At a meeting of the nurserymen’s
section of the Horticultural Congress, recently held at Chicago, Mr. Henry
Izawa, gardener of the Imperial Japanese Commission to the Columbian Exposition,
read a paper on some Japanese nursery practice, from which we make the
following extracts:
The art of dwarfing plants is
so little known in other lands that a short description of its process
is not out of place here. The successful Japanese nurseryman must
not only be a good grower, but he must also be an artist, conversant with
the general arts and customs of his country, which differ very materially
with those of any other country. The Pines may be considered the
most important of all trees in Japan, and great care is taken in their
cultivation and preservation. The most popular ones are Pinus densiflora,
Pinus parviflora, and Pinus Thunbergii. They are generally grown
from seed, and great care is taken to select the choicest quality of seed.
In the spring of the second year, when the seedlings are about eight inches
in height, they are staked with Bamboo-canes and tied with rice straw,
the plants being bent in different desirable shapes. In the next
fall they are transplanted to a richer soil and are well fertilized.
In the following spring the plants are restaked and twisted and tied in
fanciful forms. This mode of treatment is given until the seventh
year, when the trees will have assumed fairly large proportions, the branches
being trained in graceful forms, and the foliage like small clouds of dense
green. The plants are now taken up and placed in pots one and a half
feet in diameter, and are kept well watered every succeeding year; great
care must be taken to keep new shoots pinched back. After another
three years of this treatment, the trees are virtually dwarfed, there being
no visible growth thereafter.
The dwarfing of Bamboo is another
important branch of the Japanese nursery business. A few weeks after
the shoots begin to grow, and when the trunks measure about three inches
in circumference and five feet in height, the bark is removed, piece by
piece, from the joint. After five weeks, when the plants get somewhat
stout, the stem is bent and tied in. After three months, when the
side-shoots grow strong enough, they are all cut off five or six inches
from the main trunk; they are then dug up and potted in sand. Care
should be taken not to use any fertilizer, but plenty of water should be
given. Cut off the large shoots every year, in May or June, and after
three years the twigs and leaves will present admirable yellow and green
tints.
Dwarfed Thujas are produced by
grafting. Let a Thuya Lobbi seedling grow in fertile soil until it
becomes about five feet in height, then in the middle of spring we cut
off all the branches, leaving the trunk and top branch, With a quarter-inch
chisel a cut is made in the thickest portion of the trunk, an inch deep,
at distances of two or three inch space, so that the trunk can be bent
more easily in the desired direction. Rice straw is twisted around
the trunk, which is bent in many curious forms and fanciful shapes.
In the spring of the second year of this treatment the plants are potted
in rich soil; in two years more, when the plants have assumed permanent
forms, Thuya obtusa is grafted on the stem of T. Lobbi.
The process of grafting is, in
brief, as follows: We give plenty of fertilizer to the plant of Thuya
Lobbi, and, in early spring, take two-inch shoots of Thuya obtusa, cut
the ends slantwise and insert them in the smaller portions of the Thuya
Lobbi trunk, using one graft to every inch on the trunk. We then
wrap the grafts with rice straw and take them to a shaded, windless room
with the temperature of thirty-five degrees Fahrenheit. For three
weeks the temperature is raised one or two degrees daily, and by that time
a little breeze may be admitted; the temperature of the room is kept at
sixty degrees for two weeks, and at seventy degrees for two weeks, and
then leaves will start from the grafted twigs. In the latter part
of spring, when the temperature in and out-of-doors becomes uniform, the
plants can be safely transferred to some shady position out-of-doors.
In the fall, when all the grafts have taken good hold, all the remaining
shoots of Thuya Lobbi are cut off. Transplant every year in good
rich soil; six years will be sufficient to produce handsome specimens of
dwarfed Thuyas. All kinds of Conifers are treated in a similar manner.
There is also a great demand for curiosities in mixed grafted Conifers,
that is, six or seven kinds of Conifers on one plant.
Maples form one of the best materials
for the artistic fancies of the Japanese graftsman. Many times a
great many different varieties are grafted on one stem. Seedling
Maples are spliced and tied together when growing. After they have
formed a union the desired shoot is cut off – this is kept up until ten
or twenty varieties are obtained. Maples thus grafted form lovely
features for lawns, their varying hues and types of foliage enhancing each
other's beauty.
The æsthetic idea shows
itself in every line of Japanese industry, and especially is it the case
with our nursery and landscape gardeners. The most inexperienced
need not fear any difficulty in our mode of gardening if he but uses his
mind and efforts in the right direction. The skillful artist introduces
into his miniature garden not regular geometrical forms, but anything odd,
irregular and artistic. To us gardening is not mathematics, but an
art; hills, dales, rivulets, waterfalls, bridges, etc., vie with each other
in presenting their quaintest forms and fancies and harmonious symmetries.
Dwarfed plants of all descriptions deck the scene here and there in thousands
of peculiarly artistic shapes. We derive lessons from nature and
strive to imitate her as much as is practicable, although on a smaller
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