The Pelargoniums (Pansy Geraniums)

This section contains the most
wonderful flowers of all the geraniums. Imagine, if you can, a rather
graceful shrub with attractive foliage, eighteen inches or so high and
broad, covered with loose clusters of pansies in the most brilliant and
harmonious contrasts of color, and the most delicate blendings of
rare shades, such as snow white and lilac. Unfortunately, these
marvelous blossoms remain but a few weeks at most, and then there is a
year's care and waiting. As with the fantastic cacti, all their
blossoming energy and beauty seems to be concentrated into one brief but
glorious effort. It certainly is to be hoped that the new strain,
mentioned on a former page, will successfully be developed. Pelargoniums
are propagated by cuttings, and cared for as the ordinary geraniums,
except that they should be kept very cold and dry during their winter
resting spell. Cut back after blooming.

Sweet Scented Geranium

This type has two valuable uses; their
delicious fragrance and also the beauty and long keeping quality of the
leaves when used in bouquets or to furnish green with geranium blossoms.
Rose and Lemon (or Skeleton) are the two old favorites of this type. The
Mint geranium, with a broad, large leaf of a beautiful soft green, and
thick velvety texture, should be better known. All three must be kept
well cut back, as they like to grow long and scraggly.

The ivy-leafed geraniums have not yet come into their own. To me they
are the most beautiful of all. The leaves are like ivy leaves, only
thicker and more glossy. The flowers, which are freely borne, contain
some of the most beautiful and delicate shades and markings of any
flowers, and the vines are exceedingly graceful in habit when given a
place where they can spread out or hang down. Like the common or Zonal
geranium, the ivy-leafed section has within the last few years been
greatly improved. There is space here to mention but one variety
(L'Elegantea), whose variegated white and green foliage, in addition to
its lovely flowers, gives it a wonderful charm.

Foliage Geraniums

The foremost of these is Mme. Salleroi (Silver-leaf
geranium). It is unequaled as a border and for mingling with other
plants in the edge of boxes and vases. Well grown specimens make
beautiful single pot plants. Mrs. Pollock and Mountain of Snow are other
good varieties.

Geranium Varieties

S. A. Nutt leads them all. It is the richest, darkest crimson--usually
ordered as "the darkest red." It is a great bloomer, but one word of
caution where you grow your own plants:--You must keep it cut back and
make it branch, otherwise it will surely grow up tall and spindling. E.
H. Trego is the most brilliant of the reds that I have grown. Marquis de
Castellane is the richest of the reds--a dull, even, glowing color with
what artists term "warmth" and "depth." The trusses are immense and the
stems long, stiff and erect. It is the best geranium for massing in
bouquets that I know.

Beauté Potevine is the richest, most glorious of the salmon
pinks--perhaps the most popular of all the geraniums as a pot plant for
the house. It is a sturdy grower and a wonderful bloomer.

Dorothy Perkins is a strong growing bright pink, with an almost white
center. Very attractive.

Roseleur is one of the most lovely delicate pinks. Mme. Récamier,
perhaps the best of the double whites, making a very compact, sturdy
plant.

Silver-leafed Nutt, very recently introduced, is, I believe, destined to
be one of the most popular of all geraniums. It has the rich flowers of
S. A. Nutt and leaves of a beautiful dull, light green, bordered with
silver white. I am chary of novelties, and got my first plants last
spring with the expectation of being disappointed. So far it has proved
a great acquisition.

New-life is another new sort which has won great popularity, the center
of the flowers being white in contrast to the red of the outer petals.
This is one of a new type of geranium having two more or less distinct
colors in each flower. Another new type is the "Cactus" section, with
petals narrower and recurved. In fact, the geranium seems to have by no
means reached its full development.

The geranium - flowering plant

The geranium has been for years, and is likely to remain, the most
popular flowering plant of all, whether for use in summer flower beds or
for the winter window garden. To some people this wide popularity
renders it less desirable, but with those who grow plants for their
intrinsic beauty and not because they may or may not be in vogue the
geranium with its healthy vitality, its attractive foliage and its
simply marvelous range of color and delicate shadings will always be a
favorite. I even venture to predict more; to prophesy that it is going
to be used, as one seldom sees it now, as a cut flower for decorative
purposes. I have grown some of the newer varieties with stems from
twelve to eighteen inches long, supporting enormous trusses of dull red
or the most delicate pink and keeping fresh in vases for days at a time.
I find that very few people, even old flower lovers, have any conception
of the improvement and variety which the last few years have brought,
especially in the wonderful new creations coming from the hands of the
French hybridizers. The latest news is that a German plant-breeder has
produced the first of a new race of Pelargoniums (Pansy or Lady
Washington geraniums) that continues to bloom as long as any of our
ordinary bedding sorts. It has not yet been offered in this country, but
doubtless soon will be, and it will be an acquisition indeed.

The culture of the geranium is simple. For its use as a house plant
there are just two things to keep in mind; first give it a soil which is
a little on the heavy side; that is, use three parts of good heavy loam,
one of manure and one of sand; secondly do not over-water. Keep it on
the "dry side"--(see page 45).

To have geraniums blooming in the house _all_ winter prepare plants in
two ways, as follows: First, in May or June pot up a number of old
plants. Cut back quite severely, leaving a skeleton work of old wood,
well branched, from which the new flowering wood will grow. Keep plunged
and turned during the summer and take off every bud until three or four
weeks before you are ready to take the plants inside. Secondly, in March
or April, start some new plants from cuttings and grow these, with
frequent shifts, until they fill six-or seven-inch pots, but keep them
pinched back to induce a branching growth, and disbudded, until about
the end of December. These will come into bloom after the old plants.

The best time for propagating the general supply of geraniums is from
September 15th to the end of October. Cuttings should be taken from
wood that is as firm and ripe as possible, while still yielding to the
"snapping test" (see page 30). In all stages of growth the geranium is
remarkably free from any insect or disease.

The varieties of geraniums now run into the hundreds--a wonderful
collection. I shall name but a few, all of which I know from my own
experience in selling several thousand every spring, are sure to be
well-liked and good bloomers.