Window Box Gardening.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXIX, Issue IV, 26 July 1902, Page 252

Window Box Gardening.

HOW TO GET A GOOD EFFECT FOR A SMALL OUTLAY.

It is a mystery why garden-lovers, especially those who live in towns, where opportunities for horticulture are more restricted than in the country. have not practised hitherto the art of window-gardening to a greater extent. They are very seldom seen in the colonies. Window-boxes are artistic, may be inexpensive, are easily tended from inside, and their contents are not subject to destruction by cats. MAKING THE BOX. There are few things more easy to make than a window-box, and the larger it is the better. It should be the full length of the sill, and quite as wide; in fact, it may with advantage be allowed to project two or three inches beyond, as this extra width will give a great deal more room. Six to eight inches will be sufficiently deep for it. Ordinary flooring-board answers as well as anything for its construction, and the ends and sides may be nailed together just in the ordinary way. About a dozen to eighteen holes, each half an inch in should be bored in the bottom of the box for the purpose of • allowing superfluous water to run away freely, and to assist this end the box should not be allowed to rest dead on the win-dow-sill, but should be raised about half an inch or so from ir. T

is done by nailing a few sticks of wood on to the bottom of the box at intervals.

It. should be painted on the outside (a good sober green is as good a colour as any), but the inside should not be touched.

When the box is made and in position, the first thing to do is, of course, to till it. At the bottom shoidd be strewn a few broken pieces of flower-pot to allow of free drainage. Over this a layer of decayed leaves or leaf-mould will be an advantage, and then the box should be filled up to within an inch of the top with a mixture of loam, more leafmould, and a little silver-sand.

As window-boxes do not require a great deal of soil to fill them, care should be taken to get it as good as possible, and a shilling or two spent for this purpose will be amply repaid by a larger and more healthy display of bloom when the time comes.

Another way to utilise the boxes, instead of filling them with earth, is to buy plants in pots, and stand them, pots and all, in the boxes, covering the whole surface with cocoanut fibre. This gives a somewhat formal effect, but has one advantage. If the plant in one pot finishes flowering. fails to flower at all. or dies, it can easily be lifted out and replaced by another one without any trouble. Summer is, of course, the time when window-boxes are at their best; but there is no reason why they should not be fresh and bright nearly all the year round. The snowdrop will be the first to make its appearance in spring; and all the usual bulbs—such as daffodils, crocuses. scillas, and tulips—'are admirably adapted for box-cultivation. Practically, any kind of daffodil is suitable: and among the tulips White Swan, Golden Eagle, Ophir d’Or. Bouton d’Or (all yellow), Keizer’s Kroon (red. with yellow edges), and the scarlet Gesneria are all desirable. With these may be interspersed an occasional dwarf evergreen shrub. Lilies-of-the-vallev. too. and

dogs'-tooth violets should also be planted. Summer brings with it a wealth of available flowers. One of the most charming feats of window-box gardening may be accomplished by training sweet-peas to hang over the edges of the box. The seeds should be planted about an inch from the edge, and as they grow they will probably fall over by their own weight. Sweet-peas grown in this way give a delightful shower of blossom, especially if intermingled with the yellow flowers of the creeping jenny, and the various coloured blooms of hanging geraniums. For the body of the box many things are available. Scarlet geraniums. white daisies, and blue lobelia promise to be all the rage this year on account of the Coronation festivities; but beyond this nemophilas. petunias, pelargoniums, 'mignonette, Clarkias. flowering heaths, fuchsias, begonias. convolvuli. nasturtiums, mush. canary creeper, stonecrop, saxifrages, forget-me-nots, and dozens of other plants may be used, to be followed later on by chrysanthemums. asters, and dahlias. Ping-Pong Invades the Ocean. Ping-pong, having invaded every corner of the earth, is now extending its conquest to the ocean. Fashionable ocean travellers who take delight in frequent trips to America will now have something besides deck quoits to occupy their time. The game was first introduced on board the Campania, and afforded so much amusement to the passengers that the company, it is stated, has decided to instal ping-pong outfits on all their ships. Scarcely had the Campania left Liverpool when the passengers were hard at it. striving for the championship of the North Atlantic, which was won by a Scotchman.

The King’s Bracelets. The wearing of a bracelet by’ a man seems a little odd to modern ideas, yet it is done by some very great personages, indeed. In earlier times it was the mark of Royalty among the nations in the East, and its use is recorded in Biblical pages, Hence it is not so strange to find that among the ornaments that King Edward will don on his Coronation Day will be a pair of bracelets, These English bracelets, or “armib lae.” are of the finest gold, and adorned with bands of pearls at the edges. They are beautifully chased and ornamented with the rose, sham 4 rock and thistle, and open by means of a hinge. Our old Anglo-Saxon kings wore these baubles, and in some of the old chronicles they are termed “givers of bracelets.” The Latest Fad. A little animal of the gruesome order is the last pet of the fashionable woman always craving for something new. Happily, it is not alive, for she will stick a toad upon the bosom of her gown with as little fear as she places a black beetle or lizard on the blotter of her writing table. The chameleon, in every shade of colour which it is its special privilege to assume, is a favourite fancy, and these ornaments are so made that a varied dozen given as a present are sufficient for the roost fastidious, for they can be changed and changed about, and those that have been worn as ornaments one day can serve as additions to a boudoir the next, clinging to curtains, fastening photographs to draperies, etc., and so on.