FoodNet

Pot-pourri from a Surrey garden

1898

Page 68

Presented as published in 1898. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
Fuchsias, especially the old-fashioned fulgens, are satisfactory. Carnations— Eaby Castle, Countess of Paris, and Mrs. Eeynolds Hole — I grow in pots, and they do extremely well ; they must be layered early in July, and answer best if potted up in September and just protected from severe frosts. This year we took up a large clump of Montbretias out of a dry sunny bed of Cape bulbs in the kitchen garden, just as they were coming through the ground, and dropped them into a large Sea-kale pot. They flowered exceedingly well, and in September we put them back in the dry border to die down. In fine summers Myrtles and Oleanders flower well with us in tubs, not in the open ground. We treat Oleanders as they do in Germany — cut them back moderately in October, and dry them off, keeping them in a coach-house, warm shed, or wherever severe frosts will not reach them. MAY 113 When quite dry, they stand a moderate amount of frost. Then in March they are brought out, the ground is stirred and mulched, and they are taken into a greenhouse and brought on a bit. In May they are thickly covered with good strong horse-manure and copiously watered. At the end of the month they are stood out in the open on a low wall. During May, June, and July they cannot have too much water ; after that they want much less, or the leaves turn yellow and drop off. Campanula pyrami- dalis (see * English Flower Garden '), a biennial, does well in pots, if shaded — blue and white both in one pot, or apart. The seedlings have to be potted up in autumn (plants a year old) ; as with the Canterbury Bells, if you cut off the fading flowers the flowering season is much pro- longed. Canterbury Bells (Campanula medium) make charming pot-plants for large rooms or corridors in May or June. They are annuals, and the seed can be sown out of doors in March or April, keeping the seedlings well thinned, transplanting in the autumn, and potting-up the following spring (see 'English Flower Garden '). If strong crowns of Campanula persicifolia are potted up in autumn, they force beautifully in a moderate greenhouse in spring, and are most satisfactory for picking or otherwise. Some years I grow Solanum jasminoides over bent wires in pots; they are rather pretty. Clethra (Sweet Pepper Bush), a small North American shrub, we lifted from the reserve garden in June and put into a pot, and it flowered very well. The variety of plants which can be experimented upon for growing in pots out of doors in summer is almost endless. Love-lies-bleeding (Ama- ranthus caudatus) is an annual ; but if sown in January, and very well grown-on as a fine single specimen plant, it looks handsome and uncommon in a green glazed pot or small tub. Nothing we grow in pots is more i ii4 POT-POURRI FROM A SURREY GARDEN