Fourth Week

GREENHOUSE AND CONSERVATORY. The plants that are introduced to the conservatory from the stove, forcing-pit, or any other such structures, merely for the blooming season, will require particular care to be taken in the application of water that they may not become sodden and



diseased. Continue to stop, prune, or pinch back all rambling and luxuriant shoots in due time. Stir the surface of the bed in the conservatory, and apply fresh soil, to maintain the plants in good health. Azaleas, Chinese.--Supply them liberally with water at their roots during their blooming season, and prevent damp and drip from injuring the bloom. Calceolarias.--The herbaceous sorts that have been pushed along in a gentle heat will now be showing bloom, and will require to be grown in a cool, airy place, to prevent the flower-stems from being too much drawn. Keep down green fly. Shift on young stock, keeping the plants well down in the pots as they throw out fresh rootlets from the stem. Cuttings taken off now will root readily in a gentle bottom heat. Camellias.--Apply shading the moment it is necessary, to protect the young leaves. Fuchsias.--Grow them steadily on in a moist, warm temperature. Use the syringe freely. Stop any that have a tendency to be long-jointed, to produce uniform and bushy plants. Heaths.--Admit air liberally to them, and such other hard-wooded plants that are now in bloom, or approaching that state. Pelargoniums.--Shift on young plants. Any that are wanted for late blooming should now be stopped. Rhododendrons, Hybrid Indian.--Treat as advised for Azaleas. STOVE AND ORCHID-HOUSE. Continue a kindly moistness amongst the Orchids, and slightly increase the temperature. Shade with tiffany, or close-meshed netting, in bright sunny weather; removing it early in the afternoon. Water liberally all that are making free growth. Repot any that may require it as soon as they have fairly commenced their growth. Continue to give liberal shifts to the free-growing young stock of stove plants, slightly shading for a few hours in hot weather, shutting up early in the afternoon, and producing a kindly humid atmosphere by damping the walls, floors, pots, &c. Begonias.--Repot and propagate. This is one of the most useful tribe of plants that can be grown, both for the stove and the adornment of the conservatory. Clerodendrons.--Encourage by a moist heat. Climbers.--Keep them neatly tied up, and give them liberal supplies of water, if in pots. Gardenias.--They delight in a close atmosphere; a pit with dung linings is most congenial to them. Gesnera zebrina.--Pot bulbs for late flowering. FORCING-HOUSES. Cherries.--Thin out the fruit where in large clusters; admit plenty of air at favourable opportunities, and never allow the trees in tubs, or pots, to become dry. Figs.--The same as last week. Peaches and Nectarines.--Keep the leading shoots regularly tied in, and pinch out the points of some of the stronger ones. Pine Apples.--It is advisable to keep all that are starting, or have already started, into fruit, at one end of the house, or pit, that more air may be admitted to them than to the others more advanced, to produce a more robust growth, and to avoid the necessity of using stakes to support the fruit. Air to be admitted freely to the succession plants at every favourable opportunity. Strawberries (in pots).--Where fruit are colouring, keep a rather dry atmosphere, with a liberal supply of air, in order to secure flavour. When the plants are in bloom, keep them near the glass, and the atmosphere dry, with a good supply of fresh air; but avoid currents of frosty air. Introduce succession plants under glass according to the demand. Do not expose those from which fruit has been picked to the open air till well hardened off. Give them the protection of a cold pit for a time, as they are invaluable in open-air plantations. Vines.--Where the fruit is on the change to colouring admit air on every favourable opportunity, not forgetting to give it in the morning before the sun shines on the house, to prevent the condensed vapour, which would affect them injuriously, from settling on the bunches. Attend to stopping the laterals, thinning the young shoots, tying in leaders, &c., in the later houses. Remove the top dressing from the outside border, to allow the increasing power of the sun to act beneficially upon it.

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