The Library of Work and Play: Gardening and Farming Part 16

Estimate off the bottom of the box something like this: To every foot bore six holes. This is none too much. The great trouble usually is lack of drainage, or lack of air, or sour soil. Over each drainage hole put a bit of broken pot. Then it is well to put a half-inch of drainage material in the box. Stone, broken pot, sphagnum moss, or hay will do for this. The soil should be good, rich, garden soil. With this one might mix in some sand to help drainage. Window boxes should be watered with care; they should not be flooded.

Eloise had very effective boxes. Vincas trailed over the edges; dwarf cannas were in the back of each box; and red and white geraniums were a glory all summer long.

Josephine's gardening was a little difficult. She had no s.p.a.ce at all.

The backyard at her house was seeded down and her mother did not wish it spaded up. She had no front yard. Josephine thought and thought for some time, then decided she would just simply have to make a way to have a garden.

So one day she went to the grocery store and bought a soap box for ten cents. This she filled with soil from Eloise's garden. Then she bought a five-cent package of parsley seed. These seeds were soaked over night in warm water, for parsley seeds are slow to germinate.

Then the seeds were planted in neat little rows in her box garden. This garden was most convenient. It stood out near the house in the backyard all summer. It went to the exhibit in the fall. It stayed on the piazza until frost and then went into the kitchen for the winter. Josephine had parsley enough for her mother's table all the year around.

XVI

MORE ABOUT THE GIRLS' WORK.

In late September the girls began agitating the matter of bulb planting for the school grounds and their homes. The boys were rather scornful of it.

"I believe in gardens," said Albert with great finality, "but bulb work seems to me like fancy work. And then too, bulbs are pretty expensive."

"Very well," answered Dee, "we girls are quite able, as you boys know, to work alone. But spading is pretty hard, and I should think some of you would be glad to help."

"I'll help any time," Myron volunteered, "and I promise to bring two of these other chaps whenever you say."

"Thank you, Myron. We'll not bother you boys further now." Off the girls ran to Katharine's home to study bulb catalogues. Katharine's father gave five dollars for bulbs for the school grounds. This he stipulated was for outdoor planting. Elizabeth and Ethel were going to plant outdoors at home. The other girls had each some money for indoor work.

You may all like to know what the girls found out from their search in bulb catalogues. In the first place very good and perfectly reliable information is obtained from the catalogue of any reputable seed house.

The girls found out that certain bulbs are better adapted to outside planting, while others do equally well indoors or out. Take tulips first; these are suited to the outdoor conditions. To be sure the florist, whose business it is to raise them inside does so with great success. But boys and girls are more likely to have trouble with inside planting of tulips than of other bulbs. Oftentimes lice cover them when the bulb is first brought up from the cellar. Then when treated with kerosene emulsion or some other insecticide the bud becomes blasted, for the blossom is close under the folded outer leaves, so is in a very precarious position. Then, too, tulip bulbs rot easily and the buds blast easily. So it is wise not to run so many risks but try the kinds of bulbs which are less p.r.o.ne to trouble. The easiest and safest bulbs for children to work with are narcissus (including daffodils, jonquils, Chinese lily bulbs and paper narcissus), and hyacinth.

Hyacinth has one bad habit when planted indoors. This is the tendency to unfold its blossom too soon. So the beautiful hyacinth blossom appears dwarfed and stunted close down near the ground. To avoid this condition do not take the bulb from the dark until the leaves are about an inch to two inches above the earth and until they have spread apart.

This gives the blossom a chance to shoot up. Tip the pot over and see if the roots are visible through the drainage hole.

The time to buy bulbs is in late August or early September. After this bulbs through shrinkage depreciate in value; by which value is meant not one in price but in soundness and ability to produce blossoms. Do not buy cheap or cut-rate bulbs. Buy good, big, sound ones.

The Roman hyacinths are excellent for forcing. They are small flowered, quite different from the large st.u.r.dy Dutch hyacinths more commonly planted. In choosing hyacinths you have to decide upon the colour and whether you wish double or single varieties. In general most people enjoy single flowers better. If you are to use the hyacinths for outdoor planting or bedding it is perfectly safe just to write for bulbs which are to be bedded. La Grandesse is a beautiful white; King of the Blues speaks for itself and the Sarah Bernhardt is a salmon pink. These do well inside, too. Charles d.i.c.kens is a fine rose colour, Prince of Wales, violet, and L'Innocence, a fine white. These are good for inside planting. Some may like the smaller Roman hyacinths, which do splendidly indoors. Very good hyacinths are bought for fifteen cents.

Tulips do especially well outdoors. A capital one for either bedding or indoor forcing is the Isabelle. It is a beautiful red tulip which is bought for five cents. The Summer Beauty, a hardy white tulip, is well worth the ten cents asked for each one. Some of you may like to raise some freaks; then try parrot tulips at about thirty-five cents a dozen.

A thing to remember about the indoor planting of tulips is this--tulips, more than other bulbs, are likely to have plant lice, so watch out!

In daffodils you may be sure of the Van Sion. These are worth forty cents a dozen. You can buy daffodils for twenty.

If you wish to lay in a stock of bulbs for water planting choose, of course, Chinese lilies, but try, too, the paper white narcissus. These bulbs cost forty cents a dozen. Buy from the five-and-ten-cent store a gla.s.s dish, and gather stones for it. About three weeks before you wish blossoms plant a dozen of these narcissi in the gla.s.s dish with the stones as a foundation, and water enough to come up around the base of the bulbs. It is a good plan to set the dish of bulbs in the dark for four or five days.

You can grow hyacinths in water too. For this a special gla.s.s is sold, although I have seen children place a bulb in the top of a preserve jar.

It works all right. Bulbs must never drop low into water or they decay.

These, too, should be placed in the dark for about a week.

Suppose you have a quarter to spend. You can make all kinds of interesting combinations. Three daffodils for ten cents, a hyacinth for ten, and a tulip for five, give you a chance to experiment.

A word more about narcissus. This is a large family, One gets confused sometimes with the names daffodil, jonquil and paper white narcissus.

All these are of the family narcissus. The daffodils are the bulbs with large single or double cups. The jonquil has a cl.u.s.ter of small blossoms of from three to six single flowers. The paper white narcissus has four to twelve single blossoms to the flower head.

Ethel and Dee had good lawns at home which their mothers were not willing to have spaded up, but they gave consent to the girls putting crocus bulbs here and there over the lawns. These bulbs should be planted about an inch deep and three inches apart in the group. These were dotted about in cl.u.s.ters of six. The dibble is a good instrument to use in dotting bulbs around the turf. Crocuses are good for indoor planting as well. They may be planted in flats or in indoor boxes.

Remember crocuses are of practically no use for cut-flower purposes.

The school tulip bed was made just as Philip's round bed was made. The time to plant depends on the weather. It is always well to get all outdoor planting done before the time of frost. Why? Because you wish to get the bulbs in while the earth is still warm. Bulbs lie in the ground all winter slowly putting out roots, slowly starting to push up toward the light above. For good root forming they need this long time of slow growth. Get the outdoor bulbs in the ground during September.

Before this the ground may be prepared. In all the beds dig down about two feet. Work over the soil well. Make it fine and free from lumps and stones. Ordinary garden soil will be right for these beds. Put no fertilizer in. If your ground is clayey, mix sand with it. Use one-quarter sand in a mixture of this sort. This makes a lighter soil.

Clay soil is what we call a heavy soil. Bulbs require light soils.

Now comes planting. Different kinds of bulbs require different depths of soil. Place the tulip bulbs four inches deep, and six inches apart.

Hyacinths were planted by Elizabeth in a strip beside the house. Jack also planted daffodils in a corner sheltered by the house foundation and an old high fence. The daffodils were planted exactly as the tulips, but the hyacinths were planted six inches deep, instead of four.

In buying bulbs for outdoor planting ask for bedding bulbs, while for indoor work buy forcing varieties.

One bright day in October the girls met at Katharine's house to pot their bulbs for winter. Some had made wooden boxes or flats during the winter; others had bought low pots; while still others had the ordinary high pot.

In potting bulbs or any other plant two things are to be kept in mind--first, the soil, and second, the drainage. The soil may be any good garden soil. To a given quant.i.ty one may add one-fourth rotted manure and one-fourth sand. This last helps lighten the material, allowing more air to get at the entire ma.s.s and making good drainage easier. Mix all this together. If one lacks the well-rotted manure and sand, any good garden soil may be used. Sift the soil until it is perfectly fine.

A simple sieve, which works well, may be made from a small soap or starch box. Knock the bottom out and use in place of this wire netting.

Helena and Eloise made two sieves which did for all the girls. Eloise also made some very good flats as described before under the chapter on the girls' winter work. You can easily see how excellent this style of flat is from a drainage point of view.

More trouble, in potted bulbs and all kinds of plants, comes from too little drainage s.p.a.ce than from any other one thing. Most boys and girls think it enough if one little stone or piece of pot is put in the hole of the flower pot. Not so; there should be from one to two inches of drainage material in the pot. That seems a great deal, doesn't it? But it will give not only drainage but air s.p.a.ce, too, and this keeps the plant in good healthy shape. With too little drainage area the earth in a pot gets clogged and very often sour. A high pot needs more drainage matter in it than a low one. First use a piece of broken pot to place over the drainage hole. But put this in such a position that the drainage hole will be kept open. Then put in two inches of coa.r.s.e material like broken pot. It is now a good plan to place over this a layer of coa.r.s.e material. This gives a greater opportunity for air. Over this goes the soil you have already prepared. Place bulbs just below the surface and have soil one inch below the top of pot. Narcissus and hyacinths may be planted with their tops out of the soil.

A low pot needs less drainage material. Some pots have sphagnum moss over the drainage. Instead of this use old sod finely torn up or coa.r.s.e soil. See, too, that the bulb comes nearly to the top of the soil. When indoor bulbs are planted at some distance below the surface of the soil they have too much work to do to force their way up and out. It takes too long.

After the girls had finished potting the next step was to make arrangements for the resting time. Bulbs should stay in the dark and cold from five to ten weeks. It is difficult to give an exact time as conditions differ and bulbs too.

Bulbs may take their retirement in a dark cold cellar where there is no danger from mice. Some attics are suited for this. Eloise put hers in an old bureau. This bureau was in an unused, cold room. The bulbs were placed in the drawers which were then closed, but not tightly. Ethel, Dee and Josephine put theirs in the cellar. Helena, Elizabeth and Katharine tried another plan. They had a trench dug outdoors two feet deep and eighteen inches wide. In this they placed their pots and flats. Then the trench was filled in with dirt and over this a layer of ashes was put. The pots were given a good watering before they were sunk into the ground. Unless the winter is a very dry and open one the bulbs will need no more water. If there should be little snow-fall then it may be necessary to water the ground where the bulbs are, but this is not usual. Little sticks were put into the ground just where the bulbs were.

These help in locating them when digging-up time comes. The girls left them in the ground for six weeks. Then they were taken in and put in a cold north window for a week. Helena put hers in the dark a week and then brought them to a north window for another week. Then she put them in a south window.

Bulbs should go very slowly from dark and cold to warmth and light. This is a point to be remembered.

The girls who stored their pots in attic and cellar of course had to water them. This should be done as often as the plant needs it, perhaps three times a week.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE BULB STORY

1. Ample Drainage 2. Depth of Planting 3. Perfect Root Development 4. Ready to Come to the Light

Photographs by H.E. Angell and Henry Schultz.]

When the plant is about an inch above the ground, as one of the pictures shows, it is the time to bring it to the light. Be sure the outer leaves have spread apart in the ease of hyacinths and tulips; also invert the pot and see if the roots are poking through; this is another way to be sure that the bulb is ready to come to the light.

A way to help a hyacinth or tulip develop its stems properly and so prevent blossoming low down in the box is to put a cone over the bulb as soon as you bring it to the light. Make the cone of paper and have one opening at the top two inches in diameter. The flower stem and leaves of the bulb will quickly start to grow up to the light. Take this cone off when the leaves are several inches high.

The girls did some water-planting, too. For this purpose hyacinths, Chinese lilies, paper narcissus and jonquils are good. Some people put these dishes and gla.s.ses immediately in the light. But it is better if they are set away in the dark until the shoots start and the roots, too, begin development. The girls bought gla.s.s dishes at the five-and-ten-cent store. Into these dishes were put small stones which they had gathered in the fall for this purpose. Stones should be small for this work, from one-half inch to an inch in diameter. Josephine had a lot of fine white sand which she packed in all about the stones. The sand was kept thoroughly wet all the time. This is a good method of treatment. Paper white narcissus, if planted early, will blossom by Thanksgiving. They may be held back until Christmas. These blossoms are sweet smelling and very graceful in appearance. Eloise tried the same method with jonquils with excellent results.