My Garden Tools Gardening Blog

How To Take Care Of Tulips

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 20:54:00 +0000

Tulips are one of the most beautiful flowers because they are so colorful. They are one of the first flowers to bloom in the Spring. They also like to come back each year if you take care of them. They don't need much care, but a little will have them coming back each and every year. Now for the good stuff.

How to take care of tulips:

Tulips are one of the flowers that love water. If you don't get much rain or you are in a area that is always warm, make sure you are giving them plenty of water. They will love you for it.

You will want to fertilize your tulips once or twice a year. The best time to give your tulips fertilizer would be the early spring before they bloom again. Simply add a tablespoon of fertilizer on the soil around each of your bulbs.

Protect your precious tulips from little critters. If your tulips are near small animals such as rabbits, squirrels or gophers, you may want to spray your tulips with an animal repellent spray. Another idea would be to build some sort of barrier around them. Some people use chicken wire to protect their tulip gardens. If you are just planting the bulbs, you can install a netting over the bulbs when you plant them.

If you are are trying to transplant tulips, keep them in the same condition they are in. When removing them from the pot, keep the soil intact. If you separate the soil from the bulb, you can risk killing your plant.

For the fresh cut tulips, keep them in a vase with lukewarm water. Make sure to change the water every 2 days. Keep them away from fresh fruit as the fruit releases gas that causes flowers to age faster. If you don't have plant food, add a little sugar to the water.

Getting Ready for the Crab Apple Bonsai

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 08:36:00 +0000

How to train Crab Apples

Crab apples or Malus Apples are members of the Rosaceae family. There is only around twenty-five species, yet the group develops an amazing bonsai. The tree is grown in Asia, North America, Europe, etc. The Crabs has a historic moment that sends them back to the era when Neolithic or New Stone Ages emerged, which brought forth the Ornamental Crab Apple Malus.

Get your pen out, since you may want to note the Malus Baccata Mandshurica Cerasifera or better known as the Manchurian Crab Apple. This lovely creature develops in native regions and Japan, growing some of the most majestic leaves, flowers, fruits, branches, roots, etc, that the world of bonsai growers has ever seen. Man has the plan, since the plant grows up to 20-feet tall and blooms egg-shaped leaves, which are tinted green. The white flowers contrast the green, which these flowers bloom in April and/or May. Fruits start to appear in the shades red, yellow, etc, and are shaped-like cherries. Cultivars may have different shades and tints. The small bitter apples provide a tasty delight, i.e. if you like the similar tastes of green apples.

Relative to the Man is the Malus halliana or better known as the Hall Apple. Hall’s grow shrubs in Japan, China, and native regions. The tree when grown in the wild reaches up to 16 ½ -feet tall. The trees produce spreading that include egg-shaped leaves. The green leaves have attractive tones, e.g. hues, purple, pink, which bloom as flowers. The flowers start to bloom in May, which promotes the growth of ripe, edible fruits.

Malus sieboldii or the Toringo crab is another relative of the Malus breeds. Tree or shrubs grow in native regions, Japan, China, etc, grows up to 33-feet tall. The deep pink flowering buds contrast pale pink tones. The tiny edible fruits are yellow or red.

Himekokoh is the Malus native breed that is grown in Japan. The tree gives birth to delightful edible fruits. A tasty dish is complimented by the minute size small orange citrus fruits, or Clementine.

To train these breeds as bonsai you will need to feed the plants by hand. Once you decide which family member you want to grow, you can start propagation by sowing seeds. Cuttings is not an option. In the spring, you can layer.

How to seed:
Once the fruits has ripen pick them and et them rest in a cool environment until they rot. Clean the seeds of the fruits, or pips and dry, stratify and move them to sand. In November or December, you can sow your seeds, using light earth. Germination is not something we can discuss at this point, since each species start growing at different stages, depending on the breed. I can tell you however, that if you chose the Ornamentals the seedling produces will be that of the diverse, or heterogeneous if you will.

How to care for your plants:
All year you should place your plant in south sunlight. This particular group of bonsai will tolerate exceptionally hot conditions, as well as frost.

How to pot:
Potting starts with rather deep containers. Since the plants grow decorative flowers, you can choose a balance pot.

How to clean:
You may need to remove some of the fruits, especially the Himekokoh group, since the heavy fruit will weigh down your plant. To avoid insect attacks, remove any un-fallen leaves in the fall.

How to re-pot:
When the crabs are grown in pots, they grow fast. In the spring each year, you will need to re-pot your plants in a larger pot. Cut one-third of the roots before re-potting. Wait two years if the plant is aged. You will need to learn how to prune, water, wire, spray, and feed to continue training your bonsai.

Fighting Bonsai Disease and Damage

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 16:00:00 +0000

How to fight disease and damage continues

Bonsai are subject to decay and damage. To protect your bonsai you must learn how to treat the plants from pests and disease. Before you can treat the plants however, you must learn the symptoms to prevent damage or decay.

How to spot damage and decay:
Decay and damage comes from lack of care, as well as from red spider mites, scale insects, and mealy bugs, aphids, which include the greenfly, gall aphid, and the black fly. Wooly aphids also attack bonsai as well as goat moth, leopard moth, geometer moths, small ermine moths, etc.

Spider mites include the web-forming tetranychus and the glasshouse reds. The greenhouse mites and the red spiders often feast at the underside of bonsai or other plants, especially at the leaves. The spider mites and greenhouse will chew at the foliage as well. If the spiders or mites gnaw at the leaves, you will notice marks, patterns, or irregular patterns, which turn yellow, or silver-gray. It depends on how severe the pests have attacked the bonsai. The tree may fade away if you do not treat immediately. The web-formers create webs, which you will find on the trees. To eliminate the problem and save your bonsai spray the plant/foliage with insecticides. You want to spray the undersides. Use acaricides immediately if you notice mild symptoms. You can use defensive action at the start of spring, otherwise use a selection of acaricides so that the pests do not adapt to the chemicals.

Red mites or the red spiders will feast on needles. The needles will show signs of damage. The plant will change from its natural color, changing to reddish-brown, yellow, etc. The needles will finally fall off the plant if you do not treat. The spiders will produce a matted web between the branches. This will cause the carbohydrates to slow production, since light and chlorophyll is reduced, i.e. the process of plants ability to produce basic carbohydrates produced from carbon dioxide, hydrogen, etc are reduced. The plant will not have the energy produced from photosynthesis processes to continue its growth and produce macrobiotic cellular pigments that absorb from radiant sources.

To treat your bonsai you will need to consider the plants. If you produce, confer and deciduous trees you can wait until the climate is warm and dry the plant. (Deciduous trees only) Continue treatment by cutting and destroying any branches that have been severed. Once the bonsai starts its new growth (usually near the end of winter), you can spray the bonsai with tar oil. Tar oil is a thick black substance, which is obtained from destructive distillation process and extracted from macrobiotic fluids. (E.g. coal or wood) Spray the tar oil with caution. Tar oil will destroy the female reproductive cells, or eggs. As the spring nears, use methodical acaricides and spray the bonsai. You will need to spray the bonsai again in the summer with distinctive acaricides. You should water your bonsai munificently in the summer and vapor the foliage methodically.

The deciduous trees will show signs of damage, such as hibernated eggs, which are often found on the branches. At the bark, you may notice red patches. During spring, the mites may leave holes in the leaves. You will find the mites predominantly at the underneath of the leaves. Mites and spiders often drop eggs on confers in cracks, especially at the bark. The eggs are also deposited at the foundation of the plant needles.

Geometer moths leave trails on foliage. The pests will feast on foliage and leave perforations in the sprouts, or buds. Geometers will also leave silky web trails in the soil or at the foliage. To treat the problem sprays the bonsai at the last months of winter with oil-based solutions. The oils will obliterate the eggs. Once spring arrives, treat the plant with parathion-based solutions made by chemical processes, or use lindane.

Fagus Beech and the Trained Bonsai

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Fri, 28 Dec 2007 18:28:00 +0000

How to train Fagus Beech

Fagus Beech is a beautiful trained bonsai if directed properly. The Beech comes from the family of Fagaceae. The plants are born in native temperate regions. The leaves are of the deciduous group. The tree itself has a lifespan that can last up to 500 years if taking care of properly. The sturdy tree grows smooth, ash barks, which is elongated. The sprouts are pointed and during the spring, the leaves are light green. In the summer, the leaves change to darker tones. During fall, the leaves are shades of russet.

Marscents remain on the tree sometimes during the colder months. The older trees will grow edible nuts, or masts of beech. The nuts are enclosed within the spiny casings. The group of Fagus Beech specimens are ideal for growing and training bonsai. The specimens include Fagus Sylvatica pendula, which is the weeping beech. The branches extend downward. Fagus Sylvatica purpurea is the purple beech specie. The foliage is reddish-russet. The garden specie when grown outdoors will stand erect in drier climates.

Fagus sieboldii is a native plant, or Japanese plant, which the tree trunk is longer than other species. The foliage is small, and the trunk is whiter than other beech specimens.

Fagus Sylvatica is the common specimens in the beech family. The tree has elongated leaves with serrated edges and strikingly noticeable veins.

Tip: Beech wood is used to make furniture.

You can propagate and germinate the plants from seedlings. To start growth you will need fall seeds. Sow the seeds after fall. The seeds will sprout in a short time, and stratify the seeds in dry sand. In spring, sow your seeds. You should sow the seeds in soil (Peat, course sand mixtures avoiding compost is devoid of acid) at around 1-inch deep. You can start propagation in boxes, yet you want avoid firm soils and provide room for air circulation.

Beech trees need direct sunbeams, yet require semi-shaded regions in the summer. If you live around the Mediterranean regions, shade is essential.

How to ventilate:
Young and re-potted species should be protected from strong winds. As the plant matures, natural ventilation is fine. The proper temperature desired by the plants is based on the plant and the region you live.

Few beech species require feeding, water, sprays, pots, wiring, pruning, etc to survive. It depends on the shape you hope to accomplish when growing as bonsai. Most beech species are sculpted rather than wired to shape bonsai. Still, you can use wire if you want a fixed-bonsai.

Before you wire your plant however, use fiber of palm trees to create supple straw-colored ribbons, which you can obtain from leaves of the raffia palm. Wrap the wire with your raffia and then wire your plant cautiously. You want to cut the wires with cutters, yet avoid cutting any region of the tree.

One of the attractive beech trees is the Siebold Beech. The Fagus sieboldii lives a long time and grows up to 2-feet, 2-inches when trained as the bonsai. I needed to mention this species, since after studying its features I see a potential majestic bonsai in the making.

Beech species need to feel safe from disease and pests. The common pests that nest in Beech species is the beech-leaf miner, gall midge, felt beech coccus and/or the scale. Gall midges also group around the Beech species, as well as the bark beetles.

To protect your species keep the plants moist. Spray the trees in spring and the last days of summer.

How to pot:
Beech will not grow effectively in flat pots. Nor will the plant tolerate décor containers. If you have an older beech, species pot in a container about 3-inches deep. If the plant is smaller, pot it in a 1 ½ inch deep container.

How to prune:
Prune the leaves, roots, and branches simultaneously as you re-pot the plants. Pinch back the new shoots during the spring. Prune the branches lightly. You can use spoiled main branches as bonsai saws to start the prune development project.

Enkianthus and How to Train Bonsai

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 21:00:00 +0000

Enkianthus is the family to Ericaceae. The plant grows in the Himalayas, Asia, and in native regions. Enkianthus includes the group of Enkianthus campanulatus. In Japan, these trees grow up to 33-feet tall and in France; the plants only grow around 10-feet tall. The tree stands erect and develops beautiful red branches. The leaves are attractively developed in serrated, acute. The geometric shapes or patterns form eclipses. The crown of Enk is green while the undersides are reddish.

Enk has a relative named Enkianthus perrulatus. The kin grows in Japan, native regions, etc. The plants grow around 6 ½ -feet tall. The eclipsed features have acute leaves shaped like eggs. The undersides of the leaves develop elongated veins. The leaves are brilliantly shaded green and in April and May, the specie sends out the troop. The troop includes umbrella-like hanging white flowers. What a beautiful sight!

Now that you have a brief history of the Enk family, you may want to gather seeds, cuttings, etc, to start training your bonsai.

How to seed:
The seedlings should be sown in greenhouse environments. This is not one of the beginner-friendly species. You want to mix peat, heath mould and lightly cover the seeds. Use sieved or meshed soil and place the seeds in a dark, moist environment. After a few weeks, the seeds will start germination, which you want to move the buds to a lighted area. Get your pot together and immediately plant. Make sure the pot has a good drainage environment. Soft shoots grow best in shaded areas. Air and light is needed when the shoots begin to harden.

How to care for your Enkianthus:
In the summertime place, the plants in semi-shaded areas and the remaining year provide adequate light. The plants should be shielded from frost. Strong winds should be avoided.

How to pot:
Use an unglazed, medium deep pot to transplant your Enks.

How to clean:
In the fall, remove all leaves that have not fallen.

How to re-pot:
The shrubs grow slowly. In the early days of spring each year and after your have pruned 1/3 of the roots, re-pot.

How to prune:
Sub-branches should be pruned in summer near the end. Use clippers once the withered flower heads appear, as well as the new shoots begin to harden. Branches should be pruned in September. The elongated branches should be clipped back to a shorter length.

How to wire:
In the spring and fall, you want to wire loosely your plant and prepare bonsai shaping.

Soil:
Enks prefer cool soil, rich humus, leaf mould, etc. Mix ½ of leaf mould, course sand, and loam for the best growth.

How to water:
Once the leaves develop, water generously. After fall, you can reduce the water intake.

How to feed:
Spring and fall is the best time to feed your plants. Enks enjoy liquidities fertilizers with slow-moving macrobiotic affects.

How to spray:
The trees should be sprayed before the flowers start to develop.

Enkianthus is subject to damage and disease. Pests, such as aphids, scale insects, etc, will attack the plant, yet if you provide sufficient care; you can reduce damage, or decomposing. Enks are subject to chlorosis, which is a disease. Use iron, nitrogen, zinc, and magnesium, applying it to the soil to prevent disease.

How to detect Chlorosis:
If your plant has yellow leaves near the lamina, veins, etc, and the new leaves start to show discoloration, you should treat your tree. Sooty mould will also attack the Enk family. Sooty is recognized for its black scabs that appear on the stems and leaves. Deposits of sticky stuff is another indication that your plant has encountered sooty mould. To treat, clean the leaves. Use a sponge and soak it in spirit and water. Use insecticides to eliminate the pests.

Detailing Taxus Yew and Bonsai

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Wed, 26 Dec 2007 20:59:00 +0000

How to continue care of the Taxus Yew

Bonsai plants are grown from seeds, cuttings, or purchased in nurseries. The seeds or cuttings include the Taxus Yew, which is the family of Taxaceae. The plants require care, such as proper lighting, temperature, ventilation, pots, cleaning, growth, re-potting, soil, and pruning. The basics can help you produce quality bonsai plants. Still, you must consider wiring, water, sprays, pests, feeding, and diseases to maintain a healthy bonsai.

To get started let’s learn how to care for your bonsai:
Sunlight is essential to plants, since it promotes the photosynthesis stage, as well as overall growth. The Taxus Yew requires adequate sunlight yet it can stomach shade. If the plant is situated in semi-shaded environments in heated climates, the plant can grow well. The Taxus family, unlike other bonsais’ can also stand frosts. The mountain plant is bested suited in its habitat however.

Taxus family can withstand winy environments, especially the hedged plants. You will need a deep pot to start the growth of the Taxus Yew and re-pot the plant as it starts to age. The aged Yew desires profundity balanced with the width of the trunk. You should re-pot the Yew three to four years, transplanting the tree into a larger pot. When you re-pot the Yew, cut any damage from the roots, including dead roots.

How to clean:
In the fall, you will need to remove the dead needles. Throughout growth, you will need to remove any debris or dying parts from all areas of the tree.

How to soil:
Calcareous soil and chalky soil is the suited earth for growing Yew. Calcareous soil contains elements of calcium carbonates. You will need one-third leaf mould, one-third course sand, and 1/3 soil, or loam.

How to prune:
Pruning requires pressing back the shoots, especially at its adolescent stage. The shoots should be pinched back during spring and fall, which you should pinch the shoots back at the side branches. You can wait until the tree develops flowers before pinching back the shoots, especially if you want to grow fruit. If the tree is the female specie, you will need male pollen to grow fruits.

Pruning the Yew in spring and fall is ideal for training bonsai. Prune the side branches that stick out, and cut the top clumps, or tuft of the needles.

How to wire:
Do not wire the Taxus Yew at what time the tree is growing new shoots. If you want to shape the Taxus Yew as the bonsai, wire the tree for shaping in September and March.

How to water:
Water the Taxus Yew moderately and habitually without adding too much water, or too little water.

How to feed:
Feeding the plants at slow growth stage will help your Taxus Yew grow healthy. Spring and fall is the best time to start feeding your plant, which you want to increase feeding at the last month in the fall. DO not feed the Taxus Yew during the months of July and August. DO not feed the plants in poor conditions, or if you have recently re-potted the bonsai.

How to spray:
In hot climates, you will need to spray the Taxus Yew. If the tree is standing in areas where no shade is available, DO NOT sprays the tree. The common pests that bug the Taxus Yew are the galls, weevils, tortrix, and the scale insects. The common disease that affects the Taxus family is found at the stem and roots, which include decomposing. The Tortrix, in case you are wondering is a type of caterpillar.

Defining Lavender Bonsai

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Tue, 25 Dec 2007 20:58:00 +0000

How to care for lavenders

French and Spanish lavenders are common herbs grown to train bonsai trees. The sweet marjoram is another of the herbs grown to train bonsai. Each plant is the member of the tender perennial group, which the plants will live for a long time if cared for properly. French lavender grows woody shrubs and requires brilliant light and warm environments to survive. The plants can survive in lower temperatures if grown outdoors, yet the warm environment is recommended. The south window is the recommended spot for growing French lavender bonsai indoors. You can also rest the plants at the west or east, yet south is best. In fact, most bonsai plants require the south, west, or east corners to grow healthy.

Lavandula dentata or French lavender is grown as bonsai trees. The beautiful plant includes leaves with indents. The trees grow woody shrubs; therefore, you can grow the bonsai as a cascade, or grow the bonsai upright. The French lavenders can live a long time. The plant grows elongated stems and arched flowers, which are light purple. French lavender requires brilliant lights to survive. If the lights are lowered, the plant becomes weak. The French lavender will develop pale green leaves, especially when the plants do not receive sufficient lighting. You will need to wire the plant so that it does not hang down also. When the plant starts to cascade and the stems become woody and hard remove the wires.

How to upkeep French lavender
To maintain French lavenders you will need brilliant light from the sun, added water, etc. The soil should be richer than that used in common lavender bonsai. The seeds often sprout slowly and continue slow growth. The recommended light, water, and soil may increase growth. You will need to continually cutting to propagate the tree. Insecticides may be used if you see a need; however, French lavender bonsai has physical powerful scented oil that intimidates loose species.

About Sweet Marjoram
Origanum majorana or Sweet marjoram when maturing will grow craggy, harsh wood. Sweet bonsai is one of the fragile species, which is a member of the perennial. When the tree starts, growth it shoots up 1-foot greens that often flowers after it becomes woody. During maturity, you are required to trim the shoots regularly to maintain the bonsai. You should remove the shoots, unless you intend to grow the species in another format.

How to care for Sweet marjoram:
Sweet marjoram requires bright light during winter months. The plant can survive cooler weather, yet brilliant light will prevent weakness. The seeds of the Sweet marjoram often geminate quickly, which you should trim the branches often to promote rooting. The plant is one of the easier species to propagate. Sweet marjoram has a sweet to the smell aroma. The tree often grows up to 8-inches, or sometimes 6-inches, yet it resembles the oldest bonsai species when matured.

Lavandula stoechas or Spanish lavender bonsai grows silvery green leaves, which are smaller than other bonsai plants. The plant can tolerate dryness, whereas the French lavender cannot. If you plan to grow the Spanish lavender indoors, prepare to research. This particular species is not friendly to indoor growing. The species can still make a good bonsai, since it ages like wine.

Bonsai trees are creative miniature garden growths, which form trees and shrubs while requiring meticulous pruning of the branches and root. If you grow bonsai, it is wise to research the market to learn more about caring for the plants. Bonsai require training, care, particulars, etc to continue growing healthy.

Caring for Bonsai Geraniums

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Mon, 24 Dec 2007 20:57:00 +0000

How to care for geraniums

While I am not going too much in depth on the subject Geraniums I will touch basis to help you decide if the plants are for you, and if you are ready to maintain bonsai geraniums. Pelargonium is aromatic geraniums, which signify large varieties of the cultivars and clusters that are easier to grow in windows and are simple to coach, or train as the bonsai. The problem is the geraniums have several hundred species to select from, as well as the cultivars. You may want to visit stores that sell Geraniums so that you can get an idea of what the plants look like when grown as bonsai.

The species include Pelargonium nervosum, which is the lime. Lemon is the Pelargonium Crispum, while ginger is Pelargonium torento. The list continues to nutmeg (Pelargonium Fragrans, rose (Pelargonium Graveolens) strawberry (Pelargonium scabrum), gooseberry (Pelargonium grossular-ioiders), peppermint (Pelargonium tomentosum), fern-leaf (Pelargonium filicifolium) and so on. You will find a variety of geraniums, yet the small leaved plants are best suited for growing bonsai.

You can grow the large leaved plants, training them into bonsai also. The peppermint is one of the large leaved species, which overlaps the pot and hangs down about 3-feet. The lemon Geraniums grow yellowish to green leaves, which makes up the Prince Rupert group. The trees or Prince will grow brilliant toned foliages, such as yellow with patches of different color. The lemon bonsai has a lemony scent of course. Some of the trees are yellow or green and may grow oval citrus fruits, which has thick aromatic rinds and soured juice flesh. Some of the trees have gloss leaves shaped like almond and spiky branches, which bear lemons. The bonsai may not grow lemons, yet it is often used as flavoring.

Geraniums are easy to train, yet you will need to provide plenty of water and brilliant lighting to keep the plants healthy. The plants are ideal for training as bonsai, yet you will need to trim the plants as needed to maintain shape. You can also re-grow the bonsai after trimming. The results will show in just a few weeks if you trim the plant properly. Refer to your manual and follow the instructions. You can use heavy fertilizer to slow aged yellowing leaves. You can use the leaves from the bonsai plant once you have removed them as recommended to prepare potpourri.

Geraniums require root boundaries to grow flowers; therefore do not remove the plants from the pot frequently. You can remove them periodically however.

How to start growing Geraniums:
Most Geraniums grow from cuttings. You may find a few species that allow growth from seeds however. The Geraniums propagate quicker when grown from cutting, which will also make them easiest to maintain.

Geraniums are grown as bonsai plants. The plants often grow bright colored flowers. The flowers are popular grown as garden plants, which some have large and small rounded leaves. The Germaniums grow pink, white, bright red flowers, etc, which the flowers sometimes have tall stalks. Few plants are shaped like saucers, or the flowers are, which the leaves divide. Robert and Cranesbills is a type of Germanium. Few Germaniums have bright red colors, which tinges of orange, and are similar to the scarlet Geraniums.

Now that you have an ideal what is involved with growing Geraniums, you may want to learn more about training herbal bonsai. The plants often come with instructions, providing you purchase them in nurseries, supermarkets, etc. Otherwise, you may need additional research and information to help you keep your plants growing healthy.

Buying Bonsai

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Sun, 23 Dec 2007 20:56:00 +0000

How to choose bonsai trees

Bonsai has a group of Latin names, which can help you choose how to buy the trees. For instance, if you want the whitish, pale plants you would search the group of Albescens. Albidus or albus has white growth as well. The Albiflurus group has white flowers that grow from its branches. If you want plants that adapt in land or water, you would choose the amphibious group of bonsai.

Additional groups of bonsai include angulosus, angusti-folius, arborescens, and so on. The group of Glaucus has a frosty bloom, similar to grapes. Pinous is the pine-like group of bonsai.

In short, the best way to choose bonsai for purchase is to view magazines, nurseries, or online services that provide you visuals of what you are purchasing. When you view the plants however, pay thoughtful attention to the size. For instance, if you purchase a dollar seed plant, you will not grow a tree the size you may desire. If you choose a 3.7-liter container to grow bonsai however, you can easily shape the plant to suit your needs. The Larix leptolepsis or Larix Kaempferi is one of the smaller bonsai, yet in seven years, the tree could grow up to 18 inches. The suitable try recommended for this plant is the humidity, drip trays at 10 inches by 8 inches. The cones on this tree are purple, while the foliage is brilliantly shaded in lime green. The shades change to darker greens during summer months, and in autumn, the shades turn bronze and/or yellow. The Larix Leptolepsis blooms cherries.

Starters should consider seeds, rather than the tree itself. The seeds are ideal to assist you in getting what you want. The ideal bonsai for starters is the group of Mame. Few of the Mame trees grow up to 6 inches. The minute size trees grow up to 3 inches, i.e. the infant Mame’s.

You want to avoid the Kingsville, Buxus Microphylla, boxwoods, Juniperus chinensis, Robusta green, Chinese Juniper, etc. The bonsais’ are ideal for expert bonsai growers.

How to choose liners:
Liners include the Acer Ginella. Like the Chinese elms, the tree has hedge maples. Ulmus parvifolia or the Wild Plum is other liners. Check the line of Prunus. The Chinese elms are similar to the Ulmus parvifolia, in that the actual trees grow large, and have serrated leaves. In addition, wing-like fruits grow from the tree.

Additional groups of bonsai include Virens, Viridis, Vulgaris, Xanthinus, Zonalis, and so on. One of the trees that stand erect is the group of Strictus, which these trees need careful attention to grow. The suppliers of the Strictus bonsai emerge from the Bamboo seeds. The branches include Bambus—Nutans, Tuldoides, Tuminoda, Chinomobambusa, and so on. The branches move onto Dendrocalamus Strictus, and extend to Dendrocalamus Membraceus.

How to choose imported bonsai:
If you are, importing bonsai make sure that you ask for photos and examine the tree carefully. The supplier should have no problem supplying you photos, unless the tree is not worth the price offered. If you garden will allow room for the old ivy bonsai, you may find this plant interesting.

Old ivy is a legendary folklore that associates with Bacchus. According to old folklores, the tree can heal whooping cough. If you choose the old ivy however, make sure that you provide the tree Simi-shaded area. Old ivy includes the Rhombea and the Helix. The Rhombea is delicate, whereas the Helix can stand indoor temperatures at all levels. Watering the plants require that you provide moderate treatments during winter, and often when the plant is growing.

Bonsai Selections

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Sat, 22 Dec 2007 20:54:00 +0000

How to select your herbs

Did you know you could purchase particular herbs and train them as bonsai? It’s true and all you need is some training, skill, and a few details to get started. You can purchase specimens in the 4-inch miniature range to create, and grow a sizeable leaf tree. The tree if trained correctly will grow up to 3-feet.

Growers have created rosemary and oregano herbs to create bonsai trees. The herbs prized for growing bonsai include tender perennials-shrubs, annual herbs, resilient perennial, and the semi-hardy perennial. The groups however should be separated, as well as the group of thymes, scented geraniums. See the group of Pelargonium to learn more about each group of geraniums.

If you are new to growing herbs as bonsai, you may want to start with the rosemary specimens. The rosemary is an aromatic evergreen tree, or shrub that derives from Southern European regions. The shrugs come from the family of mint. Rosemary is grown for the scents emerging from its gray to green needle-shaped leaves. Rosemary is also used as flavoring to enhance meals, or fragrances to make perfume. Rosemary has a wood shrub, which is easier to maintain.

Rosemary is similar to pine trees. In addition to Rosemary, the lemon verbena, as well as the sweet bay, or commonly known as laurel trees are ideal for first time growers. The trees grow up to 40-feet however, i.e. in nature. Laurel is a tree that produces leaves, aroma, and berries that are similar to the laurel shrubs. The cherry and mountain laurel is an example of the family of laurel. The wreath of the leaves may be responsible or cultivated in foreign lands for its mark of honor in ancient history.

The lemon verbena is a scented ornamental tree, which is cultivated throughout South America. The tree has minute size lavender flowers, which grow from lance-shape leaves and produces a lemony scent when compressed. The lemon verbena comes from the Latin name Lippia triphylla.

Sweet bay is a North America Magnolia tree, which is a miniature magnolia bush. The tree comes from the Easter United States as well, and often has a huge scented white flower with yellow to green leaves and red colored fruits. The tree is known as the Magnolia Virginia family of plants as well.

Additional herbs that are trained as bonsai is the willows, black berry, junipers, oaks, barberries, citrus, hawthorns, calamondin orange, etc. Willows have elongated branches that flex. The branches grow narrow leaves, which its catkins contain minute size flowers that do not have petals. Willow wood is made from this tree, which is the gamily of Genus and called Salix.

Juniper is a common bonsai plant, which has many variants. The Junipers are evergreen plants that bear cones that bear a resemblance to berries. The tree has minute size purplish cones, which yield oils and is often used to flavor gin. The Genus group is also known as Juniperus.

Assuming you is familiar with the black berry bush, oak, and citrus we can move onto the hawthorns. The hawthorn is a thorny tree that has minute size fruits with red tone. The tree is a member of the rose family and grows a collection of pink or white flowers. Crataegus is its Genus name, which this herb is also known as Haw.

Barberries are a shrub that grows red berries. The thorny flowering tree is cultivated in Asia and is grown widely at hedge plants or in gardens. You can also find the group that produces yellow flowers and a selection of red or orange berries. Its Genus name is Berberis.

Bonsai Perennial Tender Shrubs

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 20:52:00 +0000

How to choose tender herbs

Bonsai fascinators purchase herbs and train them as bonsai. The herbs include rosemary, laurel, sweet bay, willows, barberries, oaks, citrus, junipers, black berry, hawthorns, calamondin orange, etc. The herbs are actually listed in bonsai categories, yet because the herbs are prescribed in medicinal usage; it is often referred to as herbs.

Blackberry herbs grow as thorny bushes and have small, purplish fruits. The plants derived from European bushes of the rose family. Blackberry has pink and/or white flowers. The Latin name is Rubus Fruticosus.

Oak trees bear acorn and may have lobed leaves. The deciduous trees have evergreen colors, which the leaves have several round, or piercing projections. The Genus, Quercus oak plants grown in Jerusalem have lobed leaves. Oak is a valuable wood also.

Junipers are sold widely as bonsai, however, many people think of the Juniper as herbs, or scents.

Among the citrus family is the Calamondin orange. The shrub is a miniature tree, which its citrus scents derived from the Philippine Islands. Calamondin is a hybrid citrus, which got its name from the Latin, Citrofortunella mitis. Calamondin is one of the better herbs to train as bonsai. Many growers enjoy this herb for its similarity to the mandarin orange. The mandarin is also known as the Citrus reticulata.

The small fruits that grow from the calamondin tree will withstand, although it becomes weighty. The fruits make great preserves or ideal for flavoring meals. The calamondin is also similar to the Nagami kumquat. This Fortunella margarita tree grows miniature fruits. The tree has an awesome scent, i.e. citrus scent as that of the calamondin. This tree is also tasty in dishes, or can be used as preserves.

Olea europaea or the olive trees make great bonsai trees. The olive trees have green and/or black fruits, which are oval-shaped and bitter to the taste. The fruits have pits. When ripe the fruits are black. Olive trees are grown for its olive oil also. Throughout the Mediterranean regions, the olive tree is valued. The tree grows slow. Most growers up bring the olive herbs, training them as bonsai dwarfs. The ornamental trees grown in homes do not produce fruits, yet you can find herbs that grow bonsai olive trees.

Pomegranate is the family of Punica granatum. The plant is used in medicine and food. Pomegranate trees produce round-red fruits the size of an orange. The rinds are tough and enclose several chambers, which fill a selection of seeds that surround tart, juicy red pulp. The Asian species is the tropical breed that comes from Asia. Other types of Pomegranate exist as well. Pomegranate may have variable foliages and a selection of colored flowers. You should keep the room temperature at 65 degrees when training this bonsai. During winter months, the Pomegranate will start to shred its leaves.

The dwarf Pomegranate is ideal for beginners. Dwarfs grow yellow fall leaves and change to red during its growth cycle. Dwarfs also grow flowers and miniature fruits.

Dwarf Sweet Myrtle is another of the bonsai trees grown from herbs. Myrtle is known as Myrtus communis compacta as well. The plant represents ancient rituals and heroes, which Myrtle has miniature shrubs. The scented dark green leaves were once used as an herb scattered over large areas of the body for healing. The sweet odors have produced potpourri, fragrances, bathwater scents, and more. Myrtle trees are available in a variety of shades, colors, scents, etc, including the starry white flowered plant. Experts recommend planting Myrtle in groves. In groves, the Myrtle rather resembles a miniature orchard.

Bonsai Japanese White Pine

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 00:31:00 +0000

How to care for Pinus Parviflora and Pentaphylla

The Japanese White Pine requires careful attention to maintain its health and train it as a bonsai. When you consider White Pine, you must learn cleaning techniques, growth, re-potting, soil, pruning, wiring, water, spray, feeding, etc. In addition, you want to consider peat, pests, disease, and more. Now, we cannot go into extensive details, however I can provide you a few helpful tips to get you started in growing Japanese White Pines as bonsai.

How to clean:
Cleaning the plants is easy. Use your “thumb and index finger” to pluck the aged pine needles. The pine needles often turn yellowish during the fall. Next, prune the internal undergrowth or foliage and get rid of any decaying and/or injured sections. As well, get rid of any debris or decaying elements from the soil. Finally, you have cleaned your Japanese White Pine; however, you will need to move ahead. Remember the growth of the Japanese Whites is a slow process.

You want to clean the plants as needed, water, and provide nourishment for your White Pines as recommended. Wait five years before you re-pot the plants. You can re-pot the plants in a larger pot, which has a deep bottom. You want to treat the plants for a few weeks once you re-pot the plants. Early spring around March, you want to prune the roots. Prune around 1/3 length and get rid of the aged roots. You can leave aged soil about the roots so that the plant can re-establish its growth. Avoid cleaning at this stage. After you re-pot the plant, you want to, carefully watch its growth.

How to soil:
Adding the right soil is important when growing the Japanese White Pines. Use ½-soil leaf container to make a shape. (Learn about Mould) Next, add fertile workable soil, or 1/3 loam. The fertile soil is easy-working soil that consists of mixture of clay, sand, silt, and many times organic matters. Add some course sand, at least 1/3 and provide a drainage hole.

How to prune:
Pruning is best handled in April, yet you should prune back the candles as needed. The candle(s) should be pruned back about 2/3 before the candles open. Use your index finger and thumb. If the plant grows thick crowns, you will need to remove at least one bud. There should be around three buds per growth, which you will only remove one per growth of the three. You can leave the buds alone if you want a thicker plant. In October, you will need to prune the branches. You do not want to cut the needles, rather cut 1/3 of the branch. You can pinch the buds back for a few weeks to balance the needles.

How to water:
If you plant the bonsai with stones at the base, water your plant sparingly. The Japanese White Pines require less water than common plants; therefore sparingly water your plants as recommended.

How to spray:
During the summer, you want to spray the undergrowth, or foliage.

How to fertilize:
Fertilizer is a feeder, which the Japanese White Pines require feeding during spring months and fall. Use slow-processing natural fertilizer sparingly about once a month during July and August to feed your plant. At the end of fall amplify the amount of fertilizer and add moderate amount of chemical radicals, or nitrate. Read the instructions on feeding so that you know which nitrate to add, since you have the option of potassium nitrate, ammonium nitrate, and sodium nitrate. If the tree is sick, or recently has been re-potted, do not add fertilizer.

How To Choose Bonsai Herb

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 05:01:00 +0000

Laurus Nobilis or the sweet bay laurel is an aromatic tree with evergreen shrubs. In nature, the tree grows up to 40-feet tall in warm areas. When the tree is potted however, it only grows a few feet at a slow pace. Sweet bay laurel is one of the difficult species to reproduce organisms. When the plant is grown in gardens, you will need to cut and seed frequently to entice the plant to root, or propagate. The roots and seed are difficult to grow at the start.

If you purchase the sweet bay, choose the smaller plants that are designed to grow in gardens, or outdoors. The plant in suitable growing conditions will flourish. However, as the plant starts to develop suckers you will need to remove them. Otherwise, the bonsai will loose its shape. During the winter months, you want to bring the plant indoors. Use brilliant lights, and situate the plant near the south window.

The sweet bay is a long-lasting bonsai, yet it is not idea for beginners. If you are a new grower, you may want to view the list of rosemary herbs instead. The rosemary is the Rosmarinus Officinalis group, which the herbs are easiest to grow. You can keep this plant indoors, since it can handle humidity. Rosemary bonsai is similar to pine. The plant will endure indoors or out. The rosemary group has a selection of colors and styles. Rosemary grows scented flowers, which are pink, light to dark blue, and/or white. Rosemary adds variety, and the plant type has a wide array of foliages.

Like the sweet bay however, rosemary is difficult to start growth. Rosemary requires a degree of cutting in order to propagate. You should trim the plant during growing season, i.e. around summer. During the winter months, rosemary can tolerate cooler weather, yet you should place the plants near the south, west, or east area of your home, near a window. Rosemary includes the pine fragrance. Experts recommend that all rosemary plants have limited peat added to the soil, especially in pots. If you use less peat or sand, it will assist in keeping rosemary from drying out or having too much moisture, the required care for the rosemary plant.

Santa Barbara rosemary’s are attractive bonsai. If you plant the Santa Barbara in your garden, make sure that you surround it with debris, or objects such as timber, flat rocks, etc. The plants can benefit from the shield. If you fail to provide the shield, the Santa Barbara bonsai has a tendency to grow outside of its boundary. Prostrate rosemary is another herb trained as the bonsai. The creeping rosemary is the same as prostrate, only known as creeping in different areas. Each member of this herb named is a cascade-style so to speak. Rosemary plants require warmer environments, drier surroundings, and ventilation to prevent mildew.

How to train:
When you train, cascades follow the instructions provided to you. Few cascades are best off if you plant them at the edge of an elevated bed. The bed should trail to the other side of the bed. Rosemary is also grown for adding flavors to meals or making perfumes. Again, if you are a beginner, the rosemary herbs are the plant of choice. In fact, rosemary is a beautiful plant that you will enjoy for years to come.

Rosemary, cascades, Santa Barbara, etc, are of the tender perennial group. If you starting out, we recommend that you learn more about the plants, including training, caring, types, styles, classes, etc, to help you grow your plants effectively.

Wild Flower Garden

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 01:20:00 +0000

A wild-flower garden has a most attractive sound. One thinks of long tramps in the woods, collecting material, and then of the fun in fixing up a real for sure wild garden.

Many people say they have no luck at all with such a garden. It is not a question of luck, but a question of understanding, for wild flowers are like people and each has its personality. What a plant has been accustomed to in Nature it desires always. In fact, when removed from its own sort of living conditions, it sickens and dies. That is enough to tell us that we should copy Nature herself. Suppose you are hunting wild flowers. As you choose certain flowers from the woods, notice the soil they are in, the place, conditions, the surroundings, and the neighbours.

Suppose you find dog-tooth violets and wind-flowers growing near together. Then place them so in your own new garden. Suppose you find a certain violet enjoying an open situation; then it should always have the same. You see the point, do you not? If you wish wild flowers to grow in a tame garden make them feel at home. Cheat them into almost believing that they are still in their native haunts.

Wild flowers ought to be transplanted after blossoming time is over. Take a trowel and a basket into the woods with you. As you take up a few, a columbine, or a hepatica, be sure to take with the roots some of the plant's own soil, which must be packed about it when replanted.

The bed into which these plants are to go should be prepared carefully before this trip of yours. Surely you do not wish to bring those plants back to wait over a day or night before planting. They should go into new quarters at once. The bed needs soil from the woods, deep and rich and full of leaf mold. The under drainage system should be excellent. Then plants are not to go into water-logged ground. Some people think that all wood plants should have a soil saturated with water. But the woods themselves are not water-logged. It may be that you will need to dig your garden up very deeply and put some stone in the bottom. Over this the top soil should go. And on top, where the top soil once was, put a new layer of the rich soil you brought from the woods.

Before planting water the soil well. Then as you make places for the plants put into each hole some of the soil which belongs to the plant which is to be put there.

I think it would be a rather nice plan to have a wild-flower garden giving a succession of bloom from early spring to late fall; so let us start off with March, the hepatica, spring beauty and saxifrage. Then comes April bearing in its arms the beautiful columbine, the tiny bluets and wild geranium. For May there are the dog-tooth violet and the wood anemone, false Solomon's seal, Jack-in-the-pulpit, wake robin, bloodroot and violets. June will give the bellflower, mullein, bee balm and foxglove. I would choose the gay butterfly weed for July. Let turtle head, aster, Joe Pye weed, and Queen Anne's lace make the rest of the season brilliant until frost.

Let us have a bit about the likes and dislikes of these plants. After you are once started you'll keep on adding to this wild-flower list.

There is no one who doesn't love the hepatica. Before the spring has really decided to come, this little flower pokes its head up and puts all else to shame. Tucked under a covering of dry leaves the blossoms wait for a ray of warm sunshine to bring them out. These embryo flowers are further protected by a fuzzy covering. This reminds one of a similar protective covering which new fern leaves have. In the spring a hepatica plant wastes no time on getting a new suit of leaves. It makes its old ones do until the blossom has had its day. Then the new leaves, started to be sure before this, have a chance. These delayed, are ready to help out next season. You will find hepaticas growing in clusters, sort of family groups. They are likely to be found in rather open places in the woods. The soil is found to be rich and loose. So these should go only in partly shaded places and under good soil conditions. If planted with other woods specimens give them the benefit of a rather exposed position, that they may catch the early spring sunshine. I should cover hepaticas over with a light litter of leaves in the fall. During the last days of February, unless the weather is extreme take this leaf covering away. You'll find the hepatica blossoms all ready to poke up their heads.

The spring beauty hardly allows the hepatica to get ahead of her. With a white flower which has dainty tracings of pink, a thin, wiry stem, and narrow, grass-like leaves, this spring flower cannot be mistaken. You will find spring beauties growing in great patches in rather open places. Plant a number of the roots and allow the sun good opportunity to get at them. For this plant loves the sun.

The other March flower mentioned is the saxifrage. This belongs in quite a different sort of environment. It is a plant which grows in dry and rocky places. Often one will find it in chinks of rock. There is an old tale to the effect that the saxifrage roots twine about rocks and work their way into them so that the rock itself splits. Anyway, it is a rock garden plant. I have found it in dry, sandy places right on the borders of a big rock. It has white flower clusters borne on hairy stems.

The columbine is another plant that is quite likely to be found in rocky places. Standing below a ledge and looking up, one sees nestled here and there in rocky crevices one plant or more of columbine. The nodding red heads bob on wiry, slender stems. The roots do not strike deeply into the soil; in fact, often the soil hardly covers them. Now, just because the columbine has little soil, it does not signify that it is indifferent to the soil conditions. For it always has lived, and always should live, under good drainage conditions. I wonder if it has struck you, how really hygienic plants are? Plenty of fresh air, proper drainage, and good food are fundamentals with plants.

It is evident from study of these plants how easy it is to find out what plants like. After studying their feelings, then do not make the mistake of huddling them all together under poor drainage conditions.

I always have a feeling of personal affection for the bluets. When they come I always feel that now things are beginning to settle down outdoors. They start with rich, lovely, little delicate blue blossoms. As June gets hotter and hotter their colour fades a bit, until at times they look quite worn and white. Some people call them Quaker ladies, others innocence. Under any name they are charming. They grow in colonies, sometimes in sunny fields, sometimes by the road-side. From this we learn that they are more particular about the open sunlight than about the soil.

If you desire a flower to pick and use for bouquets, then the wild geranium is not your flower. It droops very quickly after picking and almost immediately drops its petals. But the purplish flowers are showy, and the leaves, while rather coarse, are deeply cut. This latter effect gives a certain boldness to the plant that is rather attractive. The plant is found in rather moist, partly shaded portions of the woods. I like this plant in the garden. It adds good colour and permanent colour as long as blooming time lasts, since there is no object in picking it.

There are numbers and numbers of wild flowers I might have suggested. These I have mentioned were not given for the purpose of a flower guide, but with just one end in view your understanding of how to study soil conditions for the work of starting a wild-flower garden.

If you fear results, take but one or two flowers and study just what you select. Having mastered, or better, become acquainted with a few, add more another year to your garden. I think you will love your wild garden best of all before you are through with it. It is a real study, you see.

Vegetable Culture

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 06:41:00 +0000

As a rule, we choose to grow bush beans rather than pole beans. I cannot make up my mind whether or not this is from sheer laziness. In a city backyard the tall varieties might perhaps be a problem since it would be difficult to get poles. But these running beans can be trained along old fences and with little urging will run up the stalks of the tallest sunflowers. So that settles the pole question. There is an ornamental side to the bean question. Suppose you plant these tall beans at the extreme rear end of each vegetable row. Make arches with supple tree limbs, binding them over to form the arch. Train the beans over these. When one stands facing the garden, what a beautiful terminus these bean arches make.

Beans like rich, warm, sandy soil. In order to assist the soil be sure to dig deeply, and work it over thoroughly for bean culture. It never does to plant beans before the world has warmed up from its spring chills. There is another advantage in early digging of soil. It brings to the surface eggs and larvae of insects. The birds eager for food will even follow the plough to pick from the soil these choice morsels. A little lime worked in with the soil is helpful in the cultivation of beans.

Bush beans are planted in drills about eighteen inches apart, while the pole-bean rows should be three feet apart. The drills for the bush limas should be further apart than those for the other dwarf beans say three feet. This amount of space gives opportunity for cultivation with the hoe. If the running beans climb too high just pinch off the growing extreme end, and this will hold back the upward growth.

Among bush beans are the dwarf, snap or string beans, the wax beans, the bush limas, one variety of which is known as brittle beans. Among the pole beans are the pole limas, wax and scarlet runner. The scarlet runner is a beauty for decorative effects. The flowers are scarlet and are fine against an old fence. These are quite lovely in the flower garden. Where one wishes a vine, this is good to plant for one gets both a vegetable, bright flowers and a screen from the one plant. When planting beans put the bean in the soil edgewise with the eye down.

Beets like rich, sandy loam, also. Fresh manure worked into the soil is fatal for beets, as it is for many another crop. But we will suppose that nothing is available but fresh manure. Some gardeners say to work this into the soil with great care and thoroughness. But even so, there is danger of a particle of it getting next to a tender beet root. The following can be done; Dig a trench about a foot deep, spread a thin layer of manure in this, cover it with soil, and plant above this. By the time the main root strikes down to the manure layer, there will be little harm done. Beets should not be transplanted. If the rows are one foot apart there is ample space for cultivation. Whenever the weather is really settled, then these seeds may be planted. Young beet tops make fine greens. Greater care should be taken in handling beets than usually is shown. When beets are to be boiled, if the tip of the root and the tops are cut off, the beet bleeds. This means a loss of good material. Pinching off such parts with the fingers and doing this not too closely to the beet itself is the proper method of handling.

There are big coarse members of the beet and cabbage families called the mangel wurzel and ruta baga. About here these are raised to feed to the cattle. They are a great addition to a cow's dinner.

The cabbage family is a large one. There is the cabbage proper, then cauliflower, broccoli or a more hardy cauliflower, kale, Brussels sprouts and kohlrabi, a cabbage-turnip combination.

Cauliflower is a kind of refined, high-toned cabbage relative. It needs a little richer soil than cabbage and cannot stand the frost. A frequent watering with manure water gives it the extra richness and water it really needs. The outer leaves must be bent over, as in the case of the young cabbage, in order to get the white head. The dwarf varieties are rather the best to plant.

Kale is not quite so particular a cousin. It can stand frost. Rich soil is necessary, and early spring planting, because of slow maturing. It may be planted in September for early spring work.

Brussels sprouts are a very popular member of this family. On account of their size many people who do not like to serve poor, common old cabbage will serve these. Brussels sprouts are interesting in their growth. The plant stalk runs skyward. At the top, umbrella like, is a close head of leaves, but this is not what we eat. Shaded by the umbrella and packed all along the stalk are delicious little cabbages or sprouts. Like the rest of the family a rich soil is needed and plenty of water during the growing period. The seed should be planted in May, and the little plants transplanted into rich soil in late July. The rows should be eighteen inches apart, and the plants one foot apart in the rows.

Kohlrabi is a go-between in the families of cabbage and turnip. It is sometimes called the turnip-root cabbage. Just above the ground the stem of this plant swells into a turnip-like vegetable. In the true turnip the swelling is underground, but like the cabbage, kohlrabi forms its edible part above ground. It is easy to grow. Only it should develop rapidly, otherwise the swelling gets woody, and so loses its good quality. Sow out as early as possible; or sow inside in March and transplant to the open. Plant in drills about two feet apart. Set the plants about one foot apart, or thin out to this distance. To plant one hundred feet of drill buy half an ounce of seed. Seed goes a long way, you see. Kohlrabi is served and prepared like turnip. It is a very satisfactory early crop.

Before leaving the cabbage family I should like to say that the cabbage called Savoy is an excellent variety to try. It should always have an early planting under cover, say in February, and then be transplanted into open beds in March or April. If the land is poor where you are to grow cabbage, then by all means choose Savoy.

Carrots are of two general kinds: those with long roots, and those with short roots. If long-rooted varieties are chosen, then the soil must be worked down to a depth of eighteen inches, surely. The shorter ones will do well in eight inches of well-worked sandy soil. Do not put carrot seed into freshly manured land. Another point in carrot culture is one concerning the thinning process. As the little seedlings come up you will doubtless find that they are much, much too close together. Wait a bit, thin a little at a time, so that young, tiny carrots may be used on the home table. These are the points to jot down about the culture of carrots.

The cucumber is the next vegetable in the line. This is a plant from foreign lands. Some think that the cucumber is really a native of India. A light, sandy and rich soil is needed I mean rich in the sense of richness in organic matter. When cucumbers are grown outdoors, as we are likely to grow them, they are planted in hills. Nowadays, they are grown in hothouses; they hang from the roof, and are a wonderful sight. In the greenhouse a hive of bees is kept so that cross-fertilization may go on.

But if you intend to raise cucumbers follow these directions: Sow the seed inside, cover with one inch of rich soil. In a little space of six inches diameter, plant six seeds. Place like a bean seed with the germinating end in the soil. When all danger of frost is over, each set of six little plants, soil and all, should be planted in the open. Later, when danger of insect pests is over, thin out to three plants in a hill. The hills should be about four feet apart on all sides.

Before the time of Christ, lettuce was grown and served. There is a wild lettuce from which the cultivated probably came. There are a number of cultivated vegetables which have wild ancestors, carrots, turnips and lettuce being the most common among them. Lettuce may be tucked into the garden almost anywhere. It is surely one of the most decorative of vegetables. The compact head, the green of the leaves, the beauty of symmetry all these are charming characteristics of lettuces.

As the summer advances and as the early sowings of lettuce get old they tend to go to seed. Don't let them. Pull them up. None of us are likely to go into the seed-producing side of lettuce. What we are interested in is the raising of tender lettuce all the season. To have such lettuce in mid and late summer is possible only by frequent plantings of seed. If seed is planted every ten days or two weeks all summer, you can have tender lettuce all the season. When lettuce gets old it becomes bitter and tough.

Melons are most interesting to experiment with. We suppose that melons originally came from Asia, and parts of Africa. Melons are a summer fruit. Over in England we find the muskmelons often grown under glass in hothouses. The vines are trained upward rather than allowed to lie prone. As the melons grow large in the hot, dry atmosphere, just the sort which is right for their growth, they become too heavy for the vine to hold up. So they are held by little bags of netting, just like a tennis net in size of mesh. The bags are supported on nails or pegs. It is a very pretty sight I can assure you. Over here usually we raise our melons outdoors. They are planted in hills. Eight seeds are placed two inches apart and an inch deep. The hills should have a four foot sweep on all sides; the watermelon hills ought to have an allowance of eight to ten feet. Make the soil for these hills very rich. As the little plants get sizeable say about four inches in height reduce the number of plants to two in a hill. Always in such work choose the very sturdiest plants to keep. Cut the others down close to or a little below the surface of the ground. Pulling up plants is a shocking way to get rid of them. I say shocking because the pull is likely to disturb the roots of the two remaining plants. When the melon plant has reached a length of a foot, pinch off the end of it. This pinch means this to the plant: just stop growing long, take time now to grow branches. Sand or lime sprinkled about the hills tends to keep bugs away.

The word pumpkin stands for good, old-fashioned pies, for Thanksgiving, for grandmother's house. It really brings more to mind than the word squash. I suppose the squash is a bit more useful, when we think of the fine Hubbard, and the nice little crooked-necked summer squashes; but after all, I like to have more pumpkins. And as for Jack-o'-lanterns why they positively demand pumpkins. In planting these, the same general directions hold good which were given for melons. And use these same for squash-planting, too. But do not plant the two cousins together, for they have a tendency to run together. Plant the pumpkins in between the hills of corn and let the squashes go in some other part of the garden.

The Genesis Of Soil

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Sun, 16 Dec 2007 01:39:00 +0000

Soil primarily had its beginning from rock together with animal and vegetable decay, if you can imagine long stretches or periods of time when great rock masses were crumbling and breaking up. Heat, water action, and friction were largely responsible for this. By friction here is meant the rubbing and grinding of rock mass against rock mass. Think of the huge rocks, a perfect chaos of them, bumping, scraping, settling against one another. What would be the result? Well, I am sure you all could work that out. This is what happened: bits of rock were worn off, a great deal of heat was produced, pieces of rock were pressed together to form new rock masses, some portions becoming dissolved in water. Why, I myself, almost feel the stress and strain of it all. Can you?

Then, too, there were great changes in temperature. First everything was heated to a high temperature, then gradually became cool. Just think of the cracking, the crumbling, the upheavals, that such changes must have caused! You know some of the effects in winter of sudden freezes and thaws. But the little examples of bursting water pipes and broken pitchers are as nothing to what was happening in the world during those days. The water and the gases in the atmosphere helped along this crumbling work.

From all this action of rubbing, which action we call mechanical, it is easy enough to understand how sand was formed. This represents one of the great divisions of soil sandy soil. The sea shores are great masses of pure sand. If soil were nothing but broken rock masses then indeed it would be very poor and unproductive. But the early forms of animal and vegetable life decaying became a part of the rock mass and a better soil resulted. So the soils we speak of as sandy soils have mixed with the sand other matter, sometimes clay, sometimes vegetable matter or humus, and often animal waste.

Clay brings us right to another class of soils clayey soils. It happens that certain portions of rock masses became dissolved when water trickled over them and heat was plenty and abundant. This dissolution took place largely because there is in the air a certain gas called carbon dioxide or carbonic acid gas. This gas attacks and changes certain substances in rocks. Sometimes you see great rocks with portions sticking up looking as if they had been eaten away. Carbonic acid did this. It changed this eaten part into something else which we call clay. A change like this is not mechanical but chemical. The difference in the two kinds of change is just this: in the one case of sand, where a mechanical change went on, you still have just what you started with, save that the size of the mass is smaller. You started with a big rock, and ended with little particles of sand. But you had no different kind of rock in the end. Mechanical action might be illustrated with a piece of lump sugar. Let the sugar represent a big mass of rock. Break up the sugar, and even the smallest bit is sugar. It is just so with the rock mass; but in the case of a chemical change you start with one thing and end with another. You started with a big mass of rock which had in it a portion that became changed by the acid acting on it. It ended in being an entirely different thing which we call clay. So in the case of chemical change a certain something is started with and in the end we have an entirely different thing. The clay soils are often called mud soils because of the amount of water used in their formation.

The third sort of soil which we farm people have to deal with is lime soil. Remember we are thinking of soils from the farm point of view. This soil of course ordinarily was formed from limestone. Just as soon as one thing is mentioned about which we know nothing, another comes up of which we are just as ignorant. And so a whole chain of questions follows. Now you are probably saying within yourselves, how was limestone first formed?

At one time ages ago the lower animal and plant forms picked from the water particles of lime. With the lime they formed skeletons or houses about themselves as protection from larger animals. Coral is representative of this class of skeleton-forming animal.

As the animal died the skeleton remained. Great masses of this living matter pressed all together, after ages, formed limestone. Some limestones are still in such shape that the shelly formation is still visible. Marble, another limestone, is somewhat crystalline in character. Another well-known limestone is chalk. Perhaps you'd like to know a way of always being able to tell limestone. Drop a little of this acid on some lime. See how it bubbles and fizzles. Then drop some on this chalk and on the marble, too. The same bubbling takes place. So lime must be in these three structures. One does not have to buy a special acid for this work, for even the household acids like vinegar will cause the same result.

Then these are the three types of soil with which the farmer has to deal, and which we wish to understand. For one may learn to know his garden soil by studying it, just as one learns a lesson by study.

Cultivation Of Vegetables

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 15:58:00 +0000

Before taking up the garden vegetables individually, I shall outline the general practice of cultivation, which applies to all. The purposes of cultivation are three to get rid of weeds, and to stimulate growth by (1) letting air into the soil and freeing unavailable plant food, and (2) by conserving moisture.

As to weeds, the gardener of any experience need not be told the importance of keeping his crops clean. He has learned from bitter and costly experience the price of letting them get anything resembling a start. He knows that one or two days' growth, after they are well up, followed perhaps by a day or so of rain, may easily double or treble the work of cleaning a patch of onions or carrots, and that where weeds have attained any size they cannot be taken out of sowed crops without doing a great deal of injury. He also realizes, or should, that every day's growth means just so much available plant food stolen from under the very roots of his legitimate crops.

Instead of letting the weeds get away with any plant food, he should be furnishing more, for clean and frequent cultivation will not only break the soil up mechanically, but let in air, moisture and heat all essential in effecting those chemical changes necessary to convert non- available into available plant food. Long before the science in the case was discovered, the soil cultivators had learned by observation the necessity of keeping the soil nicely loosened about their growing crops. Even the lanky and untutored aborigine saw to it that his squaw not only put a bad fish under the hill of maize but plied her shell hoe over it. Plants need to breathe. Their roots need air. You might as well expect to find the rosy glow of happiness on the wan cheeks of a cotton-mill child slave as to expect to see the luxuriant dark green of healthy plant life in a suffocated garden.

Important as the question of air is, that of water ranks beside it. You may not see at first what the matter of frequent cultivation has to do with water. But let us stop a moment and look into it. Take a strip of blotting paper, dip one end in water, and watch the moisture run up hill, soak up through the blotter. The scientists have labeled that "capillary attraction" the water crawls up little invisible tubes formed by the texture of the blotter. Now take a similar piece, cut it across, hold the two cut edges firmly together, and try it again. The moisture refuses to cross the line: the connection has been severed.

In the same way the water stored in the soil after a rain begins at once to escape again into the atmosphere. That on the surface evaporates first, and that which has soaked in begins to soak in through the soil to the surface. It is leaving your garden, through the millions of soil tubes, just as surely as if you had a two-inch pipe and a gasoline engine, pumping it into the gutter night and day! Save your garden by stopping the waste. It is the easiest thing in the world to do cut the pipe in two. By frequent cultivation of the surface soil not more than one or two inches deep for most small vegetables the soil tubes are kept broken, and a mulch of dust is maintained. Try to get over every part of your garden, especially where it is not shaded, once in every ten days or two weeks. Does that seem like too much work? You can push your wheel hoe through, and thus keep the dust mulch as a constant protection, as fast as you can walk. If you wait for the weeds, you will nearly have to crawl through, doing more or less harm by disturbing your growing plants, losing all the plant food (and they will take the cream) which they have consumed, and actually putting in more hours of infinitely more disagreeable work. If the beginner at gardening has not been convinced by the facts given, there is only one thing left to convince him experience.

Having given so much space to the reason for constant care in this matter, the question of methods naturally follows. Get a wheel hoe. The simplest sorts will not only save you an infinite amount of time and work, but do the work better, very much better than it can be done by hand. You can grow good vegetables, especially if your garden is a very small one, without one of these labor-savers, but I can assure you that you will never regret the small investment necessary to procure it.

With a wheel hoe, the work of preserving the soil mulch becomes very simple. If one has not a wheel hoe, for small areas very rapid work can be done with the scuffle hoe.

The matter of keeping weeds cleaned out of the rows and between the plants in the rows is not so quickly accomplished. Where hand-work is necessary, let it be done at once. Here are a few practical suggestions that will reduce this work to a minimum, (1) Get at this work while the ground is soft; as soon as the soil begins to dry out after a rain is the best time. Under such conditions the weeds will pull out by the roots, without breaking off. (2) Immediately before weeding, go over the rows with a wheel hoe, cutting shallow, but just as close as possible, leaving a narrow, plainly visible strip which must be hand- weeded. The best tool for this purpose is the double wheel hoe with disc attachment, or hoes for large plants. (3) See to it that not only the weeds are pulled but that every inch of soil surface is broken up. It is fully as important that the weeds just sprouting be destroyed, as that the larger ones be pulled up. One stroke of the weeder or the fingers will destroy a hundred weed seedlings in less time than one weed can be pulled out after it gets a good start. (4) Use one of the small hand-weeders until you become skilled with it. Not only may more work be done but the fingers will be saved unnecessary wear.

The skilful use of the wheel hoe can be acquired through practice only. The first thing to learn is that it is necessary to watch the wheels only: the blades, disc or rakes will take care of themselves.

The operation of "hilling" consists in drawing up the soil about the stems of growing plants, usually at the time of second or third hoeing. It used to be the practice to hill everything that could be hilled "up to the eyebrows," but it has gradually been discarded for what is termed "level culture"; and you will readily see the reason, from what has been said about the escape of moisture from the surface of the soil; for of course the two upper sides of the hill, which may be represented by an equilateral triangle with one side horizontal, give more exposed surface than the level surface represented by the base. In wet soils or seasons hilling may be advisable, but very seldom otherwise. It has the additional disadvantage of making it difficult to maintain the soil mulch which is so desirable.

Rotation of crops.
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There is another thing to be considered in making each vegetable do its best, and that is crop rotation, or the following of any vegetable with a different sort at the next planting.

With some vegetables, such as cabbage, this is almost imperative, and practically all are helped by it. Even onions, which are popularly supposed to be the proving exception to the rule, are healthier, and do as well after some other crop, provided the soil is as finely pulverized and rich as a previous crop of onions would leave it.

Here are the fundamental rules of crop rotation:

(1) Crops of the same vegetable, or vegetables of the same family (such as turnips and cabbage) should not follow each other.

(2) Vegetables that feed near the surface, like corn, should follow deep-rooting crops.

(3) Vines or leaf crops should follow root crops.

(4) Quick-growing crops should follow those occupying the land all season.

These are the principles which should determine the rotations to be followed in individual cases. The proper way to attend to this matter is when making the planting plan. You will then have time to do it properly, and will need to give it no further thought for a year.

With the above suggestions in mind, and put to use , it will not be difficult to give the crops those special attentions which are needed to make them do their very best.

Requirements Of A Home Vegetable Garden

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 20:06:00 +0000

In deciding upon the site for the home vegetable garden it is well to dispose once and for all of the old idea that the garden "patch" must be an ugly spot in the home surroundings. If thoughtfully planned, carefully planted and thoroughly cared for, it may be made a beautiful and harmonious feature of the general scheme, lending a touch of comfortable homeliness that no shrubs, borders, or beds can ever produce.

With this fact in mind we will not feel restricted to any part of the premises merely because it is out of sight behind the barn or garage. In the average moderate-sized place there will not be much choice as to land. It will be necessary to take what is to be had and then do the very best that can be done with it. But there will probably be a good deal of choice as to, first, exposure, and second, convenience. Other things being equal, select a spot near at hand, easy of access. It may seem that a difference of only a few hundred yards will mean nothing, but if one is depending largely upon spare moments for working in and for watching the garden and in the growing of many vegetables the latter is almost as important as the former this matter of convenient access will be of much greater importance than is likely to be at first recognized. Not until you have had to make a dozen time-wasting trips for forgotten seeds or tools, or gotten your feet soaking wet by going out through the dew-drenched grass, will you realize fully what this may mean.

Exposure.
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But the thing of first importance to consider in picking out the spot that is to yield you happiness and delicious vegetables all summer, or even for many years, is the exposure. Pick out the "earliest" spot you can find a plot sloping a little to the south or east, that seems to catch sunshine early and hold it late, and that seems to be out of the direct path of the chilling north and northeast winds. If a building, or even an old fence, protects it from this direction, your garden will be helped along wonderfully, for an early start is a great big factor toward success. If it is not already protected, a board fence, or a hedge of some low-growing shrubs or young evergreens, will add very greatly to its usefulness. The importance of having such a protection or shelter is altogether underestimated by the amateur.

The soil.
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The chances are that you will not find a spot of ideal garden soil ready for use anywhere upon your place. But all except the very worst of soils can be brought up to a very high degree of productiveness especially such small areas as home vegetable gardens require. Large tracts of soil that are almost pure sand, and others so heavy and mucky that for centuries they lay uncultivated, have frequently been brought, in the course of only a few years, to where they yield annually tremendous crops on a commercial basis. So do not be discouraged about your soil. Proper treatment of it is much more important, and a garden- patch of average run-down, or "never-brought-up" soil will produce much more for the energetic and careful gardener than the richest spot will grow under average methods of cultivation.

The ideal garden soil is a "rich, sandy loam." And the fact cannot be overemphasized that such soils usually are made, not found. Let us analyze that description a bit, for right here we come to the first of the four all-important factors of gardening food. The others are cultivation, moisture and temperature. "Rich" in the gardener's vocabulary means full of plant food; more than that and this is a point of vital importance it means full of plant food ready to be used at once, all prepared and spread out on the garden table, or rather in it, where growing things can at once make use of it; or what we term, in one word, "available" plant food. Practically no soils in long- inhabited communities remain naturally rich enough to produce big crops. They are made rich, or kept rich, in two ways; first, by cultivation, which helps to change the raw plant food stored in the soil into available forms; and second, by manuring or adding plant food to the soil from outside sources.

"Sandy" in the sense here used, means a soil containing enough particles of sand so that water will pass through it without leaving it pasty and sticky a few days after a rain; "light" enough, as it is called, so that a handful, under ordinary conditions, will crumble and fall apart readily after being pressed in the hand. It is not necessary that the soil be sandy in appearance, but it should be friable.

"Loam: a rich, friable soil," says Webster. That hardly covers it, but it does describe it. It is soil in which the sand and clay are in proper proportions, so that neither greatly predominate, and usually dark in color, from cultivation and enrichment. Such a soil, even to the untrained eye, just naturally looks as if it would grow things. It is remarkable how quickly the whole physical appearance of a piece of well cultivated ground will change. An instance came under my notice last fall in one of my fields, where a strip containing an acre had been two years in onions, and a little piece jutting off from the middle of this had been prepared for them just one season. The rest had not received any extra manuring or cultivation. When the field was plowed up in the fall, all three sections were as distinctly noticeable as though separated by a fence. And I know that next spring's crop of rye, before it is plowed under, will show the lines of demarcation just as plainly.

Planting Seeds

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 14:46:00 +0000

Any reliable seed house can be depended upon for good seeds; but even so, there is a great risk in seeds. A seed may to all appearances be all right and yet not have within it vitality enough, or power, to produce a hardy plant.

If you save seed from your own plants you are able to choose carefully. Suppose you are saving seed of aster plants. What blossoms shall you decide upon? Now it is not the blossom only which you must consider, but the entire plant. Why? Because a weak, straggly plant may produce one fine blossom. Looking at that one blossom so really beautiful you think of the numberless equally lovely plants you are going to have from the seeds. But just as likely as not the seeds will produce plants like the parent plant.

So in seed selection the entire plant is to be considered. Is it sturdy, strong, well shaped and symmetrical; does it have a goodly number of fine blossoms? These are questions to ask in seed selection.

If you should happen to have the opportunity to visit a seedsman's garden, you will see here and there a blossom with a string tied around it. These are blossoms chosen for seed. If you look at the whole plant with care you will be able to see the points which the gardener held in mind when he did his work of selection.

In seed selection size is another point to hold in mind. Now we know no way of telling anything about the plants from which this special collection of seeds came. So we must give our entire thought to the seeds themselves. It is quite evident that there is some choice; some are much larger than the others; some far plumper, too. By all means choose the largest and fullest seed. The reason is this: When you break open a bean and this is very evident, too, in the peanut you see what appears to be a little plant. So it is. Under just the right conditions for development this 'little chap' grows into the bean plant you know so well.

This little plant must depend for its early growth on the nourishment stored up in the two halves of the bean seed. For this purpose the food is stored. Beans are not full of food and goodness for you and me to eat, but for the little baby bean plant to feed upon. And so if we choose a large seed, we have chosen a greater amount of food for the plantlet. This little plantlet feeds upon this stored food until its roots are prepared to do their work. So if the seed is small and thin, the first food supply insufficient, there is a possibility of losing the little plant.

You may care to know the name of this pantry of food. It is called a cotyledon if there is but one portion, cotyledons if two. Thus we are aided in the classification of plants. A few plants that bear cones like the pines have several cotyledons. But most plants have either one or two cotyledons.

From large seeds come the strongest plantlets. That is the reason why it is better and safer to choose the large seed. It is the same case exactly as that of weak children.

There is often another trouble in seeds that we buy. The trouble is impurity. Seeds are sometimes mixed with other seeds so like them in appearance that it is impossible to detect the fraud. Pretty poor business, is it not? The seeds may be unclean. Bits of foreign matter in with large seed are very easy to discover. One can merely pick the seed over and make it clean. By clean is meant freedom from foreign matter. But if small seed are unclean, it is very difficult, well nigh impossible, to make them clean.

The third thing to look out for in seed is viability. We know from our testings that seeds which look to the eye to be all right may not develop at all. There are reasons. Seeds may have been picked before they were ripe or mature; they may have been frozen; and they may be too old. Seeds retain their viability or germ developing power, a given number of years and are then useless. There is a viability limit in years which differs for different seeds.

From the test of seeds we find out the germination percentage of seeds. Now if this percentage is low, don't waste time planting such seed unless it be small seed. Immediately you question that statement. Why does the size of the seed make a difference? This is the reason. When small seed is planted it is usually sown in drills. Most amateurs sprinkle the seed in very thickly. So a great quantity of seed is planted. And enough seed germinates and comes up from such close planting. So quantity makes up for quality.

But take the case of large seed, like corn for example. Corn is planted just so far apart and a few seeds in a place. With such a method of planting the matter of per cent, of germination is most important indeed.

Small seeds that germinate at fifty per cent. may be used but this is too low a per cent. for the large seed. Suppose we test beans. The percentage is seventy. If low-vitality seeds were planted, we could not be absolutely certain of the seventy per cent coming up. But if the seeds are lettuce go ahead with the planting.

Making Your Own Garden

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 17:27:00 +0000

The first thing in garden making is the selection of a spot. Without a choice, it means simply doing the best one can with conditions. With space limited it resolves itself into no garden, or a box garden. Surely a box garden is better than nothing at all.

But we will now suppose that it is possible to really choose just the right site for the garden. What shall be chosen? The greatest determining factor is the sun. No one would have a north corner, unless it were absolutely forced upon him; because, while north corners do for ferns, certain wild flowers, and begonias, they are of little use as spots for a general garden.

If possible, choose the ideal spot a southern exposure. Here the sun lies warm all day long. When the garden is thus located the rows of vegetables and flowers should run north and south. Thus placed, the plants receive the sun's rays all the morning on the eastern side, and all the afternoon on the western side. One ought not to have any lopsided plants with such an arrangement.

Suppose the garden faces southeast. In this case the western sun is out of the problem. In order to get the best distribution of sunlight run the rows northwest and southeast.

The idea is to get the most sunlight as evenly distributed as possible for the longest period of time. From the lopsided growth of window plants it is easy enough to see the effect on plants of poorly distributed light. So if you use a little diagram remembering that you wish the sun to shine part of the day on one side of the plants and part on the other, you can juggle out any situation. The southern exposure gives the ideal case because the sun gives half time nearly to each side. A northern exposure may mean an almost entire cut-off from sunlight; while northeastern and southwestern places always get uneven distribution of sun's rays, no matter how carefully this is planned.

The garden, if possible, should be planned out on paper. The plan is a great help when the real planting time comes. It saves time and unnecessary buying of seed.

New garden spots are likely to be found in two conditions: they are covered either with turf or with rubbish. In large garden areas the ground is ploughed and the sod turned under; but in small gardens remove the sod. How to take off the sod in the best manner is the next question. Stake and line off the garden spot. The line gives an accurate and straight course to follow. Cut the edges with the spade all along the line. If the area is a small one, say four feet by eighteen or twenty, this is an easy matter. Such a narrow strip may be marked off like a checkerboard, the sod cut through with the spade, and easily removed. This could be done in two long strips cut lengthwise of the strip. When the turf is cut through, roll it right up like a roll of carpet.

But suppose the garden plot is large. Then divide this up into strips a foot wide and take off the sod as before. What shall be done with the sod? Do not throw it away for it is full of richness, although not quite in available form. So pack the sod grass side down one square on another. Leave it to rot and to weather. When rotted it makes a fine fertilizer. Such a pile of rotting vegetable matter is called a compost pile. All through the summer add any old green vegetable matter to this. In the fall put the autumn leaves on. A fine lot of goodness is being fixed for another season.

Even when the garden is large enough to plough, I would pick out the largest pieces of sod rather than have them turned under. Go over the ploughed space, pick out the pieces of sod, shake them well and pack them up in a compost heap.

Mere spading of the ground is not sufficient. The soil is still left in lumps. Always as one spades one should break up the big lumps. But even so the ground is in no shape for planting. Ground must be very fine indeed to plant in, because seeds can get very close indeed to fine particles of soil. But the large lumps leave large spaces which no tiny root hair can penetrate. A seed is left stranded in a perfect waste when planted in chunks of soil. A baby surrounded with great pieces of beefsteak would starve. A seed among large lumps of soil is in a similar situation. The spade never can do this work of pulverizing soil. But the rake can. That's the value of the rake. It is a great lump breaker, but will not do for large lumps. If the soil still has large lumps in it take the hoe.

Many people handle the hoe awkwardly. The chief work of this implement is to rid the soil of weeds and stir up the top surface. It is used in summer to form that mulch of dust so valuable in retaining moisture in the soil. I often see people as if they were going to chop into atoms everything around. Hoeing should never be such vigorous exercise as that. Spading is vigorous, hard work, but not hoeing and raking.

After lumps are broken use the rake to make the bed fine and smooth. Now the great piece of work is done.

Landscape Gardening

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 16:24:00 +0000

Landscape gardening has often been likened to the painting of a picture. Your art-work teacher has doubtless told you that a good picture should have a point of chief interest, and the rest of the points simply go to make more beautiful the central idea, or to form a fine setting for it. So in landscape gardening there must be in the gardener's mind a picture of what he desires the whole to be when he completes his work.

From this study we shall be able to work out a little theory of landscape gardening.

Let us go to the lawn. A good extent of open lawn space is always beautiful. It is restful. It adds a feeling of space to even small grounds. So we might generalize and say that it is well to keep open lawn spaces. If one covers his lawn space with many trees, with little flower beds here and there, the general effect is choppy and fussy. It is a bit like an over-dressed person. One's grounds lose all individuality thus treated. A single tree or a small group is not a bad arrangement on the lawn. Do not center the tree or trees. Let them drop a bit into the background. Make a pleasing side feature of them. In choosing trees one must keep in mind a number of things. You should not choose an overpowering tree; the tree should be one of good shape, with something interesting about its bark, leaves, flowers or fruit. While the poplar is a rapid grower, it sheds its leaves early and so is left standing, bare and ugly, before the fall is old. Mind you, there are places where a row or double row of Lombardy poplars is very effective. But I think you'll agree with me that one lone poplar is not. The catalpa is quite lovely by itself. Its leaves are broad, its flowers attractive, the seed pods which cling to the tree until away into the winter, add a bit of picture squeness. The bright berries of the ash, the brilliant foliage of the sugar maple, the blossoms of the tulip tree, the bark of the white birch, and the leaves of the copper beech all these are beauty points to consider.

Place makes a difference in the selection of a tree. Suppose the lower portion of the grounds is a bit low and moist, then the spot is ideal for a willow. Don't group trees together which look awkward. A long-looking poplar does not go with a nice rather rounded little tulip tree. A juniper, so neat and prim, would look silly beside a spreading chestnut. One must keep proportion and suitability in mind.

I'd never advise the planting of a group of evergreens close to a house, and in the front yard. The effect is very gloomy indeed. Houses thus surrounded are overcapped by such trees and are not only gloomy to live in, but truly unhealthful. The chief requisite inside a house is sunlight and plenty of it.

As trees are chosen because of certain good points, so shrubs should be. In a clump I should wish some which bloomed early, some which bloomed late, some for the beauty of their fall foliage, some for the colour of their bark and others for the fruit. Some spireas and the forsythia bloom early. The red bark of the dogwood makes a bit of colour all winter, and the red berries of the barberry cling to the shrub well into the winter.

Certain shrubs are good to use for hedge purposes. A hedge is rather prettier usually than a fence. The Californian privet is excellent for this purpose. Osage orange, Japan barberry, buckthorn, Japan quince, and Van Houtte's spirea are other shrubs which make good hedges.

I forgot to say that in tree and shrub selection it is usually better to choose those of the locality one lives in. Unusual and foreign plants do less well, and often harmonize but poorly with their new setting.

Landscape gardening may follow along very formal lines or along informal lines. The first would have straight paths, straight rows in stiff beds, everything, as the name tells, perfectly formal. The other method is, of course, the exact opposite. There are danger points in each.

The formal arrangement is likely to look too stiff; the informal, too fussy, too wiggly. As far as paths go, keep this in mind, that a path should always lead somewhere. That is its business to direct one to a definite place. Now, straight, even paths are not unpleasing if the effect is to be that of a formal garden. The danger in the curved path is an abrupt curve, a whirligig effect. It is far better for you to stick to straight paths unless you can make a really beautiful curve. No one can tell you how to do this.

Garden paths may be of gravel, of dirt, or of grass. One sees grass paths in some very lovely gardens. I doubt, however, if they would serve as well in your small gardens. Your garden areas are so limited that they should be re-spaded each season, and the grass paths are a great bother in this work. Of course, a gravel path makes a fine appearance, but again you may not have gravel at your command. It is possible for any of you to dig out the path for two feet. Then put in six inches of stone or clinker. Over this, pack in the dirt, rounding it slightly toward the centre of the path. There should never be depressions through the central part of paths, since these form convenient places for water to stand. The under layer of stone makes a natural drainage system.

A building often needs the help of vines or flowers or both to tie it to the grounds in such a way as to form a harmonious whole. Vines lend themselves well to this work. It is better to plant a perennial vine, and so let it form a permanent part of your landscape scheme. The Virginia creeper, wistaria, honeysuckle, a climbing rose, the clematis and trumpet vine are all most satisfactory.

close your eyes and picture a house of natural colour, that mellow gray of the weathered shingles. Now add to this old house a purple wistaria. Can you see the beauty of it? I shall not forget soon a rather ugly corner of my childhood home, where the dining room and kitchen met. Just there climbing over, and falling over a trellis was a trumpet vine. It made beautiful an awkward angle, an ugly bit of carpenter work.

Of course, the morning-glory is an annual vine, as is the moon-vine and wild cucumber. Now, these have their special function. For often, it is necessary to cover an ugly thing for just a time, until the better things and better times come. The annual is 'the chap' for this work.

Along an old fence a hop vine is a thing of beauty. One might try to rival the woods' landscape work. For often one sees festooned from one rotted tree to another the ampelopsis vine.

Flowers may well go along the side of the building, or bordering a walk. In general, though, keep the front lawn space open and unbroken by beds. What lovelier in early spring than a bed of daffodils close to the house? Hyacinths and tulips, too, form a blaze of glory. These are little or no bother, and start the spring aright. One may make of some bulbs an exception to the rule of unbroken front lawn. Snowdrops and crocuses planted through the lawn are beautiful. They do not disturb the general effect, but just blend with the whole. One expert bulb gardener says to take a basketful of bulbs in the fall, walk about your grounds, and just drop bulbs out here and there. Wherever the bulbs drop, plant them. Such small bulbs as those we plant in lawns should be in groups of four to six. Daffodils may be thus planted, too. You all remember the grape hyacinths that grow all through Katharine's side yard.

The place for a flower garden is generally at the side or rear of the house. The backyard garden is a lovely idea, is it not? Who wishes to leave a beautiful looking front yard, turn the corner of a house, and find a dump heap? Not I. The flower garden may be laid out formally in neat little beds, or it may be more of a careless, hit-or-miss sort. Both have their good points. Great masses of bloom are attractive.

You should have in mind some notion of the blending of colour. Nature appears not to consider this at all, and still gets wondrous effects. This is because of the tremendous amount of her perfect background of green, and the limitlessness of her space, while we are confined at the best to relatively small areas. So we should endeavour not to blind people's eyes with clashes of colours which do not at close range blend well. In order to break up extremes of colours you can always use masses of white flowers, or something like mignonette, which is in effect green.

Finally, let us sum up our landscape lesson. The grounds are a setting for the house or buildings. Open, free lawn spaces, a tree or a proper group well placed, flowers which do not clutter up the front yard, groups of shrubbery these are points to be remembered. The paths should lead somewhere, and be either straight or well curved. If one starts with a formal garden, one should not mix the informal with it before the work is done.

Garden Pests

noreply@blogger.com (Stefani) — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 07:04:00 +0000

If we could garden without any interference from the pests which attack plants, then indeed gardening would be a simple matter. But all the time we must watch out for these little foes little in size, but tremendous in the havoc they make.

As human illness may often be prevented by healthful conditions, so pests may be kept away by strict garden cleanliness. Heaps of waste are lodging places for the breeding of insects. I do not think a compost pile will do the harm, but unkempt, uncared-for spots seem to invite trouble.

There are certain helps to keeping pests down. The constant stirring up of the soil by earthworms is an aid in keeping the soil open to air and water. Many of our common birds feed upon insects. The sparrows, robins, chickadees, meadow larks and orioles are all examples of birds who help in this way. Some insects feed on other and harmful insects. Some kinds of ladybugs do this good deed. The ichneumon-fly helps too. And toads are wonders in the number of insects they can consume at one meal. The toad deserves very kind treatment from all of us.

Each gardener should try to make her or his garden into a place attractive to birds and toads. A good birdhouse, grain sprinkled about in early spring, a water-place, are invitations for birds to stay a while in your garden. If you wish toads, fix things up for them too. During a hot summer day a toad likes to rest in the shade. By night he is ready to go forth to eat but not to kill, since toads prefer live food. How can one "fix up" for toads? Well, one thing to do is to prepare a retreat, quiet, dark and damp. A few stones of some size underneath the shade of a shrub with perhaps a carpeting of damp leaves, would appear very fine to a toad.

There are two general classes of insects known by the way they do their work. One kind gnaws at the plant really taking pieces of it into its system. This kind of insect has a mouth fitted to do this work. Grasshoppers and caterpillars are of this sort. The other kind sucks the juices from a plant. This, in some ways, is the worst sort. Plant lice belong here, as do mosquitoes, which prey on us. All the scale insects fasten themselves on plants, and suck out the life of the plants.

Now can we fight these chaps? The gnawing fellows may be caught with poison sprayed upon plants, which they take into their bodies with the plant. The Bordeaux mixture which is a poison sprayed upon plants for this purpose.

In the other case the only thing is to attack the insect direct. So certain insecticides, as they are called, are sprayed on the plant to fall upon the insect. They do a deadly work of attacking, in one way or another, the body of the insect.

Sometimes we are much troubled with underground insects at work. You have seen a garden covered with ant hills. Here is a remedy, but one of which you must be careful.

This question is constantly being asked, 'How can I tell what insect is doing the destructive work?' Well, you can tell partly by the work done, and partly by seeing the insect itself. This latter thing is not always so easy to accomplish. I had cutworms one season and never saw one. I saw only the work done. If stalks of tender plants are cut clean off be pretty sure the cutworm is abroad. What does he look like? Well, that is a hard question because his family is a large one. Should you see sometime a grayish striped caterpillar, you may know it is a cutworm. But because of its habit of resting in the ground during the day and working by night, it is difficult to catch sight of one. The cutworm is around early in the season ready to cut the flower stalks of the hyacinths. When the peas come on a bit later, he is ready for them. A very good way to block him off is to put paper collars, or tin ones, about the plants. These collars should be about an inch away from the plant.

Of course, plant lice are more common. Those we see are often green in colour. But they may be red, yellow or brown. Lice are easy enough to find since they are always clinging to their host. As sucking insects they have to cling close to a plant for food, and one is pretty sure to find them. But the biting insects do their work, and then go hide. That makes them much more difficult to deal with.

Rose slugs do great damage to the rose bushes. They eat out the body of the leaves, so that just the veining is left. They are soft-bodied, green above and yellow below.

A beetle, the striped beetle, attacks young melons and squash leaves. It eats the leaf by riddling out holes in it. This beetle, as its name implies, is striped. The back is black with yellow stripes running lengthwise.

Then there are the slugs, which are garden pests. The slug will devour almost any garden plant, whether it be a flower or a vegetable. They lay lots of eggs in old rubbish heaps. Do you see the good of cleaning up rubbish? The slugs do more harm in the garden than almost any other single insect pest. You can discover them in the following way. There is a trick for bringing them to the surface of the ground in the day time. You see they rest during the day below ground. So just water the soil in which the slugs are supposed to be. How are you to know where they are? They are quite likely to hide near the plants they are feeding on. So water the ground with some nice clean lime water. This will disturb them, and up they'll poke to see what the matter is.

Beside these most common of pests, pests which attack many kinds of plants, there are special pests for special plants. Discouraging, is it not? Beans have pests of their own; so have potatoes and cabbages. In fact, the vegetable garden has many inhabitants. In the flower garden lice are very bothersome, the cutworm and the slug have a good time there, too, and ants often get very numerous as the season advances. But for real discouraging insect troubles the vegetable garden takes the prize. If we were going into fruit to any extent, perhaps the vegetable garden would have to resign in favour of the fruit garden.

A common pest in the vegetable garden is the tomato worm. This is a large yellowish or greenish striped worm. Its work is to eat into the young fruit.

A great, light green caterpillar is found on celery. This caterpillar may be told by the black bands, one on each ring or segment of its body.

The squash bug may be told by its brown body, which is long and slender, and by the disagreeable odor from it when killed. The potato bug is another fellow to look out for. It is a beetle with yellow and black stripes down its crusty back. The little green cabbage worm is a perfect nuisance. It is a small caterpillar and smaller than the tomato worm. These are perhaps the most common of garden pests by name.