GARDEN NOTES .

Waikato Times, Volume 114, Issue 19052, 16 September 1933, Page 14 (Supplement)

GARDEN NOTES .

WORK.

SPECIALLY COMPILED TO SUIT CONDITIONS IN WAIKATO,

(By “Nikau.”)

SEASONABLE WORK. yVegetables and Fruit.— Dig in lupins, prairie grass and other plants 'frown for green manure; a little time spent in chopping them and mixing them with the soil will he well spent,, as this helps them to rot quickly. Broad beans showing signs of rust should be sprayed with lime-sulphur (1 in 80, or Bordeaux, lib to 12 gals). Plant artichoke, potato, cabbage, silver beet, rhubarb, onion, cauliflower, lettuce and herbs such as mint, parsley, sage and thyme. Sow parsnip, carrot, radish, lettuce, leek, onion, turnip, peas beetroot, salsify, kohlrabi, celery and tomato (both in boxes), mustard (a week after cress), * parsley, spinach. Prepare a few rich places for marrow, pumpkin and cucumber, but do not sow or plant for a while yet. Graft fruit trees. Continue planting lemon and orange trees. Spray apple trees (libel Bordeaux to 6 gallons of water), while the buds are still unopened. If flowers or leaves have appeared, use lime-sulphur Instead, as it is less caustic; the summer strength Is between 1 in 80 and 1 in 125 parts of water.' Flowers. —Sow asters in an open, well-drained part of the garden. ; ; Plant hardy plants of all kinds. Sow seed of the tender kinds if frames or green houses are available; otherwise wait another fortnight. Label bulbs before the flowers have gone. Plant lilies before it is too late, most kinds have now made a few inches of growth above ground, plant climbers such as those described In last week’s notes. - Take up perennials such as Helenium, perennial phlox and Rudbecliia, divide them and replant the hardy outside portions. If couch grass or oonvolvulus Is growing amongst the perennials, the latter should certainly be dug up and cleared of weeds. Make a good sowing of sweet peas now, and , tie up the early ones. Make sure that cuttings of roses, hydrangeas an d other shrubs receive one good soaking a week. The same applies to newly-planted trees and shrubs; a good start is more than half ’ the battle here.

anium, Iris, etc. Rock plants often suffer badly, as slugs and snails And cover under the rocks and trailing plants such as Aubrietia and Arabis. This is the part of the garden which would benefit most from a sprinkling with the aluminium sulphate solution mentioned above.

WIRELESS TALKS.

Readers are reminded of the horticultural lectures given every Saturday at 7.30 p.m. by a member of the Auckland Horticultural Society and broadcast by IYA. There are often lectures on other days broadcast from other centres—for example, from Wellington on Wednesday evening. The talk to be broadcast to-night from IYA is on citrus fruits.

The lecture,broadcast from lYAlast Saturday dealt with seasonable work in the flower garden. StatiV interfered greatly with the reception, and spoilt some very useful hints and recipes. The subjects dealt with included care of the lawn, treatment of wounds on trees and shrubs, pruning of shrubs, raising of annuals, making of “lawn-sand,” forms of pruning (pinching out tips of fuchsias to make plants bushy, disbudding of roses, dahlias and carnations, trimming up untidy and straggly bushes, etc.), digging and planting of mixed border, topdressipg and other treatment of rockeries, and still more subjects. One good hint w r as to sow asters where they are to bloom, as this reduces the danger from aster wilt. The week’s programme of Broadcasts is given every Friday evening in our columns.

FREE FLOWERING LILAC.

The following note from the August issue of the New Zealand Small Holder” should be of interest to readers who have lilac bushes: “Many people have the idea that lilacs are difficult to grow, as their period of blooming is most uncertain. This, however, need not be the oase if th'ey are treated in the correct manner. One of the most common causes for this uncertainty and sparseness of flowers is the presence of suckers. These shoots spring from the common stock upon which the finer varieties are grafted, and, as they are more vigorous in growth, sap the bushes of much of their energy. They grow up through the soil commencing'close to the main stem, and in many cases originate in the roots of the main plant. Scrape away the soil until the base of each sucker Is reached, and then cut it off where it joins the roots. _ “Another reason for non-flowering is the presence of worn-out shoots, which are usually foi’.nd blocking the centres of the bushes,’and preventing air and sunlight from penetrating. These old shoots must be out back to vigorous shoots, and it is best to do it as soon as the blossoms have faded. The young Shoots will then become more healthy and produce blooms next season."

GROW TOBACCO.

This should be the gardener’s slogan, even if the leaves are never, smoked but are simply boiled and made into infusions which are to be applied as insecticides. From the gardener’s point of view the valuable part of the leaf is the nicotine, for this is a deadly poison to insects. It is sold on the market in the form of Black Leaf 40, so concentrated that it must be used at the rate of t part to 800 or 900 parts of water. In large gardens room should be certainly found for two or three dozen tobacco plants to provide insecticidal solutions. The seeds, easily obtainable from seedsmen, should he treated like that of celery or tomato—that is, It should be sown early in boxes and planted out when 'danger of frost Is over. The plants require nearly as much room as dahlias—say three feet apart each way.

THE FLOWER SHOW.

An account of this will appear in next week’s notes.

PROTECTING PEAS

For protecting peas there is much to be said in favour of black cotton .—it Is cheap and easily applied. Three te' gtrands stretched over a row of turnip, radish or peas will protect it per■h-. fectly in most cases—the writer lias never found Ibis fail, though friend* ; C tepeak of over-hold sparrows which •£; mock these trivial guards. For sucli sparrows the following guards may be used: Two long C-incli boards arc placed on edge, parallel, about a foot apart, and small-meshed netting is ■ nailed on them. With a brace at rr each end and one or two near the middle, the whole contrivance Is rigid ;i enough, to be moved about. Another Vt, 1 way is to make a number of hoops ol Wire or hoop-iron and attach the email-meshed netting to these. A V length sufficient. for one planting should be made—perhaps’ 36 feet—--1 end this can be moved on as the crops get beyond the danger stage. Guards •of netting have the merit of being lasting, but the demerit of being bulky . end awkward to store from season to season.

FLOWERING LUPINS.

Owing to the great advances made In lupins, these plants are now among the favourite perennials. Visitors to Summer Shows in the last lour or five years will remember how prominent lupins have always been in the collections of cut flowers, rivalling even the delphiniums. Collections of lupin iplants may be bought from most nurserymen, but a good way Is to buy some first-class seed and work up a stock from the best of the seedlings. The b’est strain is Downer’s. The perennial lupin is Luplnus polyphyllus. Unlike most perennials,.it is not readily divisible. Readers who have large clumps may divide each into two, but bertainly not into a dozen or so as they might with Helenium, perennial phlox, etc. 'if the seed is sown now, s few of the plants will flower in autpmn, and all should make strong clumps for next spring. *

if Besides llic perennial lupin there ire various annual strains, especially Builable for massing. .As they transplant badjy, they should be sown .where they arc to flower. For ttje front of the mixed border a dwarf variety should be used, and for the back' a tail variety rising to a height ©f four or live feet. A sixpenny packet of mixed dwarf and another of mixed tall will go far to brighten up the garden in summer. r i

GLUG CURES

Besides the proprietary slug cures ion the" market, a number of others may be used. The Royal Horticultural Society’s recipe is this: “Get a pound of aluminium sulphate from any dealer in chemicals; dissolve a quarter of tills in a bowl of water. Put a walnut-sized piece of fresh lime in'a little water, let It crumble for a short time, then make up to round about a gallon. Stir the aluminium liquid into this and apply lightly with the syringe. It is quite harmless to the most tender seedlings and certain death to the slugs.” A second cure is a powder one; “Get a pound of Milestone (copper sulphate, a cheap chemical). Crush It into a fine powder. Procure 14 pounds of kainil (a cheap potash fertiliser) and mix it with the above. Dust lightly over soil and plants.” The present writer would be afraid to dust Hie copper sulphate on plants hut would have no hesitation in dusting it around them.

Readers are advised to hunt at night for slugs and snails; if a determined effort is made now to rid the garden of most of these pests, the seedlings of flowers and vegetables will have a fair chance to develop. Baits of dry bran should he set here and there in the garden to attract slugs; by about 9 o’clock in the evening there may be a dozen slugs on each heap. During the day the haunts of snails should be examined. The most likely places are (lie leafbases of flax, and young cabbage-trees and palm-trees, and the leaves of Agnpanthus, Watsonia, arum lily, ger-