GARDENING HINTS.

Dunstan Times, Issue 498, 3 November 1871, Page 1 (Supplement)

GARDENING HINTS.

FfowEii Garden. —lnjudicious watering is an injury to most garden plants, but if properly performed it is a great aid to nearly all plants. A slight Watering is an injury rather than a benefit. L’he heated earth at once absorbs (lie wat -r thus applied, it bakes, and forms a hard crust about the plant, the dews are rot absorbed, and the plants are in reality worse off than if no water had been put on. It is much more important to keep the soil light and loose about newly planted flowers, trees, etc., than it is to drench them with water. Where this is do»e the moisture conies up from below, the dew is absorbed, and the plants thrive, which they cannot do so long as the surface is crusted over Always water in the evening, and previous to watering have the ground loosened well with hoe o>rake. Then water liberally. Asa inle we prefer keeping the hoe "oing in a flower or vegetable gardm in hot dry wealh r than the watering pot. Plants will stairi the drought better by the former than the latter mode. Too much water is as injurious as too little ; therefore use judgment in watering as well as in all other matters connected with ihe care of your wardens. Attend well to roses; this is the season to make or mar them ; if the aphis rosso to get a strong hold, they wiil exhaust the sap from the tender leaves and shoots. The fema e aphis produces her vounothroughout the entire year, and it particularly active on plants in warm situations. They are most effect u diy destroyed by frequent springing with weak tobacco water, or Gishurst’s compound.

Fhuit Garden.—lf you would improveand benefit your fruit trees of all kinds, mulch them ; would you save the small surface roots from mirni-ig np, and your trees from suffering, or fiom dying in extra hot summers, mulch them at once. By a little judicious care and labor in this direction, a very great benefit wih result, *nd every tree so mulche'l will be* protected from suffering durinohoj dry seasons, and those trees bearing fruit will receive a special benefit. A trial of this experiment will soon convince every one that this must be done. Strawberries not already 111 niche I should he attended to at once. It would be well for cultivators at all sceptical upon this point to have « row or two without mulching, and note thedilf Tenceinyiehl, waiodit, eo or, and, as a consequence, profit. As the fruit becomes set on the various fruit trees it is a good plan to give them a copious syringi g, it being of treat benefit to the trees, destiny iug the almost invidble growth of lichens, killing dormant insects hidden in the crevices, and improving the trees generally. As regards for? ward vines an experienced man can do much good by carefully g,dug over them and breaking off those shoots winch start from the ground oi from the main sfock ; these young and useless shoots t ike away a deal of nourishment, which the bearing shoots cannot well spare.

Rnm-er priming is another process and one of the m >st seientidc, for reducing the over-luxurianc • of a tree, and bringing it to a frnit.nlcondition.’ When the growing point of a shoot is Stopped, the sap is deprived of its out let, and forced into the remaining buds, especially.those in the imruedu ate vicinity, which will, if early in the season, burst, and set forth shoots ; but if the operation is performed - Liter, that is shortly before the C es ation of growth, but while there is still a considerable flow of sap, though not enough to cause any of the buds to burst, a large number of them will be changed into flower buds. Unfruitful treees may be successfully treated in this manner.

Ringing is another mode of accomplishing the same object, and acts by preventing the sap from flowing downwards, and causing its accumulation ; for, as the stp of a tree rises through the vessels of the wood and descends through those of the bark, by liking off a ring o‘ bark, the channel is stopped and the escape prevented. When a man expects to h-ive trees to plant or transplant, he should m ike a special compost heap by piling turf, leaves, chip dirt, and wood"ashes’ using a little lime for aso vent. When this pile rots down and becomes soft, let him shovel it over, and, if he has it, mix in a bushel or two «f hour dust. In setting out a tree, wheel a good Imrrow-lomi of the cmipost to the hole, and stamp some of ir around the little roots, and mix it with the earth as it is filled in When nature manures her forests she does it with rott-d leaves, and we cimiot be wiser than she is in such m liters.