BUREAU OF PLANT INDUSTRY. 423 



PLANT-INTRODTltjTION FIELD STATION NEAR RoCKVILLE, MD.--The 



station near Hockville has been equipped with full facilities for the 

 care of all plant material which is suited to this climate, and plans 

 are perfected for the transfer to the newly erected greenhouses, which 

 cover (5,800 square feet of ground, of all the foreign introductions 

 now propagated in the greenhouses in Washington. Increased land 

 has been rented and an adequate water system, to insure the care of 

 nursery stock during a dry season, has been installed. 



I'lant-introduction field STATION AT Brooksville, Fla. — The 

 cleared area at the Brooksville garden has been increased materially. 

 The bamboo grove, which has made a very satisfactory growth and 

 now contains plants 25 feet tall, is rapidly reaching a stage where the 

 utilization of the material will require its distribution. It has been 

 found that small 2-inch cuttings of the rhizomes will take root and 

 in anotlier year it will be possible to distribute through the mail 

 small plants of this timber bamboo for trial throughout the South. 

 Trials of Rhodes-grass have been made at the garden with remarkable 

 success, and 7 acres of dasheen have been grown for trial and 

 distribution. A dwelling for the superintendent and a barn for the 

 tools will be erected the coining year. 



Plant-introdi^ction field station at Miami, Fla. — Because of 

 the increased demand for new varieties of East India mangos and the 

 better varieties of avocados, the ^liami garden has been equipped to 

 turn out as perfect budded plants as possible of these new tree crops, 

 A small greenhouse will be erected next year to protect strictly tropi- 

 cal material from the cold. Attention to the possibilities of the 

 papaya as a dessert fruit has been attracted through a plantation of 

 especially delicious varieties which fruited in nine months from seed. 

 The propagation of this plant from cuttings to insure the perpetua- 

 tion of the strain is now under investigation. The fruiting of the 

 white sapote and the cherimoj'a, the remarkable growth made by a 

 tropical eucalyptus from the island of Timor, and the growing of the 

 cajuput tree from Australia in the salt water along the coast are 

 some of the manv facts demonstrated at the garden. The small area 

 of the garden and the character of its soil make it advisable to con- 

 sider the question of extension, so that additional propagating work 

 can be done. 



Plant-introduction field station at Ames, Iowa. — The success 

 of the cooperative station at Ames, Iowa, has called attention to the 

 desirability of placing gardens at other State experiment stations, 

 where selected plants adapted to the various regions can be main- 

 tained in such a way that they will attract the attention of the 

 students and scientific stafl' and stimulate them to take up their in- 

 vestigation. Arrangements for a preliminar}' trial of this plan have 

 been made, and it is proposed to establish such stations wherever co- 

 operative arrangements can be made. The Chinese wild peach, which 

 proved to be hardy when all other ])eaches were killed to the ground, 

 and the dry-land elm, which has made a remarkable growth at Ames, 

 are two examples of the value of such cooperative work. 



Plant-introduction avork in southern Texas. — As heretofore in- 

 dicated, the work of the garden at Brownsville has required reorgani- 

 zation in order to make it more elfectively valuable to the wjiole 

 legion interested and to gi\e it a wider, more general character. 



