THIS WEEK’S GUIDE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 79, Issue 264, 7 November 1936, Page 13

THIS WEEK’S GUIDE

THE FLOWER GARDEN Any Dahlia roots In store should I'e brought out and started. The roots can be divided and the divisions planted in the open ground. Chrysanthemum and Dahlia beds can be prepared. Planting out of Dahlias and Chrysanthemums can be done now. ssake further sowings of hardy annuals in the open ground. I se hardy annuals to fill the vacant spaces in the border. Make sowings of Cosmos, Sunflowers, Asters, Zinnias, Celosias. lie in th • young growths of Rambler Roses. Do not let hang loose so as to get threshed by u‘n<t. Dust or spray Roses with sulphur to control mildew. For aphis either us one cf the derris dust or pyrethrum sprays. Do not cut the foliage oil the bulbs that have flowered. Tic it together loose-y and sow annuals between. THE GREENHOUSE Shading vilt be necessary. Dampen the benches anti floor two or three times dally. Vick off decaying foliage and wash the outsides of pots occasionally. Handle seedlings ns soon as they require it. Make so n mgs of Celesia. Salvia, Peppers, Egg Plants, Cape Gooseberry. THE VEGETABLE GARDEN Prepar? ground for Krnnaras. Tomatoes can Im planted. Sow Dwarf Bear? in sheltered position. Prepare ground and sow Runner Beans. Sow main crop Carrots. A sowing of Shorthorn variety Is advisable, in shallow soils. Sow Parsnips. These need a long season of growth. Sow Cabbage, Can li flowers, Broccoli and other winter greens. Sow Spinach, l ettuce. Radish, Celery and Celeriac. Prepare ah vacant plots and have them ready for cropping. Sow more Peas. Stake thoss that- are through the ground. Sow Bee!root. These appreciate a little salt applied when the plants have made two leaves Sow Onions tint- al -o a patch of Pickling Onions. These latter need no thinning out. Plant Potatoes. Earth up those planted earlier. Spraying is advisable. THE FRUIT GARDEN Mulch the Strawberry Bed. Use* pine needles or rushes if possible. Sjnay Peaches for leaf curt and Plums for leaf rust and shot-hole fungi. Spray Apples will’ arsenate of lead as soon as petals fall. s.iray Gooseberries with lime sulphur. Dust Raspberries and Loganberries with derris dust to control insects.

VIOLET BEDS SECRETS OF SUCCESS I The month of October is one of the ; best for obtaining runners of violets | for making new beds. One of the secrets of success is to get the young plants growing as quickly as possible, land this will, of course, depend on the | weather. The ideal conditions are I showers (but not drenching rain) with I bright periods between for several ' weeks on end. I Sometimes in November we experi--1 cncc really hot, sunny weather and a , dry spell that is somewhat prolonged. I At such times the plants need wateri ing frequently, not merely wetting the ' surface, but giving enough to soak i down to the roots. Is exposed to full ! sun the plants may need shading at •mid-day by placing some branches of ! evergreens over the beds. I The semi-shade afforded by deciduous trees is ideal for violets. Through i the summer the trees afford a welcome shade, and in winter the leafless branches let in all the sun, yet give considerable plbtection from cutting | winds. If violets are allowed to suffer j from lack of moisture they are almost certain to be attacked by red spider. It is easier to keep off this pest than • Co effect a cure. Spraying overhead every evening ;in warm weather with water is 'the best preventive. Hoeing all the summer is essential. The more | the soil is broken up and aerated ;the more the moisture will be con--1 served and weeds destroyed. By mid- ' January the plants should be in full (vigour and fertilisers may be applied. | Spent soot once a month is admirable, j for it not only feeds the plants, but I keeps off slugs and snails. | Bone meal is another good fertiliser 1 for violets. A slight sprinkling should bo given round each plant and hoed in. The danger with artificial manure is | giving too much. Overfed plants pro(d.ucc numbers of coarse leaves but few, if any, flowers. In using natural manures, such as fowl manure, equal care should be exercised, and it is belli er to apply in liquid form. For instance, one pail full of fowl manure 1 tied in a bag and soaked in an 18-gal-lon cask of water makes a strong | manure, which should be diluted to the colour of very weak tea. No feeding, however, is half so imI portant as keeping the hoe going. ROSES * This Is one of the most anxious times for the enthusiastic rose grower, I especially so if he has pruned early. I Warm days and cold nights are a .nightmare to him, for he knows that I the time a late frost does most harm is when the bud is forming at the point of the shoots. The inexperienced gardener may wonder why a sharp frost this month often spells ruin to I the lirst crop of flowers. We all know l that a fairly hard frost will do litt?e harm as long as .the shoots contain no bud, from now on the buds are being formed. When these are frosted the growth is arrested and the bud is useless; when partially frozen the flower will develop but will be deformed. It is not the loss of the first crop of flowers that the grower has to contend with, but a perhaps greater trouble arises from the fact that a check opens out the way for the entry of various pests to the tender growths. These pests or many of them, do not attack the healthy bush to any appreciable extent, but should there be a weakly bush it is almost an impossibility to keep it clear of pests. Therefore we watch our roses as anxiously as we watch the weather. Greenfly is one of the first pests to appear. There are various preparations sold for the destruction of this pest, most of which will be found efficacious. It is, however, not so easy to deal with rose grub. Practically and quietly it waits in a curled up leaf until the bud is fairly advanced. Then it steals from its temporary home, there to do its deadly work. It is almost impossible to kill the grub with insecticides, for it is so encased in the leaf that nothing can touch it, and one way is to pick it off the bushes. Spraying with arsenate of lead will keep the pest from the leaves if applied in time, but the arsenate must be applied early.

CARE OF HEDGES CUTTING AND MANURES Not every shrub used for hedging requires the same treatment. Sorne should be cut on top repeatedly to encourage a freely branching habit, but others are better if allowed to grow upwards unchecked until they reach the height required for the fully developed hedge. Privet, tecoma, lonicera, olearia, and euonymus, are examples of the first type, while the various kinds of cupressus, thuya and juniper, belong to the second group. It may seem hard to sacrifice two thirds or so of the growth which seems so promising now, but experience had proved that this loss will be more than made good by the improved rate of growth during the following summer. Do not be afraid to use the secateurs drastically. All of the first named shrubs are capable of making new growth from apparently bare and thick old stems, and at this time of the year, with sun and showers, and soil that is becoming warmer every week growth follows pruning in a very short time, and the bareness is soon made good. Do not forget that large-leaved shrubs like laurel and aucuba should always be trimmed with the secateurs, and not the shears. It certainly takes longer, but it is quite impossible to trim those shrubs without slashing some of the leaves in halves. These quickly turn brown at the edges and become unsightly. Another cause of failure in old hedges is that the surface soil has become washed away. If this has occurred, the soil on both sides should be topdressed without delay, with a mixture of good loam and decayed manure. This may be put on six inches thick with safety. MANURING LARGE TREES When manure is to be applied to a large tree, such as an apple or pear, there is not much use in spreading it on the ground merely close around the trunk, for this would not be of much benefit. Every plant has its receiving stations, where it takes in all its food supplies. They are not situated, as might be supposed, at the tips of the roots. Each tip is covered with a mass of loose tissue, called the root cap, whose function is not to gather in food, but to lead to the places where it is to be found. For some distance behind the tip the root is clothed with hairs—these are the actual gatherers. Food is taken in by them and nowhere else. The rest of the root, by far the largest part in the case of a tree of any size, is merely a channel through which the supplies are passed on to the stem and thence to the leaves. If, therefore, manure is to benefit the tree, it must be applied within reach of the tips of the roots, and that may be a long way from the trunk. SHOWY BEDDING DAHLIAS . Where it is the object to fill beds or borders with the modern dwarf type of bedding dahlia of whjch Coltness Gem was the forerunner, and a sufficiency of old dahlia stools exists for the purpose, it is good advice not to divide these unnecessarily, but to plant the old stools entire, and at quite wide distances apart. Theh, during the growing season, stake the plants so as to spread tne stems outward by thrusting the necessary stakes at an acute angle with the soil level, and tie the shoots thereto. If this is done the grower will be astonished at the large space one stool with seven or eight vigorous growths will cover. Small plants will have to go in more closely, and their two or three sterna trained in an upright manner in order to fill a given space. If this method is new to any reader, give it a trial.

LITTLE STEPS ON GARDENING PART KI Before commencing my talk on annuals, etc., as promised last week, I thought I would continue my talk on roots and leaves a little further. So that each member will be able to follow these two important parts of plants I have already mentioned that the roots are the mouths of the plants and it is in them that the food of the plant is stored. If you examine the roots of plants you will find them covered with what looks likt fine hairs, but are in reality long bags made of thin skin; these suck up the water from the soil, each drop of which has other substances—such as lime, soda, and iron—dissolved in it. The water thus sucked up is then conducted by the stem to the leaves ! and then changed into sap, as we shall see later on. There are two kinds of roots—those of trees,*shrubs and grasses, which simply feed the plant as it grows; and those which store up food to help the plant to grow the following year. The dahlia are among the later kind of roots. i Of What Use Are Stems to a Plant ? I --Stems are of many kinds and have different names; for the trunk of a big tree is just as much its stem as is the stalk of the tiniest flower. There I arc stems, too, which twine, such as the clematis and climbing bean; others that creep, as do those of the strawberry plant; whilst some run beneath the ground, and are often mistaken for roots, but are really subterranean stems. But a stem, as a rule, grows upwards, and not only holds up the buds, leaves and flowers or fruit, as the case may be, but is also the tube through which the food, or sap, as it is called, passes to the plant. How do Plants Breathe?—lf you look at the leaf of a plant you will see that it is made of thousands of tiny veins, like the ribs of an umbrella. These are practically little bundles of vessels coming straight from the stem, giving the leaf strength and enabling it to breathe in exactly the same way that we and all animals breathe. Their business is also to catch as much sunlight as possible. How do Plants Purify the Air? Plants are always taking in from the air a gas often called carbonic acid, but the proper name is carbon dioxide. This carbon, by the help of the sunlight, is divided into two other gasses—oxygen and carbon. The plant seizes, through its litlle leaf-mouths or "stomata,” on the carbon and uses it for food, giving back in exenange the oxygen, which is most valuable —indeed necessary—to both men and animals, for it not only purifies thcair for them to breathe, but without it they would die. How do Plants Use the Carbon for Food?—The water drawn up by the 1 roots, which has become 'sap,” tra- | vels up the stem and branches—just | as oil travels up the wick of a lamp I until it reaches the leaves with their I many mouths. These mouths are called "stomata,” for they are the I plant’s mouth and stomach all in one. | Most of them are on the under side 'of the leaf. These lit 1c mouths open I and shut just as do our own mouths. The lips are called guard-cells. 'I he sap mixing with the carbon made by the sunshine from the carbon dioxide, turns it into food to form new leaves and flowers, as well as fruit for us to cat. Though they breathe both day and night, plants feed only in the day, as they cannot make their food without. the help of sunlight. A great deal of the water they draw up passes off into the air through thousands of little holes—or "pores.” as they are called —in the leaves. If no water came up from the soil and passed off in vapour in this way, the plant would shrivel up and die. But it is only the green parts of a growing plant, chiefly Ihe leave.-, which can do all this good work. Why Are Leaves Green? —The colouring matter of green plants comes from a substance called "chlorophyll” (Greek), chloros, "green,” and phullon, "leaf.” But it is not green in itself only becoming so by being exposed to the light. Green plants also need iron in their food for the development of this chlorophyll, ana iron, as we have seen, is in the water sucked up by the roots. So it is that, what we call the higher plants divide the labour, each part having some special work to perform; the green leaves take in carbon, and give out oxygen in exchange, the stem carries the water from the roots to the leaves; and the leaves turn the materials into food. The sunlight, too, takes its share, for if plants were deprived of this they would have almost no colour, but be pale and sickly-looking. This is why roots and bulbs which grow underground are not green; the talks of celery are an example of this. Without sunlight, also, plants could not make the starch which they require for food. Now, before closing, let us sec just what we learn from the above. First we learn that plants must oe carefully lifted when transplanting so that these little mouths are not damaged. We also learn that all plants should be watered of ter transplanting so that the food is brought in close contact with the little mouths at the ends of the roots. As the leaves play such a big part of the plant it is important that they be kept healthy. This is important in all plant life and every care should be taken to keep them free from disease. Sunlight playing such an important part, every care should be taken that young seedlings, etc., should not be left in the dark after germination takes place.—Your gardening friend, "CARNATIC/ PRUNING FLOWERING SHRUBS As a general rule, the best time to prune flowering shrubs is after they have finished flowering. This practice enables the shrubs to form new wood in time for it to ripen well and produce an abundance of flowers the following season. This is particularly important in the case of spring flowering shrubs, as winter pruning would result in destroying much of the wood that should flower, and no growth would have been made to take its place. Flowering currants, Forsythias, double peaches, flowering plums and apples, -lilac and cherries should be attended to as they pass out of bloom. In many cases all the cutting that is necessary is such as will keep them within bounds, but the desired shape of the bush should'also be borne in mind. I