BIENNIALS
BIENNIALS are plants that do not flower till the second year after
sowing. They are sown in spring and summer, pricked out when large
enough, and transplanted, either in the autumn or the following spring,
to their flowering places. If you can only have a small patch in a
small garden, we advise you to buy, ready-grown, every spring, the
few biennials you need. You can get all the well-known ones cheaply
by the dozen, or just as they have been sown in a box. But if you are
one of those lucky children who grow up in a big garden, we advise you
to beg for a little extra bit for a ‘nursery,’ and then to try your
hand at growing some of the easier biennials and perennials from seed.
Some people will tell you that this operation is beyond the skill
and patience of any child, but we think that if you will follow our
instructions carefully you might succeed. Do not dream of trying all we
tell you about in one season. In every chapter we speak of more plants
than any one child could crowd into one small garden. You must choose
some of your great favourites to begin with, and each year add a few
new ones to the plants you have learnt to manage well.
Skilled gardeners grow some biennials, as annuals, by raising the seed
in frames and greenhouses early in the year; but this, we think, would
be too difficult for children to do without help. So you must, as we
have said, buy your biennials ready-made, or you must get someone to
raise them in heat for you, or you can sow your own seed one year,
understanding that the seedlings will not flower till the next. Of
these three plans we think the purchase of ready-made seedlings the
easiest, but in some ways the least satisfactory. At any rate, if you
must adopt it, try to get them from good nurserymen. Those you buy in
the London streets or from advertisement columns are often grievously
disappointing, so that when your biennials flower you discover you have
thrown your money and your labour away. Your Snapdragons are either
hideously splotchy or crudely magenta; your pink Canterbury Bells are
blue and white; your Wallflowers are spindly and colourless. A few
experiences of this kind will soon drive you to buy your own seed from
one of the best firms, and for a few pence and some happy hours of
gardening to get more plants of the best colour and quality than you
can possibly use. Then you will have the pleasure the true gardener
always finds in giving some of his plants away, or you can exchange
your surplus stock for plants you do not possess yet.
WALLFLOWERS (CHEIRANTHUS).
This is a good biennial to start with, because every seed comes up and
comes quickly. Sow thinly on a partly shaded patch of ground, and prick
out when the seedlings have four good leaves. Do this on a showery
day, if possible, and plant in rows ten inches apart each way. It is
important to sow your seed early in the spring, because where the
winter is severe the plants should be in their permanent quarters by
May or June. If you transplant them late in the autumn, they suffer
greatly from frost. In London market-gardens the seed is sown early
in February; the plants are put out in May, and by Christmas are in
flower. A seedling Wallflower has a tap-root as well as fibrous roots,
and this is why the seedling should be pricked out once before it is
transplanted to its permanent quarters. If you left it where it was
sown it would send down a great root like a carrot, and then when
you tried to move the plant you would kill it. Many gardeners pinch
off the tap-root when they prick out, and then the Wallflower makes
fibrous roots that can be safely transplanted. Mr. Robinson says that
a well-grown Wallflower in a London market-garden could not be covered
by a bushel basket, so now you know what size your plants _ought_ to
be, and how many you will have room for in your border. If you buy them
ready-made late in the autumn, you will probably find that each plant
has two bare, lanky stalks, with a miserable little bunch of leaves at
the top; and when a frost comes they will look so dejected that you
will pull them up and throw them away.
PANSIES AND TUFTED PANSIES (VIOLA TRICOLOR).
The Pansies, or Heart’s-ease, and Tufted Pansies (known to nurserymen
as Violas) can be treated as annuals, biennials, or perennials,
according to position, climate, and soil. In a Cornish garden from
October to Christmas we had Pansies in flower from seed sown at the end
of May, so they were annuals. But we had put them in their permanent
places that autumn, because we wanted them to live through the winter
and make the border gay the summer following, when they became
biennials. At the end of the summer we kept the best of them to flower
another year, and, if they liked, a year after that.
The seed should be sown in early summer in light, moist, leafy soil. It
soon comes up, and when the seedlings have three pairs of leaves they
should be pricked out. The Pansy, like the Carnation, has a tiresome
trick of producing its best flowers on its poorest plants, so you must
be patient and careful with the weak, backward ones, because they may
give you the finest blooms. Pansies would rather be moved in autumn
than in spring, and remember that they like a rather shady place in
your border, and a good loamy soil. They either die or make poor little
flowers in hard, dry ground. If you want your Pansies and Violas to
go on flowering all the summer, you must be careful to pinch off the
dead flowers. The roots you see in London shops and markets, wrapped in
hard clay and showing two or three big flowers, will not do much good
as a rule. If, however, you have some, and want to keep them alive,
you should soak the cake of clay off the fibrous roots, plant in a
puddle of water, and protect from the sun and wind for several days
with a flower-pot. We have been told by a well-known gardener that she
can make anything live by planting it in a pool of water, and out of
our own experience we would say that we can make most things live by
shading them for some days, except from showers, with a flower-pot. It
is most interesting to see how a flagging plant will revive after a few
hours of shade and shelter.
[Illustration: IRISES]
If you have a light, warm soil, you can easily strike cuttings from
your best Violas and Pansies. One way is to cut them down in June.
A month later a number of young shoots will appear, and these should
have soil put amongst them into which they will root themselves. In
two or three weeks you can take away these young plants and put them
in a nursery bed. A cutting should be set one-third of its length
into a little bed of sandy soil that you have previously made smooth
and moist. You must always slice them across the stalk just below a
joint, and cut off the lower leaves. They should be taken in moist,
warm weather, and placed in partial shade. As they grow pinch off the
tops, and then they make more roots, and are stronger. We have no
great gardening authority for saying so, but from our own experience
we should advise you never to cut down a favourite plant for increase,
except in showery weather. We have lost many by meddling with them
during a drought. If you only have a few Pansies you will not want to
cut them down at all in June, but you can look out for young shoots,
and try to take a few cuttings.
CAMPANULA MEDIUM (CANTERBURY BELL).
Canterbury Bells are most useful and beautiful flowers, and easily
grown. If you want the lovely pink ones be sure to get your seed from
a first-rate firm, as the cheap seed and the cheap plants are likely
to be blue or white. Canterbury Bells are beautiful in blue and white,
as well as in pink, and we only mean that for some reason the pink
ones seem a little more difficult to get hold of. Sow your seed in
shallow boxes in March or April; prick out in showery weather when the
seedlings have four leaves, and transplant to their permanent places in
September. You will find that the strongest seedlings will flower the
following year, but the small ones take two years to mature. Canterbury
Bells sow themselves easily if you leave the seed to ripen, but they
flower longer if you pick off each bell as it withers. They require
stakes.
SWEET WILLIAM (DIANTHUS BARBATUS).
One celebrated lady who writes about gardens says that she does not
like Sweet Williams, because they remind her of the plush chairs in
German furniture shops. We think ourselves that the ordinary red
ones are rather stiff and flaunting; but the new salmon-pink and
deep rose-coloured ones are not a bit like red plush, and they make
lovely patches of colour in our gardens; also, they are easy to raise
and manage. If you grow them from seed, sow out of doors in April,
prick out when the plants are large enough, and transfer to permanent
quarters in September. Next year you can take cuttings from the best
plants when they have done flowering. You are always told by skilful
gardeners that a cutting should be sliced straight through the stalk
just beneath a joint, and planted in sandy soil and slight shade to
make roots; but now we will tell you how an unskilful gardener, who
found cuttings difficult, increased her Sweet Williams with perfect
ease. It may be the wrong way, but the Sweet Williams did not seem to
think so. When they had quite done flowering, each plant had sent up
a quantity of young green shoots that evidently did not mean to make
flowers that summer; so the unskilful gardener took up her best clumps,
tore each one into from twelve to twenty pieces, planted them in fine,
rather moist soil in partial shade, and by late autumn saw that every
one was doing well and making a good plant for next year.
EVENING PRIMROSE (ŒNOTHERA).
A handsome, clear yellow flower, growing six feet high, and blooming
for many weeks, but one of those that never know when and where they
are not wanted. You know the true gardening rhyme, don’t you?—that ‘One
year’s seeding makes seven years’ weeding.’ We believe that when once
the Evening Primrose has had a chance in a garden, its seeds will come
up there till the crack of doom. However, they have tap-roots, and are
easily pulled up. If you have none and want them, you should sow in
June where the plants are to stand, and thin out severely, leaving two
feet between the plants. Remember that in this chapter we are talking
of biennials, that will not flower until the following year. If you
have one of those heart-breaking gardens made of rough, starved soil
or builder’s rubbish, you might sow Evening Primroses as carefully
as you can all along the back of the border. Then, in the following
spring, when your Evening Primroses are spreading plants, you could sow
Giant Poppies in front of them, and Dwarf Nasturtiums in front of the
Poppies. One of the great secrets of gardening is to find out how to
make the best of your conditions, even when they are unfavourable.
SNAPDRAGONS (ANTIRRHINUM MAJUS).
These are most beautiful and useful flowers. They will do well in poor
soil, and even on the tops of walls, where there is not much soil
for them—in fact, some of the finest specimens, grown from self-sown
seed, are to be found in such situations. There are three kinds: tall,
medium, and dwarf, and there are a great variety of colours. Some are
self-coloured, and some are mottled, striped, or flaked. If you buy
cheap seedlings you get ugly magentas or poor, washed-out mixtures;
while if you raise your own from good seed, you get most lovely shades.
Snapdragons may be treated as annuals or biennials, and each has its
own difficulty. If you treat them as annuals, you must raise the seed
under glass in February, so as to have flowers in July. We think you
probably have no greenhouse or frame of your own, so we will tell you
how to grow Snapdragons out of doors as biennials. The difficulty in
this case is not to get your stock of plants, but to keep them through
the winter, as Snapdragons are not quite hardy, especially in a close,
damp soil. We have heard of nursery gardeners losing their whole stock
in a frost. On a light soil and near a south wall you can, with a
hammer and nails and a few laths, knock up a wooden framework that
will hold a piece of sacking or an Archangel mat over your plants, and
keep the worst of the frost from them. If you can’t use a hammer and
nails, and live in a cold climate, we think you will have to buy your
Snapdragons every spring.
The seed of Snapdragons is very small, so it is a good plan to mix
it with sand or fine soil before you sow it. The sowing can be done
any time between April and August, and either in boxes or pans, or in
the open ground. If you have a struggle with weeds in your garden, we
advise you to sow all seeds that will bear transplantation in boxes
or pans, as you can dodge the weeds better in this way. We have heard
of people who poured a kettleful of boiling water over the soil they
meant to use for seeds, so as to destroy the weeds in it first. If
you do this, you must wait till the soil has passed through the soppy
stage in which a flood of hot water leaves it before you put it in
your seed-box. An old iron tray, no longer tidy enough for indoor use,
is convenient for this and for many other garden operations. When
your Snapdragons have four good leaves, prick them out in rows nine
inches apart in the most sheltered corner you have, and protect them
from frost till the spring, when they will make a show all through the
summer in your border. You will find that some people get quite angry
with you for growing tall ones or dwarf ones, according to the kind
they themselves prefer, while other people will forbid you to look
at a flaked or bizarre Snapdragon. You will have to bear this if you
agree with us, and like both dwarf and tall ones, all the clear selfs,
and even some of the bizarre. A ‘self’ in gardening jargon means one
colour, as opposed to striped, flaked, or speckled.
FORGET-ME-NOT (MYOSOTIS DISSITIFLORA).
There are several varieties of the Forget-me-not, but you will find
this a good kind to grow, either for your border or your rockery. It
makes a charming edging for bulbs, or a carpet through which Tulips and
Daffodils send up their leaves in spring. The seed should be sown from
April to June, and pricked out into a shady place. In the autumn your
plants can be moved to their flowering quarters. They look very well
near White Arabis, a plant you can buy anywhere, or near the Yellow
Alyssum.
FOXGLOVES (DIGITALIS).
Foxgloves are so beautiful that you will want to grow them even if
you have a sunny, sheltered, well-dug, and well-dressed garden where
anything will succeed. But they are one of the few flowers that will
never fail you who garden under difficulties. They do not mind shade,
and can be grown amongst shrubs, and even under trees. They do not mind
poor soil, though they make a finer growth when they are fed, and they
will endure the air of cities. When once they are established in your
garden, you have them for ever if you choose, as they seed themselves
freely; but you cannot keep the pure white strain unless you either
grow new ones from good seed or pull up every pink one before the buds
open and let the bees into their flowers. The bees, as you no doubt
know, are great gardeners, and fertilize your plants for you.
The seed of Foxgloves should be sown in June, either in boxes or in the
open ground. You can prick them out to where they are to stand, or you
can sow in their permanent quarters and thin to nine inches or a foot
apart. Remember that they are tall plants, and must be at the back of
your border. As you get three thousand seeds for a penny, you will have
some over to sow in wild places.
STOCKS (MATTHIOLA).
These sweet-scented flowers make a display in your border all through
the spring. They like a rich, well-dressed soil, and are generally poor
and spindly on a starved one. The Brompton and Intermediate are good
kinds to grow. Sow the seeds in summer in partial shade, and in moist
weather plant out, nine inches apart, where they are to bloom. Make the
soil firm round the young plants. Mr. E. T. Cook, in his ‘Gardening for
Beginners,’ says that amateurs often make a mistake in rejecting the
dwarf seedlings and keeping only the tall ones. The dwarf ones have
more fibrous roots, and make more double flowers. The colours of Stocks
have been greatly improved of late years, and if you get your seed from
a good firm you need not grow the magenta ones you often see in small
gardens.