Lungwort:define Lungwort Pulmonaria species, growing in shade gardens and uses

Lungwort:define

Lungwort Pulmonaria

(Pulmonaria species)

These clump-forming perennials can be grown as case plants or as a groundcover in partial to abounding shade. The foliage of best breed and varieties is blooming with white or argent spots. However, some of the newer varieties accept essentially silver leaves with blooming margins.

In accession to the adorable foliage, lungworts additionally aftermath white, pink, or dejected fl owers in spring. The accepted name refers to the declared value

Growing, Know How

For those beginner gardeners. - Grow this bulb in adumbration or allotment adumbration conditions. In abounding sun, you ability acquisition Lungworth a little billowing although it will survive.

Give Lungwort a appropriate adobe with able summertime moisture. This is not a bulb for the dry adumbration or it will artlessly atrophy away. Do not accord it adobe clay as it will rot over the winter. Abound it in a acceptable "forest-soil" one that has a aerial absorption of amoebic amount (dig in admixture and/or peat moss) and approved waterings.

What you may acquisition with Lungwort is that if you corruption it in any way, it will artlessly achromatize away. It will appear aback the afterward spring! (so don't accord up hope) It responds to corruption (too hot, too abundant sun etc) by disappearing.

Propagation and Hardiness

The easiest for the home garden is to bisect Lungwort in aboriginal bounce or in fall.

Lungwort is able appropriate bottomward to USDA area 2/3 (2 if adequate in the winter)

Varieties

There are some actual absorbing Lungwort varieties in garden centers now and the leaves appear in a advanced array of shapes, shades of blooming as able-bodied as variegations.

This is a acceptable aggregate bulb with hosta because of the choices in blade variations.

**Pulmonaria 'Baby Blue' This is the tightest, best compact, mounded anatomy to date and it won't abound to breach in the center. Flowers age to a admirable babyish blue.

**Pulmonaria 'Majeste' Solid silvery-gray leaves with a actual attenuated blooming margin. In backward spring, ablaze blush buds pop accessible to acknowledge darker bluish-pink annual bells.

**Pulmonaria 'Raspberry Ice' Long, arctic blooming leaves belted in fair with raspberry blush annual clusters accommodate a abrupt contrast, and absolutely assume to ablaze this bulb up.

**Pulmonaria 'Raspberry Splash' raspberry-pink annual clusters ball amid the aphotic green, silver-spotted leaves in backward spring. One of the added cocked growing addiction and abounding bloomers.

**Pulmonaria 'Samourai' Dejected flowers are produced in backward spring. The continued leaves are authentic silver.

**Pulmonaria 'Silver Shimmers' Clusters of almost large, steel-blue flowers are abeyant aloft the long, bouncing foliage which charcoal low. The leaves are heavily saturated with silver.

**Pulmonaria longifolia 'Bertram Anderson' Gentian dejected flowers arising from fuchia buds in backward spring. Like added P. longifolia, 'Bertram Anderson' has long, attenuated leaves heavily spotted with silver.

**Pulmonaria 'Diana Clare' angel blooming leaves biconcave in argent accumulate their blush all division long. Their long, acicular leaves adverse able-bodied with the violet-blue flowers

**Pulmonaria longifolia 'Roy Davidson' mounded foliage of 'Roy Davidson' is heavily spotted with argent and are continued and narrow. One of the abate varieties.

**Pulmonaria officinalis 'Sissinghurst White' White flowering, the leaves are brindled with silver.

**Pulmonaria saccharata 'Mrs. Moon' an earlier variety, it has mounded, argent spotted foliage. In backward spring, magenta-pink buds accessible to ablaze dejected bell-shaped flowers.

Lungwort is a accomplished adumbration garden bulb and I confess, one of my favorites.

Beginner Vegetable gardening - General guidance

Beginner Vegetable Gardening

It is with an activity in which there is article of abhorrence that I close

these pages--fear that abounding of those little things which become second

nature to the agriculturalist of plants and assume unimportant, but which

sometimes are aloof the things that the abecedarian wants to apperceive about,

may accept been aback larboard out. In every operation described,

however, I accept approved to acknowledgment all all-important details. I would urge

the reader, nevertheless, to abstraction as thoroughly as accessible all the

garden problems with which he will acquisition himself confronted and to this

end acclaim that he apprehend several of the abounding garden books which are

now to be had. It will be to his advantage to see alike the same

subjects presented afresh from added credibility of view. The added familiar

he can accomplish himself, both in approach and in practice, with all the

multitude of operations which avant-garde agronomical involves, the

greater the success he will attain.

Personally, the added I accept gone into the growing of things--and

that has now become my business as able-bodied as my pleasure--the more

absorbingly absorbing I acquisition it. Anniversary season, anniversary crop, offers its

own problems and a accolade for the actual band-aid of them. It is a

work which, alike to the beginner, presents the befalling of deducting

new conclusions, aggravating fresh experiments, authoritative fresh discoveries. It is

a assignment which offers affable and advantageous amusement to the abounding whose

days charge be, for the best part, spent in appointment or shop; and it gives

very abundant advice in the world-old botheration of authoritative both ends

meet.

Let the garden abecedarian not be aghast if he does not succeed, for

the aboriginal division or two, or possibly three, with aggregate he plants.

There is usually a preventable acumen for the failure, and studious

observation will acknowledge it. With the avant-garde success in the application

of insecticides and fungicides, and the addendum of the convenance of

irrigation, the accountable of agronomical begins to be bargain to a

scientific and (what is added to the point) a abiding basis. We are getting

control of the ambiguous factors. All this affects first, perhaps, the

person who grows for profit, but with our present advanced apportionment of

every fresh abstraction and analysis in such matters, it charge ability anon to

every alien home garden application which is cared for by a wide-awake

gardener.

Such a person, from the actuality that he or she is account a fresh garden

book, I booty the clairvoyant to be. I achievement this volume, abridged admitting it

is, has added to your armamentarium of applied garden information; that it

will advice to abound that accepted additional brand of grass. I accept alone to

add, as I about-face afresh to the problems cat-and-mouse for me in acreage and under

glass, that I ambition you all success in your work--the authoritative of better

gardens in America.
Beginner Vegetable Gardening

Calendar of Home Vegetable Gardening for all the year, Planting plan

Planting Plan. The importance of accurately planning the work ahead was emphasized I mentioned there the check list used to make sure that everything would be carried out, or started ahead at the proper time--as with the sowing

of seeds. The following garden operations, given month by month, will serve not only as a timely reminder of things to be done, but as the basis for such a check list.

JANUARY

Probably one of the good resolutions made with the New Year was a better garden for the coming summer. The psychologists claim that the only hope for resolutions is to nail them down at the start with an action--that seems to have more effect in making an actual impression on the brain. So start the good work along by sending at once for several of the leading seed catalogs.

Planting Plan. Make out a list of what you are going to want this year, and then make your Planting Plan.

Seeds. Order your seed. Do it now while the seed store's stock is full; while he is not rushed; while there is ample time to rectify mistakes if any occur.

Manures. Altogether too few amateur gardeners realize the great importance of procuring early every pound of manures, of any kind, to be had. It often may be had cheaply at this time of year, and by composting, adding phosphate, and several turnings, if you have any place under cover where it can be collected, you can double its value before spring.

Frames. Even at this season of the year do not fail to air the frames well on warm days. Practically no water will be needed, but if the soil does dry out sufficiently to need it, apply early on a bright morning.

Onions. It will not be too early, this month, to sow onions for spring transplanting outside. Get a packet each of Prizetaker, AilsaCraig, Mammoth Silver-skin, or Gigantic Gibraltar. Lettuce. Sow lettuce for spring crop under glass or in frames.

Fruit. This is a good month to prune grapes, currants, gooseberries and peach trees, to avoid the rush that will come later.

FEBRUARY

Hotbeds. A little early for making them until after the 15th, but get all your material ready--manure, selected and stacked; lumber ready for any new ones; sash all in good repair. Starting Seeds. First part of the month, earliest planting of cabbage, cauliflower and lettuce should be made; and two to four weeks later for main early crop. At this time also, beets and earliest celery.

Tools. Overhaul them all now; order repairs. Get new catalogs and study new improvements and kinds you do not possess. Poles and brush. Whether you use the old-fashioned sort (now harder to obtain than they used to be) or make your "poles" and use wire trellis for peas, attend to it now. Fruit. Finish up last month's work, if not all done. Also examine plum and cherry trees for black-knot.

MARCH

Hotbeds. If not made last of February, should be made at once. Some of the seed sown last month will be ready for transplanting and going into the frames; also lettuce sown in January. Radish and carrot

(forcing varieties) may be sown in alternating rows. Give much more air; water on bright mornings; be careful not to have them caught by suddenly cold nights after a bright warm day.

Seed-sowing under glass. Last sowing of early cabbage and early summer cabbages (like Succession), lettuce, rhubarb (for seedling plants), cauliflower, radish, spinach, turnip, and early tomatoes; towards last of month, late tomatoes and first of peppers, and eggplant. Sweet peas often find a place in the vegetable garden; start a few early, to set out later; they will do better than if started outside. Start tomatoes for growing in frames. For early potatoes sprout in sand.

Planting, outside. If an early spring, and the ground is sufficiently dry, sow onions, lettuce, beet, radish, (sweet peas), smooth peas, early carrot, cabbage, leek, celery (main crop), and turnip. Set out new beds of asparagus, rhubarb and sea-kale (be sure to try a few plants of the latter). Manure and fork up old beds of above. Fruit. Prune now, apple, plum and pear trees.

APRIL

Now the rush is on! Plan your work, and work your plan. But do not yield to the temptation to plant more than you can look out for later on. Remember it is much easier to sow seeds than to pull out weeds.

The Frames. Air! water! and do not let the green plant-lice or the white-fly get a ghost of a chance to start. Almost every day the glass should be lifted entirely off. Care must be taken never to let the soil or flats become dried out; toward the end of the month, if it is bright and warm, begin watering towards evening instead of in early morning, as you should have been doing through the winter. If proper attention is given to ventilation and moisture, there will not be much danger from the green plant-louse (aphis) and white-fly, but at the first sign of one fight them to a finish. Use kerosene emulsion, tobacco dust, tobacco preparations, or Aphine. Seed sowing. Under glass: tomato, egg-plant and peppers. On sod: corn, cucumbers, melons, early squash, lima beans.

Planting, outside. Onions, lettuce, beet, etc., if not put in last month; also parsnip, salsify, parsley, wrinkled peas, endive. Toward the end of this month (or first part of next) second plantings of these. Set out plants of early cabbage (and the cabbage group) lettuce, onion sets, sprouted potatoes, beets, etc.

In the Garden. Cultivate between rows of sowed crops; weed out y hand just as soon as they are up enough to be seen; watch for cutworms and root-maggots.

Fruit. Thin out all old blackberry canes, dewberry and raspberry canes (if this was not done, as it should have been, directly after the fruiting season last summer). Be ready for first spraying of earlyblossoming

trees. Set out new strawberry beds, small fruits and fruit trees.

MAY

Keep ahead of the weeds. This is the month when those warm, south, driving rains often keep the ground too wet to work for days at a time, and weeds grow by leaps and bounds. Woe betide the gardener ose rows of sprouting onions, beets, carrots, etc., once become green with wild turnip and other rapid-growing intruders. Clean cultivation and slight hilling of plants set out are also essential.

The Frames. These will not need so much attention now, but care must be taken to guard tender plants, such as tomatoes, egg-plant and peppers, against sudden late frosts. The sash may be left off most of the time. Water copiously and often.

Planting, outside. First part of the month: early beans, early corn, okra and late potatoes may be put in; and first tomatoes set out --even if a few are lost--they are readily replaced. Finish setting out cabbage, lettuce, cauliflower, beets, etc., from frames. Latter part of month, if warm: corn, cucumbers, some of sods from frames and early squash as traps where late crop is to be planted or set.

Fruit. Be on time with first sprayings of late-blossoming fruits--apples, etc. Rub off from grape vines the shoots that are not wanted.

JUNE

Frequent, shallow cultivation! Firm seeds in dry soil. Plant wax beans, lima beans, pole beams, melons, corn, etc., and successive crops of lettuce, radish, etc. Top-dress growing crops that need special manure (such as nitrate of soda on onions). Prune tomatoes, and cut out some foliage for extra early tomatoes. Toward end of month set celery and late cabbage. Also sow beans, beets, corn, etc., for early fall crops. Spray where

necessary. Allow asparagus to grow to tops. Fruit. Attend to spraying fruit trees and currants and

gooseberries. Make pot-layers of strawberries for July setting.

JULY

Maintain frequent, shallow cultivation. Set out late cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, leeks and celery. Sow beans, beets, corn, etc., for late fall crops. Irrigate where needed.

Fruit. Pinch back new canes of blackberry, dewberry and raspberry. Rub off second crop of buds on grapes. Thin out if too many bunches; also on plums, peaches and other fruit too thick, or touching.

Pot-layered strawberries may be set out.

AUGUST

Keep the garden clean from late weeds--especially purslane, the hotweather weed pest, which should be always removed from the garden and disposed of or rotted down.

Sow spinach, rutabaga turnip, bush beans and peas for last fall crop. During first part of month, late celery may still be put out. Sow lettuce for early fall crop, in frames. First lot of endive should be tied up for blanching.

Fruit. Strawberries may be set, and pot-layered plants, if wanted to bear a full crop the following season, should be put in. Thin out and bag grapes.

SEPTEMBER

Frames. Set in lettuce started in August. Sow radishes and successive crop of lettuce. Cooler weather begins to tell on lateplanted crops. Give cabbage, cauliflower, etc., deeper cultivation.

"Handle" celery wanted for early use. Harvest and store onions. Get squash under cover before frost. From the 15th to 25th sow spinach, onions, borecole for wintering over. Sow down thickly to rye all plots as fast as cleared of summer crops; or plow heavy land in ridges. Attend to draining.

Fruit. Trees may be set. Procure barrels for storing fruit in winter. At harvest time it is often impossible to get them at any price.

OCTOBER

Get ready for winter. Blanch rest of endive. Bank celery, to be used before Christmas, where it is. Gather tomatoes, melons, etc., to keep as long as possible. Keep especially clean and well cultivated all crops to be wintered over. Late in the month store cabbage and cauliflower; also beets, carrots, and other root crops. Get boxes, barrels, bins, sand or sphagnum moss ready beforehand, to save time in packing.

Clean the garden; store poles, etc., worth keeping over; burn everything else that will not rot; and compost everything that will. Fruit. Harvest apples, etc. Pick winter pears just before hard frosts, and store in dry dark place.

NOVEMBER

Frames. Make deep hotbeds for winter lettuce and radishes. Construct frames for use next spring. See that vegetables in basement, bins, and sheds are safe from freezing. Trench or store celery for spring use. Take in balance of all root crops if any remain in the ground, except, of course, parsnip and salsify for spring use. Put

rough manure on asparagus and rhubarb beds. Get mulch ready for spinach, etc., to be wintered over, if they occupy exposed locations. Fruit. Obtain marsh or salt hay for mulching strawberries. Cut out old wood of cane-fruits--blackberries, etc., if not done after gathering fruit. Look over fruit trees for borers.

DECEMBER

Cover celery stored last month, if trenched out-of-doors. Use only light, loose material at first, gradually covering for winter. Put mulch on spinach, etc.

Fruit. Mulch strawberries. Prune grape-vines; make first application of winter sprays for fruit trees.

AND THEN

Set about procuring manures of all kinds from every available source. Remember that anything which will rot will add to the value of your manure pile. Muck, lime, old plastering, sods, weeds (earth and all), street, stable and yard sweepings--all these and  a good Calendar of Home Vegetable Gardening - Planting Plan will increase your garden successes of next year.

A CALENDAR OF OPERATIONS
PVAE62387MCX 



The Grape - Pruning and care

THE GRAPE

No garden is so small that there cannot be found in it room for three or four grape-vines; no fruit is more certain, and few more delicious.

If it is convenient, a situation fully exposed to the sun, and sloping slightly, will be preferable. But any good soil, provided only it is rich and thoroughly drained, will produce good results. If a few vines

are to be set against walls, or in other out-of-the-way places, prepare the ground for them by excavating a good-sized hole, putting in a foot of coal cinders or other drainage material, and refilling with good

heavy loam, enriched with old, well rotted manure and half a peck of wood ashes. For culture in the garden, such special preparation will not be necessary--although, if the soil is not in good shape, it will be advisable to slightly enrich the hills.

One or two-year roots will be the most satisfactory to buy. They may be set in either fall or spring--the latter time, for New York or north, being generally preferable. When planting, the cane should be cut back to three or four eyes, and the roots should also be shortened back-- usually about one-third. Be sure to make the hole large enough, when setting, to let the roots spread naturally, and work the soil in well around them with the fingers. Set them in firmly, by pressing down hard with the ball of the foot after firming by hand. They are set about six feet apart.

GRAPE PRUNING

As stated above, the vine is cut back, when planting, to three or four eyes. The subsequent pruning--and the reader must at once distinguish between pruning, and training, or the way in which the vines are placed--will determine more than anything else the success of the undertaking. Grapes depend more upon proper pruning than any other fruit or vegetable in the garden. Two principles must be kept track of

in this work. First principle: the annual crop is borne only on canes of the same year's growth, springing from wood of the previous season's growth. Second principle: the vine, if left to itself, will set three or four times the number of bunches it can properly

mature. As a result of these facts, the following system of pruning has been developed and must be followed for sure and full-sized crops.

(1) At time of planting, cut back to three or four eyes, and after these sprout leave only one (or two) of them, which should be staked up.

(2) Following winter (December to March), leave only one cane and cut this back to three or four eyes.

(3) Second growing season, save only two canes, even if several sprout, and train these to stake or trellis. These two vines, or arms, branching from the main stem, form the foundation for the one-year canes that bear the fruit. However, to prevent the vine's setting too much fruit (see second principle above) these arms must be cut back in order to limit the number of fruit-bearing canes that will spring from them, therefore:

(4) Second winter pruning, cut back these arms to eight or ten buds-- and we have prepared for the first crop of fruit, about forty bunches, as the fruiting cane from each bud will bear two bunches on the average. However these main arms will not bear fruiting-canes another year (see first principle above) and therefore:

(5) At the third winter pruning, (a) of the canes that bore fruit, only the three or four nearest the main stem or trunk are left; (b) these are cut back to eight or ten buds each, and (c) everything else is <ruthlessly cut away.

Each succeeding year the same system is continued, care being taken to rub off, each May, buds or sprouts starting on the main trunk or arms.

The wood, in addition to being cut back, must be well ripened; and the wood does not ripen until after the fruit. It therefore sometimes becomes necessary to cut out some of the bunches in order to hasten the

ripening of the rest. At the same time the application of some potassium fertilizer will be helpful. If the bunches do not ripen up quickly and pretty nearly together, the vine is overloaded and being damaged for

the following year.

The matter of pruning being mastered, the question of training is one of individual choice. Poles, trellises, arbors, walls--almost anything may be used. The most convenient system, however, and the one I would

strongly recommend for practical home gardening for results, is known as the (modified) Kniffen system. It is simplicity itself. A stout wire is stretched five or six feet above the ground; to this the single main trunks of the vine run up, and along it are stretched the two or three arms from which the fruiting-canes hang down. They occupy the least possible space, so that garden crops may be grown practically on the same ground. I have never seen it tried, but where garden space is limited I should think that the asparagus bed and the Kniffen grapearbor just described could be combined to great advantage by placing the vines, in spaces left for them, directly in the asparagus row. Of course the ground would have to be manured for two crops. A 2-8-10

fertilizer is right for the grapes. If using stable manure, apply also potassium fertilizer.

If the old-fashioned arbor is used, the best way is to run the main trunk up over it and cut the laterals back each year to two or three eyes.

The most serious grape trouble which the home gardener is likely to encounter is the black-rot. Where only a few grapes are grown, the simplest way of overcoming this disease is to get a few dozen cheap manila store-bags and fasten one, with a couple of ten-penny nails, over each bunch. Cut the mouth of the bag at sides and edges, cover the bunch, fold the flaps formed over the cane, and fasten.

 They are put on after the bunches are well formed and hasten the ripening of the fruit, as well as protecting it. On a larger scale, spraying will have to be resorted to. Besides the spraying, all trimmed- off wood, old leaves and twigs, withered bunches and grapes, or "mummies," and refuse of every description, should be carefully raked up in the spring and disposed of. Also give clean culture and keep the main stems clean.

The grape completes the list of the small fruits worth while to the average home gardener. If you have not already experimented with them, do not let your garden go any longer without them. They are all easily

obtained, and a very limited number will keep the family table well supplied with healthy delicacies, which otherwise, in their best varieties and condition, could not be had at all. The various operations of setting out, pruning and spraying will soon become as familiar as those in the vegetable garden. There is no reason why every home garden should not have its few rows of small fruits, yielding their delicious harvests in abundance.

The Gooseberry - Enemies and Varieties

THE GOOSEBERRY

This is accustomed about the aforementioned analysis as the currant. It is even more important that it should be accustomed the coolest, airiest, location possible, and the best clammy soil. Even a partially black situation will do, but in such situations added affliction charge be taken to guard against the mildew--which is mentioned below. Summer mulching is, of course, of appropriate benefit.

In pruning the gooseberry, it is best to cut out to a actual few, or even to a distinct stem. Keep the arch open, to acquiesce chargeless apportionment of air. The admeasurement of pruning will accomplish a abundant aberration in the admeasurement of the fruit; if bake-apple of the better admeasurement is wanted, clip actual close. All branches angled to the arena should be removed. Keep the branches, as abundant as possible, from affecting anniversary other.

GOOSEBERRY ENEMIES

The currant-worm attacks the gooseberry also, and is effectively handled by the spraying mentioned above.

The abundant agitation in growing gooseberries auspiciously is the powdery mildew--a dirty, blanched fungous advance accoutrement both bake-apple and leaves.

It is abnormally annihilative of the adopted varieties, the ability of which, until the appearance of the potassium sulfide spray, was being practically abandoned. Use 1 oz. of potassium sulfide (liver of sulphur) to 2 gals. water, and mix aloof afore using. Aerosol thoroughly three or four times a month, from the time the blossoms are openinguntil bake-apple is ripe.

GOOSEBERRY VARIETIES

Of the built-in gooseberries--which are the hardiest, Downing and Houghton's Seedling are best used. Industry is an English variety, doing able-bodied here. Golden Prolific, Champion, and Columbus, are other

good adopted sorts, but alone back the bane is auspiciously fought off.

Currants - Pruning, Enemies and Varieties

The currant and gooseberry are very similar in their cultural requirements. A deep, rich and moist soil is the best--approaching a clayey loam. There need be no fear of giving too much manure, but it should be well rotted. Plenty of room, plenty of air, plenty of moisture, secured where necessary by a soil or other mulch in hot dry weather, are essential to the production of the best fruit.

The currant will stand probably as much abuse as any plant the home gardener will have to deal with. Stuck in a corner, smothered in sod, crowded with old wood, stripped by the currant-worm, it still struggles

along from year to year, ever hopefully trying to produce a meager crop of poor fruit. But these are not the sort you want. Although it is so tough, no fruit will respond to good care more quickly.

To have it do well, give it room, four or five feet each way between bushes. Manure it liberally; give it clean cultivation, and as the season gets hot and dry, mulch the soil, if you would be certain of a full-sized, full-flavored crop. Two bushes, well cared for, will yield more than a dozen half-neglected ones. Anywhere north of New York a full crop every year may be made almost certain.

PRUNING CURRANTS

Besides careful cultivation, to insure the best of fruit it is necessary to give some thought to the matter of pruning. The most convenient and the most satisfactory way is to keep it in the bush form. Set the plants singly, three or four feet apart, and so cut the

new growth, which is generously produced, as to retain a uniform bush shape, preferably rather open in the center.

The fruit is produced on wood two or more years old. Therefore cut out branches either when very small, or not until four or five years later, after it has borne two or three crops of fruit. Therefore, in pruning currants, take out (1) superfluous young growth; (2) old hard wood (as new wood will produce better fruit); and (3) all weak, broken, dead or diseased shoots; (4) during summer, if the tips of the young growths kept for fruiting are pinched off, they will ripen up much better-- meaning better fruit when they bear; (5) to maintain a good form, the whole plant may be cut back (never more than one-third) in the fall.

In special situations it may be advisable to train the currant to one or a few main stems, as against a wall; this can be done, but it is less convenient. Also it brings greater danger from the currant-borer.

The black currant, used almost entirely for culinary or preserving purposes, is entirely different from the red and white ones. They are much larger and should be put five to six feet apart. Some of the fruit is borne on one-year-old wood, so the shoots should not be cut back. Moreover, old wood bears as good fruit as the new growth, and need not be cut out, unless the plant is getting crowded, for several years. As the wood is much heavier and stronger than the other currants, it is advisable gradually to develop the black currants into the tree form.

ENEMIES OF THE CURRANT

The worst of these is the common currant-worm. When he appears, which will be indicated by holes eaten in the lower leaves early in spring, generally before the plants bloom, spray at once. For the borer, cut and

dispose of every infested shoot. Examine the bushes in late fall, and those in which the borers are at work will usually have a wilted appearance and be of a brownish color.

VARIETIES OF CURRANTS

Red Dutch, while older and smaller than some of the newer varieties, is hardier and not so likely to be hurt by the borer. London Market, Fay's Prolific, Perfection (new), and Prince Albert, are good sorts. White Grape is a good white. Naples, and Lee's Prolific are good black sorts.

Varieties of berries How many are there?

New strawberries are being introduced constantly; also, they vary greatly in their adaptation to locality. Therefore it is difficult to advise as to what varieties to plant. Once again a catalog from a reputable

nursery will prove invaluable in selecting the right varieties.

The blackberry, dewberry and raspberry are all treated in much the same way. The soil should be well drained, but if a little clayey, so much the better. They are planned preferably in early spring, and set from

three or four to six or seven feet apart, according to the variety.

They should be put in firmly. Set the plants in about as deep as they have been growing, and cut the canes back to six or eight inches. If fruit is wanted the same season as bushes are set, get a few extra plants--they cost but a few cents--and cut back to two feet or so.

Plants fruited the first season are not likely to do well the following year. Two plants may be set in a place and one fruited. If this one is exhausted, then little will be lost. Give clean cultivation frequently enough to maintain a soil mulch, as it is very necessary to retain all the moisture possible. Cultivation, though frequent, should be very shallow as soon as the plants get a good start. In very hot seasons, if the ground is clean, a summer mulch of old hay, leaves or rough manure will be good for the same purpose.

In growing, a good stout stake is used for each plant, to which the canes are tied with some soft material. Or, a stout wire is strung the length of the row and the canes fastened to this--a better way, however, being to string two wires, one on either side of the row. Another very important matter is that of pruning. The plants if left to themselves will throw up altogether too much wood. This must be cut out to four or five of the new canes and all the canes that have borne fruit should be cut and burned each season as soon as through fruiting.

The canes, for instance, that grow in 2009 will be those to fruit in 2010 after which they should be immediately removed. The new canes, if they are to be self-supporting, as sometimes grown, should be cut back when three or four feet high.

It is best, however, to give support. In the case of those varieties which make fruiting side-shoots, as most of the black raspberries (blackcaps) do, the canes should be cut back at two to three feet, and it is well also to cut back these side shoots one-third to one-half, early in the spring.

In cold sections (New York or north of it) it is safest to give winter protection by "laying down" the canes and giving them a mulch of rough material. Having them near the ground is in itself a great protection, as they will not be exposed to sun and wind and will sometimes be covered with snow.

For mulching, the canes are bent over nearly at the soil and a shovelful of earth thrown on the tips to hold them down; the entire canes may then be covered with soil or rough manure, but do not put it on until freezing weather is at hand. If a mulch is used, it must be taken off before growth starts in the spring.

THE BLACKBERRY

The large-growing sorts are set as much as six by eight feet apart, though with careful staking and pruning they may be comfortably handled in less space. The smaller sorts need about four by six. When growth

starts, thin out to four or five canes and pinch these off at about three feet; or, if they are to be put on wires or trellis, they may be cut when tied up the following spring. Cultivate, mulch and prune as suggested above.

Blackberries will do well on a soil a little dry for raspberries and they do not need it quite so rich, as in this case the canes do not ripen up sufficiently by fall, which is essential for good crops. If growing rank they should be pinched back in late August. When tying up in the spring, the canes should be cut back to four or five feet and the laterals to not more than eighteen inches.

Blackberry enemies do not do extensive injury, as a rule, in wellcared- for beds. The most serious are:

(1) the rust or blight, for which there is no cure but carefully pulling and disposing of the plants as fast as infested;

(2) the blackberry-bush borer, which burn infested canes; and

(3) the recently introduced bramble flea-louse, which resembles the green plant-louse or aphids except that it is a brisk jumper, like the flea-beetle. The leaves twist and curl up in summer and do not drop off in the fall. On cold early mornings, or wet weather, while the insects are sluggish, cut all infested shoots, collecting them in a tight box, and dispose.

BLACKBERRY VARIETIES

As with the other small fruits, so many varieties are being introduced that it is difficult to give a list of the best for home use.

THE DEWBERRY

This is really a trailing blackberry and needs the same culture, except

that the canes are naturally slender and trailing and therefore, for

garden culture, must have support. They may be staked up, or a barrel

hoop, supported by two stakes, makes a good support. In ripening, the

dewberry is ten to fourteen days earlier than the blackberry, and for

that reason a few plants should be included in the berry patch.

RASPBERRY

The black and the red types are distinct in flavor, and both should be grown. The blackcaps need more room, about three by six or seven feet; for the reds three by five feet will be sufficient. The blackcaps, and

a few of the reds, throw out fruiting side branches, and should have the main canes cut back at about two and a half feet to encourage the growth of these laterals, which, in the following spring, should be cut back

to about one-third their length. The soil for raspberries should be clayey if possible, and moist, but not wet.

RASPBERRY ENEMIES

The orange rust, which attacks the blackberry also, is a serious trouble. Pull up and dispose of all infested plants at once, as no good remedy has as yet been found. The cut-worm, especially in newly set beds, may sometimes prove destructive of the sprouting young canes. The raspberry-borer is the larva of a small, flattish, red-necked beetle, which bores to the center of the canes during summer growth, and kills

them. Cut and dispose.

RASPBERRY VARIETIES

Of the blackcaps, Gregg, McCormick, Munger, Cumberland, Columbian, Palmer (very early), and Eureka (late), are all good sorts.

Reds: Cuthbert, Cardinal (new), Turner, Reliance, The King (extra early), Loudon (late). Yellow: Golden Queen.

Picture on top right by Maggie Smith / FreeDigitalPhotos.net