Pennsylvania School of Horticulture for Women - Wise Acres Yearbook (Ambler, PA)

Page 30 text:

Wise-Acres •♦♦a Cuttings of soft green wood two to three inches long can be taken in summer and inserted in frames. They root more quickly if a hotbed of manure one inch thick is made under the sand. Keep the sashes on, syringe daily and shade with burlap. Hard wood cuttings six inches long can be made in autumn of new but ripe shoots, cutting at a joint or with a heel of older wood. Tie in bundles and bury in soil outdoors below frost line to callus. Take up in spring and plant three inches deep and three inches apart in nursery rows, outside. The cuttings can also be inserted in a propagating bench in the greenhouse in autumn. Layering should be more used as a method of propagation. Many shrubs with drooping branches root themselves into the soil around. Others can be induced to make roots by being simply pegged down into some good sandy loam mounded up around the plant, while it is necessary to cut a slit or tongue in some before pegging them into the soil. Layer in spring or autumn, keep moist, and leave for a year to make roots, then sever from the parent plant and put in nursery rows or permanent positions. A City Garden Audrey Hedge When you speak of your garden it is always taken for granted that you mean your garden in the country; for where else would you have one? The middle of New York City is one of the last places where one would expect to find a garden, but there are quite a few settlements hidden by the high walls of the city houses, which no one who had not seen behind those walls would dream existed. Turtle Bay Gardens, although not a true waterside colony like Sutton Place, was one of the first of its kind to be started by a group of literary and artistic people about nine years ago. The name seems to imply that it is on a river bank, but the lovely title originated from a rocky cove three blocks south on the East River. There, in the old days, famously large turtles were caught by the picnickers, and in the Colonial WTars the cove was frequently fortified and held by the British. The gardens are a block of twenty houses, back to back, between Second and Third Avenues, facing on Forty-eighth and Forty-ninth Streets. They were remodeled from the typical tenement houses, with dingy back yards and high board fences, into houses of stucco, with one

Page 29 text:

School oj Horticulture . - a» - in the garden here, as well as M. prunifolia, M. theifera, M. micromalus. The Japanese cherries are finding their way into American gardens and are hardy in this state; in fact, many of them are hardy as far north as Boston. One of the first to flower is Prunus subhirtella, the spring cherry of Japan. It has slender branches covered with pale pink blooms which fade to white. The weeping rosebud cherry, so popular in gardens, is P. subhirtella pendula, and no tree is more beautiful. Prunus yedoensis is the species that was presented by the Japanese to the United States Government, which planted them in Washington. When in flower they are a sight worth seeing and attract many visitors. Prunus subhirtella (Beni-higan) and P. yedoensis (Yoshina) have been planted in the spring and autumn gardens at Ambler and are growing nicely. Primus avium, the native European cherry, is not much grown here, but E. H. Wilson, of the Arnold Arboretum, reports it as hardy there, and speaks very highly of it. It makes a well-balanced tree with a rounded pyramidal top and bears pure white flowers in masses which almost obscure the branches. The double form is even more lovely. There are many more shrubs and trees as beautiful as those mentioned but space does not permit any further detailed description. A few remarks on propagation and general care may be useful. Any good garden soil will suit most shrubs, but it is worth while to double dig with manure or to prepare a deep hole for each. Spread the roots out well if the shrub is not balled and burlapped, trimming any jagged cuts with a sharp knife. Work the soil well among the roots and tread firmly. Before putting back the final layer of soil give a thorough soaking. During the first year watch closely and never allow to suffer from dryness. Soak frequently and thoroughly and mulch with well rotted manure. Pruning of ornamental shrubs is an operation that is often overlooked or badly done. It is not really difficult and can be reduced to a few quite simple principles. First, there are those as Weigela, Spirea, Viburnum, that flower in spring or early summer on the wood formed the previous year. They should be thinned directly after flowering, cutting out the shoots that have flowered to allow light and air into the bush to ripen the new wood for next year’s bloom. Pruning too hard may result in a spurt of soft sappy growth that does not ripen enough to stand the winter. Second are such as Buddleia, which flower late in summer at the ends of cuiTent year’s wood. Prune in early spring by cutting these shoots to two or three buds from their base. Shrubs bearing flowers and berries are a little harder to prune, but the best way is to thin out carefully in early spring after the berries have gone. The crabs and Japanese quince bear their flowers on spurs and need little beyond a light thinning after flowering or in early spring. Most flowering shrubs can be propagated by cuttings or layers.

Page 31 text:

School of Horticulture •♦♦a - -. .. —: whole garden full of old trees, iron gateways, balconies and fountains, which give it the atmosphere of a very old Italian garden. Each house has its own individual plot of land bordered on three sides by a low stone wall. A narrow path leads out to the center public walk, ending in a small gate. The owners have an agreement always to keep their service quarters towards the street, and the dining and living rooms at the back overlooking the gardens. Every house is unique in itself, for no two are exactly alike. Some have balconies from the second-floor windows, and others bay windows from the first floor, and an addition of two rooms on the roof. The colors of the houses vary also. One is a lovely light green, and another is the usual reddish tan, with a large ship painted on it between the first and second floor. The four end houses each have a long porch out from the second floor, overlooking the gardens, while a high wall closes in the ends of the garden from the public eye. The History of the Pansy Theresa Schindler, Ph.D. The heartsease or wild pansy was first mentioned and described by O. Brunfels (1533) and by L. Fuchs (1542), both Germans. The latter wrote that the Herba Trinitatis, the name by which the pansy was then known, was found not only wild in Germany at that time, but also as an ornamental plant. He describes the upper petals as purple, the two side petals as white and the base petal as yellow. Viola lutea also was grown in gardens at this time. The name, pansy, as far as we can learn, was used for the first time in botanical literature in 1537, by the Frenchman, Ruellius, but in its Latin form, pensea. By 1597 the heartsease, or pansy, had found its way into Gerard’s Herbal and because of its three colors, “purple, yellow, white or blew,” it was called Viola tricolor. From all records it seems certain that this dainty flower was used as a garden subject during the latter part of the sixteenth century, in the Netherlands and in France, as well as in England, while the next century found it in the gardens, also, of Denmark, Poland, Sweden and Italy. All this time, however, even into the eighteenth century, these pansies resembled both in size and coloring those growing wild, and it was not until the nineteenth century that the lovely forms which we admire today resulted from hybridization and selection.