Dwarfed Trees.

Manawatu Herald, 21 August 1900, Page 3

Dwarfed Trees.

I At a recent sale in London of ' Japanese dwarfed fruit and forest trees : very high prices were obtained for I most of the specimens. Japan's work j of Nature, aided by human ingenuity, i are as quaint as' her works of art. ! Perfect miniatures of cedars 80 years old; red-lenfed maples ift high, with gnarled and hollow trunk ; tiny wistaries under 3ft in height, and an oak 3-i-ft high were among the various exhibits. Stunted humanity is the reverse of beautiful, however well proportioned ; but these quaint specimens of Nature in miniature were in most cases as beautiful as curious. The highest price, 32gs, was paid for an Acer palmata, 80 years old, 34m high, in a white crackle-china dish ; a Larix lepolepis, 180 years old," 2oin high, of which only sin were occupied by the trunk, fetch 25gs ; and a 24m Maple Tokaido in a sea-green china pot was sold for i2igs. A curious but successful way of dwarfing trees for table decoration is described in an American paper. Take an orange, and, having cut a small hole in the peel, remove all the pulp and juice, fill the skin thus emptied with some cocoa-nut fibre, fine moss and charcoal, just stiffened with a little loam. In the centre of this put an acorn, date stone, or the seed of any tree that it is proposed to obtain a dwarf from. Place the orange-peel in a tumbler or vase in a window, and moisten the contents occasionally with a little water through the hole in the peel, and sprinkle the surface with fine wood-ashes. In due time the tiee will push its stem through the compost, and its roots through the orange-peel. The roots must then be cut flush with the peel, and the process repeated frequently for some time. The stem of the tree will assume a stunted, gnarled appearance, making it look like an old tree. When the ends of the roots are cut for the last time, the orange-peel, which, curiously enough, does not rot, may be plainted black and varnished.