ed
plants. Some trap them by placing slices of cabbage or raw potato about.
Others kill all the slugs in a bed, then make a ring of salt all about
it to keep them out. Lime dust powdered over the plants helps to keep
them away.

WORMS BORING INTO PLANTS. A couple of cases are reported of worms boring
into the stalks of Asters, Dianthus and Carnations. Of course the tops
die, and the damage is great. There is no insecticide that can be used
against these canny worms which snugly hide themselves in the plant
stalks where not a drop of liquor can reach them. The only remedy is to
keep a sharp outlook for affected plants, cutting away each
worm-infested top and burning it. This kills the worm and cuts off
future crops of worms. It seems a hard method of ridding the plants of
their enemies. However, the plants branch out again and develop a later
crop of flowers.

HOW ANNUALS RUN OUT. "Last year I purchased the very best grade of
seeds, and my flowers were lovely. I saved from these flowers, expecting
a similar treat this year. But my Pansies, Carnations and Petunias are
nothing near as large or as finely marked as they were last year, and
the last two flowers are all single, not a double one in the lot. What
is the cause of this?"

Deterioration in the quality of bloom is what our mothers used to call
the "running out" of plants. There is no mystery about it. It is
confined to those favorite flowers that have been highly bred and
hybridized. Everyone knows highly bred stock, be it animal or vegetable,
will not stand roughing it. If the flower grower would use the nerve of
the seed-grower and pull up every inferior plant or poor flowered one;
if she would keep the ground as clean as a market garden; if she would
allow only the finest flowers to go to seed, cutting the others off as
they fade, she would have good seed for next year's flowers. Petunias
are artificially hybridized to get a double strain of seed, and this the
amateur cannot well do. It pays most of us better to buy Pansy, Petunia,
Carnation and Ten Weeks Stocks seed than to try to save it ourselves.

FAILURE OF PEONIES TO BLOOM. Everyone says the Peony will endure
anything, heat, cold, rain or dry weather or any kind of soil. It is
true the plant is tenacious of life. It is just as true that it knows
when it is not well treated. It evens up matters many times by refusing
to bloom. Any one of the following reasons may cause it to be barren of
bloom. (1) Poor