Roses 9 Winter And Propagation

Roses In Winter And Propagation Of House Roses

Although the growing of roses under glass must be left chiefly to florists, advice may be useful to those who have conservatories:--

When growing forcing roses for winter flowers, florists usually provide raised beds, in the best-lighted houses they have. The bottom of the bed or bench is left with cracks between the boards for drainage; the cracks are covered with inverted strips of sod, and the bench is then covered with 4 or 5 inches of fresh, fibrous loam. This is made from rotted sods, with decayed manure incorporated at the rate of about one part in four. Sod from any drained pasture-land makes good soil. The plants are set on the bed in the spring or early summer, from 12 to 18 inches apart, and are grown there all summer.

During the winter they are kept at a temperature of 58° to 60° at night, and from 5° to 10° warmer during the day. The heating pipes are often run under the benches, not because the rose likes bottom heat, but to economize space and to assist in drying out the beds in case of their becoming too wet. The greatest care is required in watering, in guarding the temperature, and in ventilation. Draughts result in checks to the growth and in mildewed foliage.

Dryness of the air, especially from fire heat, is followed by the appearance of the minute red spider on the leaves. The aphis, or green plant louse, appears under all conditions, and must be kept down by the use of some of the tobacco preparations (several of which are on the market).

For the red spider, the chief means of control is syringing with either clear or soapy water. If the plants are intelligently ventilated and given, at all times, as much fresh air as possible, the red spider is less likely to appear. For mildew, which is easily recognized by its white, powdery appearance on the foliage, accompanied with more or less distortion of the leaves, the remedy is sulfur in some form or other. The flowers of sulfur may be dusted thinly over the foliage; enough merely slightly to whiten the foliage is sufficient. It may be dusted on from the hand in a broadcast way, or applied with a powder-bellows, which is a better and less wasteful method. Again, a paint composed of sulfur and linseed oil may be applied to a part of one of the steam or hot-water heating pipes. The fumes arising from this are not agreeable to breathe, but fatal to mildew. Again, a little sulfur may be sprinkled here and there on the cooler parts of the greenhouse flue. Under no circumstances, however, ignite any sulfur in a greenhouse. The vapor of burning sulfur is death to plants.

Propagation Of House Roses

The writer has known women who could root roses with the greatest ease. They would simply break off a branch of the rose, insert it in the flower-bed, cover it with a bell-jar, and in a few weeks they would have a strong plant. Again they would resort to layering; in which case a branch, notched halfway through on the lower side, was bent to the ground and pegged down so that the notched part was covered with a few inches of soil. The layered spot was watered from time to time. After three or four weeks roots were sent forth from the notch and the branch or buds began to grow, when it was known that the layer had formed roots.

Several years ago a friend took a cheese-box, filled it with sharp sand to the brim, supported it in a tub of water so that the lower half-inch of the box was immersed. The sand was packed down, sprinkled, and single-joint rose cuttings, with a bud and a leaf near the top, were inserted almost their whole length in the sand. This was in July, a hot month, when it is usually difficult to root any kind of cutting; moreover, the box stood on a southern slope, facing the hot sun, without a particle of shade. The only attention given the box was to keep the water high enough in the tub to touch the bottom of the cheese-box. In about three weeks he took out three or four dozen of as nicely rooted cuttings as could have been grown in a greenhouse.

The "saucer system," in which cuttings are inserted in wet sand contained in a saucer an inch or two deep, to be exposed at all times to the full sunshine, is of a similar nature. The essentials are, to give the cuttings the "full sun" and to keep the sand saturated with water.

Whatever method is used, if cuttings are to be transplanted after rooting, it is important to pot them off in small pots as soon as they have a cluster of roots one-half inch or an inch long. Leaving them too long in the sand weakens the cutting.

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