LADYBUG SAYS ... ACT NOW FOR BLOOMING HOLIDAY POINSETTIAS

Just about the first or second week of November calls begin coming in asking how to get poinsettias to bloom again in time for the holidays. Now, to beat you to it.

To make poinsettias rebloom it is time to start them on their way, because they need special attention from now until Santa arrives in order for them to flower in their bright red brackets.

The number-one requirement is that the plant be healthy and vigorous in growth at this time. Bring them inside within the next two weeks, and place the plants where they will get full sun during the day. The long night treatment may be started now and the plants should flower in time for Christmas.

Short day treatment is most important with night temperatures that are between 60 and 65 degrees. If night temperatures are higher than 70 degrees, it might be injurious to the development of buds.

In addition to needing the right temperatures for growth and flower bud initiation, they must have 14 hours of complete darkness. There are several ways of doing this and we have tried them all. They can be set in a darkened room or closet, or covered with a black cloth or plastic bag, or a tight-fitting box can be placed over the top of them.

We used to say we had to be at home by 5 p.m. to put the poinsettias to bed and then get them up and bring them out into bright light and sunshine at 7 a.m. This treatment must continue for a least six weeks or until flower buds develop.

By mid-October natural daylight lengthens and twilight provides days that are short enough. At this point plants may be kept in a room where no lights are turned on at night.

Turning lights on just once at night in a room where the plants are kept can delay or nullify flower bud development. Henry Ochs, former owner and operator of Ochs Greenhouse (now Accu-Grow at 1110 N. Cape Rock Drive), said when an automobile turned into the parking lot and the lights shone into a greenhouse this ruined (or delayed) all of the poinsettias growing there.

Usually if the long nighttime darkness treatment is begun now, color development should be seen by Thanksgiving or early December. The short day treatment can then be discontinued.

It is important to keep a normal watering and fertilizing schedule through this time. They should be watered thoroughly when the topsoil feels dry to the touch. The authorities advise feeding with a diluted house plant fertilizer every two weeks.

Once again good luck, but we still advise leaving poinsettias to the professional growers.

A reader has inquired about layering a plant as a method of propagation. This is a method of getting shrubs, roses or almost any perennial plant without cost and very little effort.

In layering a branch, choose one as near the ground as possible. Gently crack the stem, or scrape or notch the underneath side where it will come into contact with the soil. Insert a small nail or twig to keep the edges apart. See that the soil is well heaped and packed over the wounded part of the stem. Bricks or stones will keep the branch firm against the soil. This also aids in keeping the soil moist. The leafy end of the branch should be above ground. The parent plant feeds it until it is mature enough to leave home in the spring.

That's all. Forget it, and by next spring, when many fibrous roots will have formed where the twig was bruised, cut the twig or branch from the parent plant. Then there is a brand new plant for your garden. My white azaleas came from my brother's by this method. He propagated several from a parent plant that cost 29 cents many years ago at Woolworth's. His white azalea is one of the largest I have seen growing in this area.

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Visitors last Sunday at First Presbyterian's 20th Agape (meaning love) asked about the Montezuma cypress growing in Common Pleas Courthouse Park.

This tree is a fine specimen of the oldest tree on Earth. About the time the Pharaohs were building Egypt's first pyramids, a cypress shoot poked through the rich soil of Southern Mexico. As ancient civilizations rose and fell, as Old World explorers set out for a new one, the tree grew and grew. This was several thousand years ago.

Still growing today and still in vigorous health, the Tree of El Tule spreads its protective branches over a village churchyard near Oaxaca, some 300 miles southwest of Mexico City.

El Tule's guardians and botanical scientists claim it is 5,000 years or more and its 120-foot circumference is a world record.

This information about the oldest living thing on Earth was taken from statements made from time to time by the Mexican government.

Former publishers of The Southeast Missourian, the late Fred and George Naeter, while on visits to Mexico tried to get saplings of the tree but the U.S. Department of Agriculture forbade their entrance, claiming they might bring a disease with them that would be harmful to American forests.

The Naeter brothers then were able to obtain this tree and two others form a nursery man in Brownsville, Texas. When this tree was planted in the park, they had a heavy wire surrounding it for several years to protect it from being damaged.

This member of the cypress family is deciduous and looses its lacy foliage each year. An unusual specimen, this tree attracts much attention form nature lovers.

The Present Missourian publisher, Gary Rust, erected a marker that states, "Montezuma Cypress from Santa Maria El Tule, Mexico. Donated by Mr. Fred and Mr. George Naeter, founders and publishers of The Southeast Missourian."