The Practical Garden-Book Part 22

As with blackberries and dewberries, Raspberries bear on last year's canes, and these canes bear but once. Therefore cut out the old canes after fruiting, or before the following spring, thus destroying such insects and fungi as may have lodged on them. New canes should have grown in the meantime, 3 to 6 to a hill.

The first year after the plants are set the canes should be pinched back when they reach the height of from 30 to 36 inches. If a very vigorous growth has been made the first season two canes may be left for fruiting, but in the case of weak growth, only one cane should be allowed to fruit. In case of low-growing varieties--those that have been pinched back short--a mulch of straw or gra.s.s around the plants at fruiting time will help to hold the moisture, and also serve to keep the fruits clean in case of heavy rains. A Raspberry plantation will last three to five years. The black varieties are propagated by layers, the tip of a cane being laid in the soil in midsummer; by fall the tip will have taken root and may be separated. The red varieties are propagated by suckers from the roots. In nurseries both blacks and reds are often propagated by means of root-cuttings.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Black Raspberries]

For red rust, pull out the plant, root and branch, and burn it. Short rotations--fruiting the plants only two or three years--and burning the old canes and tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs, will do much to keep Raspberry plantations healthy. Spraying will have some effect in combating anthracnose.

Raspberries may be bent over to the ground so that the snow will protect them, in severe climates.

Varieties are always changing in favor. Good black-caps are Gregg, Ohio, and Kansas. Good red and purple sorts are Shaffer, Cuthbert, Loudon, and others.

RHODODENDRONS are broad-leaved evergreen shrubs which require a fibrous or peaty soil and protection from bleak winds and hot suns in winter. It is well to plant them amongst trees for protection. In the North, mulch heavily with leaves in the fall. See that the soil is made fibrous with leaf-mold or other material. Rhododendrons bloom from winter buds: therefore prune just after flowering, if at all.

RHUBARB, or PIE PLANT. This is usually propagated by division of the fleshy roots, small pieces of which will grow if separated from the old, established roots and planted in rich, mellow soil. Poor soil should be made rich by spading out at least 3 feet of the surface, filling with well rotted manure to within 1 foot of the level, throwing in the top soil and setting the roots with the crowns 4 inches below the surface, firming them with the feet. The stalks should not be cut for use until the second year, but the first, as well as the succeeding falls, some coa.r.s.e manure should be thrown over the crowns, to be forked or spaded in lightly when spring opens.

In growing seedling Rhubarb, the seed may be sown in a coldframe in March or April, protected from freezing, and in two months the plants will be ready to set in rows, 12 inches apart. Give the plants good cultivation, and the following spring they may be set in a permanent place. At this time the plants should be set in well prepared ground, at a distance each way of from 4 to 5 feet, and treated as those set with pieces of roots.

If given good care and well manured, the plants will live for years and yield abundantly. Two dozen good roots will supply a large family.

RICINUS. See _Castor Oil Plant_.

ROSES. It seems to be the first desire of the home maker, when he considers the planting of his grounds, to set out Roses. As a matter of fact, it should be one of the last things to do. Roses are essentially flower garden subjects, rather than lawn subjects. That is to say, the flowers are their chief beauty. They have very little to commend them in the way of foliage or habit, and they are inveterately attacked by insects and sometimes by fungi. In order to get the best results with Roses, they should be placed in a bed by themselves, where they can be tilled and pruned and well taken care of; and they should be grown as specimen plants, as other flower garden plants are. The ordinary garden Roses should rarely be grown in mixed borders of shrubbery.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Wild Roses]

If it is desired to have Roses in mixed borders, then the single and informal types should be chosen. The best of all these is _Rosa rugosa_.

This has not only attractive flowers through the greater part of the season, but it also has very interesting foliage and a striking habit.

The great profusion of bristles and spines gives it an individual and strong character. Even without the flowers, it is valuable to add character and cast to a foliage ma.s.s. The foliage is not attacked by insects or fungi, but remains green and glossy throughout the year. The fruit is also very large and showy, and persists on bushes well through the winter. Some of the wild Roses are also very excellent for mixing into foliage ma.s.ses, but, as a rule, their foliage characteristics are rather weak, and they are liable to be attacked by thrips.

Probably the most extensively grown cla.s.s of Roses is the Remontant or Hybrid Perpetual. These, while not constant bloomers, are so easy of culture and give such good returns for the care and labor, that their popularity grows each year. The list of good varieties is very extensive, and while a few, such as General Jacqueminot, Paul Neyron, Marshall P. Wilder, Victor Verdier, Anne de Diesbach, and Ulrich Brunner, are seen in most collections, one cannot go far wrong in planting any of the list. Two of the Hybrid Chinese Roses may go with the Remontants, having the same season of bloom and being about as hardy. These are Magna Charta and Mme. Plantier.

The next group in point of hardiness, and superior to the foregoing in continuity of bloom, are the Hybrid Noisettes, such as Coquette des Alpes, Coquette des Blanches, and Elise Boelle. The blooms of these are white, often tinted with pink, very double and fragrant.

The Hybrid Tea section, containing d.u.c.h.ess of Albany, La France, Meteor and Wootton, is very fine. These are not hardy in the North, but if protected by a frame, or if grown in pots, wintered in a pit, no cla.s.s of Roses will give more general satisfaction.

The Bourbon section contains three of the best bedding Roses,--Apolline, Hermosa, and Souvenir de la Malmaison. These will bloom continually through the fall months until severe frost, and with a little protection will prove hardy.

The Bengal Roses, of which Agrippina is a leading variety, bloom through a long season, but are not hardy, and should be protected in a pit. They also make very fine pot-plants.

The Moss Roses are well known, and are desirable in a general collection.

The little Polyantha Roses, with Cecile Brunner and Clothilde Soupert as two of the best, are always attractive, either when planted out or grown in pots.

The climbing Roses, which bloom later in the season than the Remontants, are very useful as pillar and screen plants. The old Queen of the Prairies and Baltimore Belle are still in favor. A newer and better variety is the Crimson Rambler.

The Tea Roses have proved more disappointing to the amateur than any other. No one can resist the temptation to try to have a few of these highly perfumed, richly colored Roses, but unless one has a conservatory or an especially favored location in the house, the results do not pay for the trouble. A few blooms may be had outdoors with plants set in the spring, but on the approach of winter they must be taken up and protected by more secure means than is taken with other Roses. If potted and grown in the house, they are the first plants to become infested with red spider; or if grown cool enough to escape that pest, they will be subject to an attack of mildew. Still, the results are well worth striving for, and a few persons will find the proper conditions; but the Tea Rose is essentially a florist's flower.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Hybrid Tea Rose]

All Roses are heavy feeders and require rich, moist soil. A clay soil, if well enriched and having perfect drainage, is ideal. Pruning should be carefully done, preferably in the spring. All weak growth should be cut out and the balance well cut back. The flowers of all Roses, except the Yellow Persian and the Harrison's Yellow, being borne on the new wood, the bushes should be cut back half or more of their growth.

In the majority of cases, Roses on their own roots will prove more satisfactory than budded stock. On own-rooted stock, the suckers or shoots from below the surface of the soil will be of the same kind, whereas with budded Roses there is danger of the stock (usually Manetti or Dog Rose) starting into growth and, not being discovered, outgrowing the bud, taking possession, and finally killing out the weaker growth.

Still, if the plants are set deep enough to prevent advent.i.tious buds of the stock from starting, there is no question that finer Roses may be grown than from plants on their own roots.

The summer insects that trouble the Rose are best treated by a forceful spray of clear water. This should be done early in the day and again at evening. Those having city water or good spray pumps will find this an easy method of keeping Rose pests in check. Those without these facilities may use whale oil soap, fir-tree oil, good soap suds, or Persian insect powder.

ROSES IN WINTER. Although the growing of Roses under gla.s.s is a business which would better be left to florists, as already said, the following advice may be useful to those who have conservatories:

When growing forcing Roses for winter flowers, florists usually provide raised beds, in the best-lighted houses they have. The bottom of the bed or bench is left with cracks between the boards for drainage; the cracks are covered with inverted strips of sod, and the bench is then covered with four or five inches of fresh, fibrous loam. This is made from rotted sods, with decayed manure incorporated at the rate of about one part in four. Sod from any drained pasture-land makes good soil. The plants are set on the bed in the spring or early summer, from 12 to 18 inches apart, and are grown there all summer.

During the winter they are kept at a temperature of 58 to 60 at night, and from 5 to 10 warmer during the day. The heating pipes are often run under the benches, not because the Rose likes bottom heat, but to economize s.p.a.ce and to a.s.sist in drying out the beds in case of their becoming too wet. The greatest care is required in watering, in guarding the temperature and in ventilation. Draughts result in checks to the growth and in mildewed foliage.

Dryness of the air, especially from fire heat, is followed by the appearance of the minute red spider on the leaves. The aphis, or green plant louse, appears under all conditions, and must be kept down by syringing with tobacco-tea or fumigation with tobacco stems.

An effectual and preferable method now employed for destroying the aphis is to fumigate with the vapor arising from a pan containing a gallon of water and a pint of strong extract of tobacco. To generate the vapor, a piece of red-hot iron is dropped into the pan. From one to three or four pans are required to a house, according to its size. For the red spider, the chief means of control is syringing with either clear or soapy water. If the plants are intelligently ventilated and given, at all times, as much fresh air as possible, the red spider is less likely to appear. For mildew, which is easily recognized by its white, powdery appearance on the foliage, accompanied with more or less distortion of the leaves, the remedy is sulfur in some form or other. The flowers of sulfur may be dusted thinly over the foliage; enough merely to slightly whiten the foliage is sufficient. It may be dusted on from the hand in a broadcast way, or applied with a powder-bellows, which is a better and less wasteful method. Again, a paint composed of sulfur and linseed oil may be applied to a portion of one of the steam or hot-water heating pipes. The fumes arising from this are not agreeable to breathe, but fatal to mildew. Again, a little sulfur may be sprinkled here and there on the cooler parts of the greenhouse flue. Under no circ.u.mstances, however, ignite any sulfur in a greenhouse. The vapor of burning sulfur is death to plants.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A Hybrid Perpetual Rose]

_Propagation._--The writer has known women who could root Roses with the greatest ease. They would simply break off a branch of the Rose, insert it in the flower-bed, cover it with a bell-jar, and in a few weeks they would have a strong plant. Again they would resort to layering; in which case a branch, notched half way through on the lower side, was bent to the ground and pegged down so that the notched portion was covered with a few inches of soil. The layered spot was watered from time to time.

After three or four weeks roots were sent forth from the notch and the branch or buds began to grow, when it was known that the layer had formed roots.

Several years ago a friend took a cheese-box, filled it with sharp sand to the brim, supported it in a tub of water so that the lower half inch of the box was immersed. The sand was packed down, sprinkled, and single-joint Rose cuttings, with a bud and a leaf near the top, were inserted almost their whole length in the sand. This was in July, a hot month, when it is usually difficult to root any kind of cutting; moreover, the box stood on a southern slope, facing the hot sun, without a particle of shade. The only attention given the box was to keep the water high enough in the tub to touch the bottom of the cheese-box. In about three weeks he took out three or four dozen of as nicely rooted cuttings as could have been grown in the greenhouse.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Vase of Roses]

The "saucer system," in which cuttings are inserted in wet sand contained in a saucer an inch or two deep, to be exposed at all times to the full suns.h.i.+ne, is of a similar nature. The essentials are, to give the cuttings the "full sun" and to keep the sand saturated with water.

Whatever method is used, if cuttings are to be transplanted after rooting, it is important to pot them off in small pots as soon as they have a cl.u.s.ter of roots one-half inch or an inch long. Leaving them too long in the sand weakens the cutting.

SAGE is a perennial, but best results are secured by resowing every two or three years. Give a warm, rich soil. Hardy.

SALPIGLOSSIS. Very fine half-hardy annuals. The flowers, which are borne in profusion, are of many colors, and rival in markings most other annuals. The flowers are short-lived if left on the plant, but will hold well if cut and placed in water. Seed should be sown in heat in February or March, the seedlings grown along until May, when they may be planted out. It is usually best to pinch out the centers of the plants at this time to cause them to branch.

SALSIFY, or VEGETABLE OYSTER. Salsify is one of the best of winter and early spring vegetables, and should be grown in every garden. It may be cooked in several different ways. The seed should be sown as early in the spring as possible. Handle the same as parsnips in every way. The roots, like parsnips, are the better for the winter freeze, but part of the crop should be dug in the fall, and stored in soil or moss in a cellar for winter use.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Salsify]

SALVIA. The SCARLET SALVIA (or SAGE) is a well known tender perennial, blooming late in the fall and making a fine effect in beds or borders.

It is easily transplanted, and large plants removed to the house continue in bloom for some time. The blue and white species are both desirable summer flowering plants, and the low-growing Silver Leaf Sage is well adapted for edging. Propagated from seed, cuttings, or by division. Height 2 to 3 feet.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Salvia coccinea]