Page:Australian enquiry book of household and general information.djvu/254

 In selling flowers you must not expect to get very much, the great matter is to get custom first. Arrange your bouquets prettily and tastefully, and let them be seen and known as your work. I used to get only threepence a bunch for some time, and yet I took first prize for made-up bouquets at the local shows. So I say to all who feel disheartened at not being appreciated: never mind, work on and live down that feeling, and if your flowers do not turn you in much, help them with vegetables.

All suckers round the roots should be cut out, they sap the strength of the tree and do no good.

If you wish to make a tree any particular shape, leave the last bud on each twig pointing in the direction you wish the limb to grow.

Fruit trees should be headed low, especially those that bear heavily. Three or four feet from the ground is high enough for the first branches.

To make a show, the best flowers are balsams, phlox, sweet peas, portulacca, pinks, nasturtiums. They keep longest in bloom.

Work your soil as soon after rain as possible, to mix in the chemical properties it has left.

If growing for profit, study the wants of your nearest towns and grow accordingly.

After sowing your seeds cover with dry grass during the hot weather, water over it, and directly the plants are strong enough to bear the sun, remove the grass.

Plant melon seed on their edge; they often rot when put in flat.

The grape crop all depends on the amount of pruning, manuring, and care the vines receive.

Pile all the manure together, the stable and cow yard stuff one on top of the other, and cover from the weather if possible. Spread on the land every month.

Always pulverise the soil well before planting. Mulching improves all soil.

Scatter youyour [sic] wood ashes among fruit trees.

To kill the cabbage grub, dust on slaked lime dust.

Better to keep poultry in the orchard than to grow crops.

Sow a patch of clover for the milking cows, and allow them an hour a day on it. About 4 lb. of seed will sow an acre if properly done.

To stimulate the growth of such pot plants as fuchsias, carnations, roses, and heliotrope, water them with two quarts of water, in which is mixed one teaspoonful of liquid ammonia. For