HORTICULTURAL CLIPPINGS

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 416, 2 November 1889, Page 4

HORTICULTURAL CLIPPINGS

Pinching Back Superfluous Gkowth. — Fiuit tiees that are making too much ( wood need to have the ends of young growth pinched back in July. The check of growth will not only keep the tree from becoming unwieldy, but will also induce the formation of fruit buds. It is always the trees that do not bear that grow too much wood. The bad habit perpetuates itself. After fruiting begins manure may be applied more freely with the certainty that the greater vigour will induce increased fruitfulneas.

How to Send Flowers. — One of the safest and best ways to send a few choiceout flowers to a distance is to cut slits in pota toes and insert the flower stems, taking 1 caie that they are fiimly fastened in and supported by a little cotton or paper. An ordinary potato will keepmoat floweis fresh for two weeks or more in a moderate temperatme. Potatoes can al&o be used in tloial decorations if disguised by being covered with leaves and flowers, so that the practical tubers will be concealed, thus showing only what is beautiful.

Mk Gladstone on the Fruitgrowing Industry. — Mr Gladstone, speaking at the liawarclen .Fruit and Flower Show, pointed out the superior advantage ofsmall gardens over allotments, and dwelt upon the varieties of small culture, especially in regaid to fi uit, which he considered to be a most important and increasing industry. He denied that the price of fruit must be reduced before the consumption increased. He quoted statistics to show that the consumption of apples had enormously increased during the last fifty years, and that, notwithstanding thie, the price had also increased. Attributing the large manufacture of jam to the cheap oning of sugar, he warned all consumers jealously to watch conventions, bounties, and any other schemes which might tend in the direction of increasing the price of sugar.

Rooting Large Limbs of Friit Treks.— Mr Henry Poetb, South Ausfcralia, describes a method practised in Ceylon for striking roots irom a limb of a large fruit tree. " Choose a strong healthy limb, say of a peach tree, saw into it a couple or three feet from the main stem, sufficiently to make it gape an inch or moie, according to s'v/o of wood operated upon, but not deep enough to make it split. Support the branch near the end with a forked btick, with the end iirmly planted in the giound, so as to make a firm support. Make a, mixtuioof cow dung and mould, three parts of the former and five of the latter. Place it on a piece of gunny bag or open sacking, and apply as a sort of poultice to the part that has been cut. It should extend eight inches on each side, about twelve in the middle, and tapering to both ends, which should be secuied with twine. This mixture must be kept constantly damp, and this can be done by hanging a porous ve-sel over it, and keeping it supplied with water. After a few weeks roots will be observed protruding through the baeering. Then the limb must be cut off a few inches from the lower portion of the poultice, and planted whereever desired, being especially careful to stake secuiely. Very large branches can be so treated. I have seen them removed with unripened fruit, which afterwards matured properly."

Poultry yon Orchards. - While ifc is an undisputed fact (paid the Poultry Guide) that an orchard is one of the best places in which to establish a poultry yard, we have i found poultry to be excellent for fruit tree 3. We have sixteen apple trees, now seven years old, standing: in and around our poultry yards. Some of these, standing directly in the run of the fowls, have had as many apples as any five of the trees, on the outside. This is conclusive evidence that the one is beneficial to the other. The chickens destroy all bugs and other insects which prey upon the trees and fruit.' At the same time thoy keep down all grass and weeds, and keep the surface of the ground scratched up and in a mellow con : dition, thus promoting the health and vigour of the trees. Some have been literally hanging with nice apples, and go heavily laden that we were to

keep the limbs well propped to keep them from breaking down. Shade is one of the ' indispensables about a poultry establishment during the summer months, and it is certainly better and more profitable to have some variety of fruit. We at the same time get the needed shade, while we get a bountiful supply of delicious fruit, if of the right kind. We should certainly advise all to have orchards for poultry, and poultry for orchards ; for the one will be greatly benefited by the other.