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THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[April i, 1885. 



fore, as near the equator as many of the Cattleyas, is 

 found only at high altitudes, and experiences con- 

 sequently a much cooler climate than the Brazilian Cattley- 

 as. Travellers describe it as growing in an almost 

 perpetual mist, the result of which is that it endures 

 very subdued sunlight, a large amount of air moisture, 

 and, as might be expected, is found surrounded with 

 mosses auU lichens and other moisture-loving growths. 

 The third example is a Dendrobium, of which there 

 is a multitude of varieties. It is an epiphyte. You 

 must imagine this variety, which comes from India, 

 growing in some dense jungle amidst luxuriant vegetation, 

 its long growths not turning upwards, as these are 

 trained, but hanging down possibly over a stream of water 

 from some overarching branch. These plump growths are 

 called pseudo-bulbs, and serve the same purpose as the 

 corresponding portion of a Cattleya — that is, as a reserve 

 of moisture for the plant's sustenance during the long 

 rainless season. As in the case of the Cattleya, each 

 leaf has its own reservoir. Each pseudo-bulb of the 

 Dendrobiun carries many leaves ranged symmetrically 

 down it. From these bulbs, after the leaves have fallen, 

 charming clusters of flowers emerge. The terrible and 

 the beautiful iu nature are often very close to one an- 

 other, and it may well happen to the traveller, as he 

 turns away from the scene of floral beauty, to encoun- 

 ter the gaze of a tiger watching him with not less 

 interest than that with which he has been gazing on 

 the Dendrobiums. Well for his chances of escape if the 

 tiger has not yet completed the digestion of his last 

 victim. 



Our fourth plant is a Cypripedium or Lady's Slipper, 

 so called from the slipper-shaped pouch at the base of 

 the flower. This section is the most widely distributed 

 of any Orchids. Varieties of it are found iu every 

 quarter of the world, and in England we possess one 

 native yariety, Cypripedium Calceolus, which is said to 

 lie found more especially in the north of England. The 

 Oypripediums have no pseudo-bulbs, because they are not 

 called on to bear drought. They are found in moist 

 places at the foot of trees, or protected by moist rocks 

 and stones. The plant I am specially referring to comes 

 from Sylhet, and is called (J. insigne. It may be of 

 interest to contrast the flowers of the ordinary type 

 with those of this superior variety called O. insigne 

 Maulei, after the firm Messrs. Maule, of Bristol, who 

 were fortunate in importing some plants of it many 

 years ago. The upper portion of the flower has a much 

 larger colouring of white than the normal type, and 

 there are besides some handsome purple spots on the 

 B ;i me part of the flower which are wanting in the com- 



011 type. — Journal of Horticulture. 



BRITISH GUIANA : 



REPORT TO THE GOVERNMENT OS THE PROGRESS AND 

 CONDITION OK THE BOTANIC GARDENS OF 

 DEMERARA. 



Introductory. — As the Loan of s240,000 raised for the 

 purchase of the land and laying out and planting of the 

 Botanic Gardens is now, after five years' labour, exhausted, 

 a brief introductory review of what has been accomplished 

 is desirable. If the present state of the gardens be com- 

 pared with the plan origiually approved by the Court of 

 Policy, it will be seen that the whole work there sketched 

 has been carried out, except, only, in providing a glass 

 house, the erection of which has been postponed to the 

 present year in favour of pushing forward with the (for 

 the time) more urgent wants of the institution, and 

 some slight modification found desirable in the course 

 of the serpentine drives which run through the ground 

 beyond the flower garden. My past annual reports have 

 given in detail the progress of the work, so that I need 

 only summarise here its principal features. It comprised 

 making up the land for the flower garden with the soil 

 supplied in excavating the lakes, subsoil draining, laying 

 out and planting it, supplying a system of irrigation, and 

 making the serpentine drives, which extend upwards 

 through the grounds beyond the flower garden. It is true 

 that these roads have not yet been opened to public 

 traffic, but they only await the approaches to be made 

 up to the iron bridges that connect them with the 



orinoque avenue drive at their farther end. These bridges 

 have been put up by the l'ublic Works Department. 

 Ample draining trenches have been made that enclose 

 the whole block of land. A steam engine and lofty tank 

 provide water for irrigation; propagating houses have 

 been built in the nursery, and residences for the officials in 

 charge of the institution. All this was designed on the 

 plan, but in addition thereto a drive, the chief resort 

 in the gardens, has been made under the old orinoque- 

 tree avenue that was found on the ground, and extend- 

 ing beyond it to the Lamaha canal boundary on the east. 

 Two large lakes, not originally contemplated as necessary, 

 have been dug, and their contents used in making up the 

 surface, or for burnt-earth. A broad drive quite round 

 the outside of the gardens and grounds, about two and 

 a half miles long, has been iu a large measure formed, 

 though only a small part has, as yet (for reasons ex- 

 plained iu my last year's report) been actually completed. 

 The shelter-belt on the land to the windward of the gardens, 

 purchased for the purpose from the proprietors of Bel 

 Air estate, is also an important and thriving addition 

 not contemplated at first ; and on the south side of the 

 ground, outside also of the block, fourteen acres, part of 

 the original Vlissengen estate, though not recognised as 

 belonging to it when it was taken over, have been acquired 

 and opened as an experimental ground. Lastly, an avenue 

 of trees to shade the outside south drive has been planted, 

 and a single line on the north drive, with much minor 

 work. 



A venues. — On collecting and comparing specimens of the 

 bird-viue which is such a nuisance on the orinoque trees 

 of the avenue, I have found that it is composed of three 

 species — Loranthns syringafolius, L. Tlieobrmnce and L. 

 rufwavlis. The former is the prevailing species, the other 

 two being comparatively rare. Indeed the orinoque tree 

 does not appear to be a host-plant for L. ruficaulis at 

 all, as I have only found it on two or three of the other 

 kinds of trees in the avenue. It infests a large Spondias 

 alone, neither of the other two ever being found on this 

 tree, though L. syringttfolia is a dissolute species that 

 establishes itself with freedom on a great variety of trees 

 and shrubs everywhere in the gardens. Like many other 

 parasitical and epiphytal plants, some Loranthaceae are 

 restricted in the subjects upon which they grow, and this 

 fortunately greatly limits their prevalence, while others 

 adapt themselves to a more or less greater variety of 

 host-plants. These, on cultivated trees, are a great nui- 

 sance. The seeds of L. si/rinyttfolins germinate on any 

 surface, though, of course, if ' it be an unsuitable one 

 they soon die. A few months ago I picked up a bird 

 in the grass under the avenue, and found it clogged with 

 the viscid, germinated, seed of this species. Even in 

 their earliest state of active life the influence is very 

 pernicious to the vegetation subject to it. 



Nursery. — Some improvement has been effected in the 

 nursery by raising the surface of the beds through two 

 of the blocks, and filling in the cross-paths which were 

 found unnecessary and which, being twelve feet wide, 

 occupied a good deal of space. The laud here is the 

 lowest in the gardens, and had to be raised two feet in 

 some places. Much of the ground is now devoted fo 

 raising large stocks of economic plants for sale, such as 

 coffee, cocoa, oranges, sugarcane, &c. In addition, it has been 

 planted through at proper distances apart with mangoe, 

 orange, litchi, and coffee stock plants. The mangoes I 

 am able to multiply by inarching, but I find great difficulty 

 iu meeting the demand for other fruits, as there are no 

 trees yet advanced enough in the gardens to produce seed, 

 from which stocks could be raised. In all these I have 

 to trust to obtaining supplies from the islands and other 

 sources, about the success of which at the time plants 

 are desired there is, of course, frequently uncertainty. 

 I have before mentioned that the large border in the nursery 

 enclosure has been kept chiefly for economic plants, of 

 which already it contains a cnsiderable variety. Some 

 excellent soil was obtained for this border by deepening 

 the racecourse trench next the gardens, which was allowed 

 by the racecourse committee. 



I am sorry to say that the variety of scale and other 

 insect pests that affect the nursery stock increases from 

 year to year. As in the case of the parasitic birdlime, 

 spoken of on a previous page of this report, several of 



