The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1886-05-05
SELLING SEEDS.
MAGNITUDE OF A NEW YORK
SEEDMAN'S BUSINESS.
What the Different Varieties Cost
Some Of the Adjuncts Neces-
sary to Cultivation-Some
Interesting Facts.

"Gath" writes from the metropolis
Some of the seed stores of New York are
wonders to examine. There is one man
in Courtland street who has a splendid
store, with depth of $50 feet and q
front of fifty-one. If you were to walk
in there, seeing his signs covering all the
five stories, you might suppose that you
were in the domain of great company.
This man, whose name is Dennis, is evi.
dence of how any business can be car
ried in large country to the very great
est proportions. He commenced as a
florist in Jersey City in 1s4S; he has,
therefore, been almost forty years in this
department.
He could once carry around his wares
in basket; now he has four and half
acres of glass greenhouses, uses steam
and hot water, and he boasts of sale of
$500, 900 plants per annum, not includ-
ing cabbage, cauliflower, and celery, of
which he sells every year 100000
plants beside. He is not the only man
who has fine establishment ON Court
land street, for that street leads to the
ferries which 60 to New Jersey, and
all the northern Fart of New Jersey is a
villa and garden. Little express COM
panies connect with every town in
New Jersey, and they load up at
Courtland street twice day, cross the
ferries, and drive to points desired.
The American postoffice department
has become great dispenser of seeds
for the million. For sixteen cents a
pound you can send anything over the
land; for thirty cents quart you can
send beans and peas, and corn costs
twenty cents quart. The printing of
one Of the large establishments is i'm
mense, and the systematizing of the busi-
ness is carried to rs much perfection as
the handling of the postoftice depart
mcnt. One of these big florists, or seed
sellers, will publish half dozen books,
selling from $l.50 to So. Looking over
one of the catalogues, I find it specially
demanded that customers leave their
orders in the morning and call for them
in the afternoon, so that the day can be
commenced filling them. One of the first
thing to be noticed is strawberry plants,
which sell at twelve for 81, fifty for So,
or hundred for S.. Inferior varieties
sell at So a hundred. When you buy
seeds you can pick them out separately or
get them in assorted lots. A collection
of some thirty-s seed packages costs
SIS. Some chests containing larger pack
ages cost as high as S25.
The making of manures is an impor-
tant feature of these establishments; they
have special manures for grass lawns,
made between the chemist and the gar
dener; while the best manure down to
the present day is that which is well-rot-
ted in the stable, and which requires a
wagon-load or ton for every 500 square
feet. There are special manures made
out of bones, guano, decayed fish, etc.
It takes about 1.500 pounds of rotten
bone manure to the acre; it costs about
$50 to the ton of 1900 pounds. and if
decomposed with potash costs in this
city $22. Lawn enrichers cost about 81
per twenty pounds. Grounds bone sells
for IS barrel, or $45 a ton Pure
crushed bone for grapevine costs so
per ton. Bonc-meal. finely ground, for
top dressing on lawns, costs $50 ton. A
fertilizer made of blood and bone costs
$50 ton. Guano costs s65 ton.
The infinite number of insecticides at
tracts or attention when we enter one of
these se.d stores. You can get mildew
mixtures at seventy-fve cents bottle, fir
tree oil for spiders and bugs at s. gal
lon. de nth powder and Persian powder,
Paris green at attwenty-fve cents a pound,
slug shot at six cents pound, tobacco
soap at thirty cents a rolnd, whale-oil
soap to wash trees ten cents pond, to-
bacco stems for smoking plants which
have the green fly at two cents pound,
flower sulphur at the same price, pow
dered hellebore at fifty cents pound,
and there are all sorts of little articles to
apply these things, such as the vaporizer,
the syringe, and the powder-gun.
When you come to garden tools there
are more thin emo Ugh to supply disSect-
ing room. Here are some sixteen kinds
of knives selling from thirty-fve cents
for corn knife to $3.50 for hedge
cutter; garden-axes at $780,. brush
hooks at s125, floral tools at sixty cents
a set, grating chisels at sixty cents. hoes,
picks, rakes, scyth 8, scissors, svringes,
wecders, and thermometers. When you
come TO larger instruments for the gar
den you have another museum to look at !:
An asparag 's-burcher at $3.50, hose
mender at So dozen, hose at eighteen
cents foot, corn-planters at $50, root
cutters at $780, garden engines at $50,
potato -dig2ers at $12. plow-sulkies at
s3j, iron rollers at $50. garden-rollers at
So, manure-sDreaders at $40, water.bar-
rel and truck at $12, horseradish-g CRATER
at $3.50, grass ledger at 81, plant-protec-
tors at S? dozen, and mole-traps at So.
They will sell you waterproof covering
for plants at fifteen cents yard, and
labels for trees and plants at fifteen cents
hundred, stakes at $3.50 hundred.
and the grass-mower will cost you SIS.
You can buy seeds of annual flowers at
81 hundred. Gladiolus bulbs sell $1.25
a dozen. The prices of seeds vary ac-
cording to passion or fashion; seed beans
are fifty cents quart and Lima beans
scvcnty-fve cents. Celery, which has
become one of the favorite American
vegetables. is not nowadays raised in the
hotbeds or cold frames but sowed on
the open ground in the early spring and
rop1on tod IN eurmor