Page:The Amateur's Greenhouse and Conservatory.djvu/90

82 but both are easily kept in check if taken in time. The best remedy for mildew is flour of sulphur dusted over the foliage, and for the destruction of the green-fly nothing can equal tobacco-powder. The latter should be applied after the foliage has been wetted with the syringe, and washed off again in about twenty-four hours afterwards. Green-fly can be destroyed by fumigating with tobacco-paper, but the tobacco-powder is applied more easily and is safer.

The plants must be watered carefully at all times, especially during the winter. They must have sufficient water to maintain a vigorous growth, and no more; but they must not, under any consideration, be allowed to go quite dry. Use soft water until the end of January, and then substitute weak liquid manure for it. The plants should be syringed lightly overhead every afternoon until the end of September, when syringing must be discontinued.

Where seedlings are grown, those from which it is intended to save seed should, as soon as the first flowers are expanded, be removed from the general stock, and placed in a frame by themselves to prevent their being fertilised with pollen from the worthless sorts. This is a very easy matter, because a very few plants will furnish an ample supply of seed for the generality of gardens. The seed should be saved from plants compact in habit, and with well-formed distinctly-coloured flowers. Where seed is saved from a collection of first-rate named varieties, it will not be necessary to separate the seed-bearing plants from the general stock. As the flowers begin to fade, place the plants in a light airy position to insure the seed being thoroughly matured, and gather before it is blown away and lost.

Sow the seeds in the first or second week in July in five-inch pots. Make the surface perfectly level, and cover with a very thin layer of sandy soil. The pots should then be placed in a cold frame, and constantly shaded from the sun until the young plants begin to show above the surface, when the supply of light and air must be increased. Directly the seedlings have two rough leaves, prick off into seed-pans or round the sides of the same-sized pots, and in the same manner as advised for the offsets; and, like the latter, they must be potted off as soon as established.

The universal compost will suit cinerarias admirably, but if a compost has to be made for them, let it consist of five