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Show FOR THE LAWNS. Now is the time to prepare your lawns. An authority says: Fertilizer should be applied to grass plots which have been established a few years, and thin portions should be rcsecded. If seed has been sown In the fall for a new lawn, watch carefully care-fully this spring, and reseed those places where the first seeding rall3 to como up. In making a new lawn, great care should bo taken. Prepare tho ground as soon as It can be worked. Grade it, smoothing over rough surraccs. making proper level spaces and gen-tlo gen-tlo slopes. If possible the lawn should slopo away from tho house. The grading should be done to distribute dis-tribute , evenly all surface water, avoiding the formation of llttlo runs which might produce washouts. Enrich tho boII wkh a liberal supply sup-ply of well rotted manure. This is essential where the 6oil Is lacking in humus, otherwise bone meal or other good fertilizer is userul. The ground should be ploughed or spaded not less than eight inches deep, all stones and similar materials removed, lumps broken up and the surface smoothed. Then it is ready for seeding. Use a good lawn mixture. Four parts Kentucky bluo grass with one part white clover, sown not less than five bushels to the acre is good. Red top Instead of the blue grass, or equal parts of red top and bluo grass, produce pro-duce good results. Use plenty ot seed and nothing but pure seed. If seeds for tho flower and vegetable vege-table gardens aro not already In tho hot-bed, or In boxes or pots placed near a sunny window, then the amateur ama-teur gardner who wants to keep abreast of his neighbors when warm weather comes, would better prepare his hot-bed or boxes at once. The simpler method of raising plants to be set out after all danger of frost is over, is to sow seed in boxes or pots. to be kept indoors. The boxes should have holes for drainage in the bottom, but should not be so open as to let the soli dry. Ordinary garden soil may be used in tho bottom, bot-tom, but on top there should bo a lighter soil. Small seed should be sown on the surface; then lino soil spread over them, and pressed, but not &o hard as to cause the soil to bake. Coarse seed can best be planted in Utile drills or each seed pressed down into the soil and tho whole covered with a thin layer or earth. Tho soli should bo gently sprlngled with water immediately alter al-ter tho planting. Only the quantity of water which the soil will readily absorb without becoming soggy should be given. The box should bo watered subsequently whenever the soil becomes dry a little below the surface. , Set the box in the sunlight by the window, but shield it from the direct rays of the 6un. Keep the soil well stirred to prevent it baking. For indoor planting in March, either in the hot-bed, or in boxes by the sunny window, seed of the lollowlng flowers should receive their start, In order that good sized plants may bo ready when nil danger of frost has gone, and tho beds may be made outside out-side of snapdragon, asters, begonias, marguerites, cockscomb, heliotrope, annual hollyhock, lobelia, pansy, petunia, pe-tunia, salvia, verbena, slocks, wallflower. wall-flower. Most of these will be ready to plant outside by May 1 to 15. |