, and endive should be sown, also the well-known winter greens, Brussels sprouts, savoy, leeks, curly kale, kohlrabi, and drumhead cabbage. Dwarf french beans and scarlet runners can be got in in warm positions, leaving the main sowing until later in the month.

Rhubarb will be improved and hastened by watering liquid manure round the roots- If a barrel or suitable box is placed round one of the roots and covered with grass clippings, it will hasten production of beautifully crisp stalks. Seakale should be treated in the same way. With asparagus showing for cutting, it will be necessary to feed the roots. Liquid manuring' is called for, made either from nitrate of soda, fish manure, or dry cow manure.

Plant potatoes, either early or main crop, where land can be spared from other crops. It is still early for tomatoes, but the ground can be got ready. An open, sunny position is best. The plot should be staked and good sized holes dug beside, each stake. These holes should then receive a spadeful of compost or farm manure and well mixed with the soil taken out. If well dug over ahd dispersed it should keep the plants going for the season. Cabbage, cauliflower, and broccoli may be sown. There is such a general shortage of these that householders should grow their own plants. It is inevitable that a serious shortage of spring cabbage will occur this season, but it can be prevented from recurring. i Onions are.another crop worth cultivating. Good sorts to sow now are Brown Spanish, Pukekohe, or Brown Globe, The large Rocca or Ailsa Craig type are more suited for autumn sowing. Herbs are important adjuncts of the

kitchen garden, lasting for years with a little attention in the winter. Sage, thyme, mint, chives, horse radish, parsley, all should find a place in the garden. Pruning or Shaping

Spring flowering fruit trees are out ' in all their magnificence just now, and , really need little pruning so far as ■ the word is generally understood, for i a natural habit of growth is part of . the picture. Sometimes we see them clipped and chopped to a formal close head and then they become just a flowering tree. It may be all right with a Cydonia, which blooms profusely on the old wood, but to treat a crab apple or peach that way means losing all the normal graceful appearance that only loose blossoming - branches can provide. Therefore, it should suffice to confine attention to shaping the following year’s display by thinning or removing surplus growths to leave a balanced top. If this be done soon after flowering, no further attention will be needed for a year.