THE WEEK’S WORK AT A GLANCE

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 188, 29 October 1927, Page 26 (Supplement)

THE WEEK’S WORK AT A GLANCE

THE VEGETABLE GARDEN October month is nearly over and the season advances rapidly. If gardeners expect plenty of vegetables for autumn and winter, now is the time to get busy. Large sowings should be made of peas and beans. The early crops are almost ready and a heavy main crop should be set. Stratagem peas and French or butter beans are recommended. * Rust is making its appearance on broad beans. Spray with lime and sulphur or Bordeaux powder every ten days until blight is checked. Broad beans can be kept dwarfed about two feet by pinching out the tops and making them branch. Main sowings should be made in drills of beet, radish, turnips, swedes, carrots and parsnips. Work the ground surface as fine as possible before sowing. Marrows, rock and water melons, pumpkins and cucumbers should be planted on mounds as previously directed. Lettuce, endive, celery and capsicum seed can be sown in boxes. After last rain asparagus crops are shooting well. Cut all heads as they become ready and keep beds well weeded. A dressing of salt will help things greatly at this period, 2oz per square yard sprinkled over bed. Those people from the Old Country wanting to grow Brussels sprouts and borecore or curly greens should commence sowing seed now. The young plants may be transplanted later like cabbages. The crispness of the crop depends largely on the amount of frost we have in the winter.

Trench the ground deeply for the sowings of runner beans. Tomato plants should be now set out as required. Rich ground for planting is not essential as it only promotes heavy foliage growth. The popular American dish, egg plant, is not much grown here. It makes a delicious dish and can be cooked in various ways. The seed should be now sown in pans and transplanted like tomatoes. THE FLOWER GARDEN

Chrysanthemums can now be obtained and should be planted as soon as possible in good, well-drained soil. Dahlia cuttings should be planted about the middle of November, so prepare the ground now. The final sowing of summer and autumn flowering sweet peas should take place. Sow seed in their permanent position as transplanting is not recommended. Use lime or tobacco dust, freely sprinkling it over the ground, to kill the young slugs and snails. The soil in the borders and flower beds should be stirred with the hoe to kill seedling weeds and to help the plants. This is a great help to the autumn flowering annuals. Rock and alpine plants can now be transplanted with safety. Old pockets of soil in the rock garden should be removed and replaced with fresh soil as required. Spring bulbs are now finished flowering. Cut off the dead blossoms, but not the foliage until it withers completely. These could be removed carefully with the spade and heeled in elsewhere to make room for the cineraria, nemesia, phlox, zinnia, etc. The following seeds are recommended to make a bright show during the summer and autumn months: —Phlox, salvias, portulacca, marigolds, cosmos, petunias, salpiglossis, zinnia and aster. A number of flowering bulbs and tubers may be set this month:— Cannas, all colours, IS inches apart; agapanthus, 3 feet apart; nerines,’ from 6 to 9 inches; schizostyles, 12 inches. Now that the weather is warm, red spiders will be making their appearance on the underside of the leaves of various plants. These should be well watered in summer. When once the ground is allowed to get dry the plants are attacked by the red spider. Spray the underside of the leaves with nicotine sulphate or blackleaf 40.