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THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [June i, 1887. 



properly cared for, its character is developed with more 

 freshness and vigour. 



"We believe it is correct to say that the chief features 

 of the horticulture of the present, as compared with 

 that of the past, is that complicated mixtures of soils 

 and manures are less used and believed in as '-the 

 secret" of successful culture, and that the tendency 

 is still in the direction of simplicity in this respect. 

 Mixtures when compounded from fancy, and with 

 Ittle knowledge of the elements of chemistry, may 

 or may not be compounds of evil. After many years 

 of extensive practice we are thoroughly convinced that 

 the mixing of different sorts of soils and manures 

 for potting plants in general is an evil to be avoided, 

 and feel certain that a plant that thrives in loam will 

 thrive better in it ultimately — make a more healthy 

 and robust plant — if there are no animal or organic 

 manures mixed with the turfy loam. AVe of course 

 mean all organic manures of a rapidly changing 

 character which putrifies, even though in that process 

 the substances formed are highly important to plant 

 life. All such, and humus of every description, are 

 best left out of the soil in which all the slower grow- 

 ing and more hard wooded plants are potted, if they 

 are to be healthy, floriferous and long lived. By so 

 doing the soil runs far less risk of becoming what is 

 well understood by the term soured, and, of course, 

 unhealthy. It may be asked, are the excrements of 

 animals and decaying vegetation not beneficial to such 

 plants ? Undoubtedly they arc ; but not mixed in 

 with the soil in a narrow, deep vessel like a flower- 

 pot. Such highly stimulating, and more or less fer- 

 menting, substances are best applied as a top dress- 

 ing when the plants require it. The turfy loam 

 generally used for potting posse.sses, at first, much 

 organic matter, of a less rapidly changing (because to 

 some extent differently incorporated with the soil) 

 as well as of a more natural character ; and as a rule 

 no other manure need be mixed with the ball of earth 

 in the pots, unless it be of a less rapidly changing 

 character, such as ground bones. Take for instance a 

 Oroton and a Dracreua — plants of very diverse charac- 

 ters. They thrive splendidly in light turfy loam, 

 and require nothing else till their pots get pretty well 

 filled with roots. Then a top dressing of rich manure 

 is of immense benefit to them, which if mixed with 

 the soil at the time of potting, is not only unnecessary 

 but positively injurious. The roots which these two 

 plants make in the loam pure and simple, with 

 perhaps the addition of some charcoal and bones, 

 are far more numerous, and of a different character 

 to those produced in soil made rich and soft with 

 rapidly decaying manure, in which the roots are long 

 and less twiggy, escaping more rapidly down among 

 the drainage into simpler and sweeter fare. 



As a rule we neglect far too much of nature's rule 

 of potting and nourishing her children. "We put 

 manure of a too gross nature into the soil ; Nature 

 lays it on the surface. "We give narrow, deep body 

 of soil, with comparatively little surface exposed to 

 the air, and that little is far too often a mass of 

 gangrene and slime : on the other hand nature, as a 

 rule, gives a shallow body of earth with a great wealth 

 of surface clothed with living verdure of some sort. 

 In all these respects we cannot in small gardens or 

 houses follow the lead of nature in the culture of plants 

 in pots. But the further the departure from her ways, 

 the more likely we are to be in error. "We can how- 

 ever top dress more and mix less humus i,t our soils. 

 AVho will say that flower-pots would not be better if 

 made a little shallower and a little wider ? AVith re- 

 gard to the mixing of stones or charcoal, or clean 

 broken potsherd, this can he followed without any 

 offence to the eye, or any extra space. This we have 

 come to regard as a cardinal point in the pot culture 

 of nearly all plants that are not of tho gro.ssest and 

 most ephemeral kind. Who that has had much to do 

 with plant growing and potting has not noticed that 

 a plant that has clean crocks, nr. best of all, charcoal 

 mixed to a liberal extent, with the .soil in which it has 

 been potted, has always been in a more satisfactory 

 condition the next time it required a shift, than when 

 these substances finds no place in the soil ? Take any 



hard- wooded flowering or ornamental foliage plant 

 and in potting it fill one side of the pot with soil in 

 which charcoal is liberally mixed, and the other with 

 soil devoid of that substance, and in twelve months 

 when the plant needs another shift, it will be found 

 that there are double the number of rootlets on the 

 side of tlie charcoal to what there is on the other. 

 "Wherever a few pieces of broken pot or charcoal are 

 found in the ball of a plant, then; the roots are found 

 to muster in greatest numbers and health. 



The mi.xing of the.se substances, in imitation of 

 nature's prodigality, is not practised to the hundredth 

 part in plant culture that it.s good effects demand. 

 Charcoal has a wondrous charm for roots, and is of 

 the very foremost importance in the soil of nearly 

 all pot-grown plants. It has a beneficial mechanical 

 effect; has a sweetening tendency; is highly useful, 

 absorbing ammonia and other plant food from air and 

 water and from all decaying substances in its vicinity ; 

 while its own character is most unchangeable. It 

 prevents stagnant water ; and being such a store-house, 

 is a safeguard against extreme drought. In the case of 

 nine plants out of every ten, it would be well if char- 

 coal formed a fifth part of the whole compost in 

 which they are potted. — Iiidian Gardener. 



♦ 



Brazilian Flowers.— Travellers in Brazil speak of 

 Fuchsias 50 ft. and 60 ft. in height, blooming from 

 top to bottom ; of large bushes of Abutilon venosum, 

 bearing a profusion of orange bells streaked with 

 crimson; of huge Daturas, with hundreds of white 

 trumpet-shaped and sweet-scented blossoms, some 16 

 in. in length ; of Orchids and Ferns ; huge Arums 

 with shield-like leaves, large enough to cover a man ; 

 brilliant red and yellow Bromelias and Tillandsias ; 

 epiphytes and parasites of all descriptions ; Camelias 

 large enough to climb into to pluck the topmost 

 blossoms. — Indian Gafdfiier. 



Tobacco. — In France, in the Pas de Calais, large 

 tobacco crops are reared. All about douai the plants 

 may be seen reaching up to between five and six feet 

 high, and the cultivation, treatment, and manufacture 

 form quite an industi y of the place. But the Pas de 

 Calais is appreciably colder than the South or even 

 the Midland parts of England. The snow rests there 

 in winter when our landscape is clear of it. It is 

 true the tobacco grown is but of a coarse kind. Still, 

 its cultivation gives employment and brings in revenue. 

 In Canada the revenue authorities are less strict. 

 Tobacco is viewed in that colony not as a luxury but 

 as a necessity. Every farmer is allowed to plant one- 

 eighth of an acre with the plant, and whatever that 

 plot produces is his own, for his own consumption. 

 Beyond that limit he comes under the rigid laws 

 and prohibitory penalties of the Custom-house, but 

 so far he may go with impunity. The 5th of May, 

 1886, may be an important date in the future history 

 of Engl-sh revenue ; but, if great results should be 

 attained, they will certainly have sprung from very 

 modest commencements. — PaJl MaH Gazett>\ 



Plants in Living Rooms — There was once, still is, 

 perhaps, a superstition that plants in rooms are unwhole- 

 some. Setting aside 'special cases it may be said that 

 as a general rule, plants in a living room, if they have 

 any, perceptible effected at all, are benefical rather 

 than otherwise. "We are glad to see the Faculty 

 taking this view of the subject. An American physi- 

 cian has, it seems, pointed out that by their powers 

 of tran.spiring moist vapour plants render great service 

 in rooms warmed by dry air. The value of plants and 

 flowers as dHasroiwul for the weak and weary is acknow- 

 ledged on all hands. Dr. Anders, according to the 

 Briti!']) Jlcdical Journal, goes further and states that 

 the pursuit of gardening, though naturally it favours 

 rheumatism, appears to arrest consumption in persons 

 of phthisical tendency, while the abandonment of the 

 pursuit in other cases led to the development of the 

 disease. Dr. Anders recomends a room well stocked 

 with plants as a complete and agreeable health-resort 

 free from the inconveniences of travelling and the 

 anxiety of separation from home. AVe concur with 

 our contemporary in the opinion that the Doctor has 

 opened up a most interesting subject for investiga- 

 tion.— GflroJeners' Chronicle. 



