1885.] OUTDOOR CULTIVATION OF BRITISH ORCHIDS. 453 



root is prevented, altliough in many cases it may not in tlie least 

 affect the flowering during the present season. 



An ordinary garden trowel or hand-fork — the latter is preferable — 

 may be used for lifting the plants, which should be taken up with 

 a good circular ball of say four inches in diameter (much depending 

 on the size of the plant as well as formation of root), and carefully 

 reduced until the rootlets appear in view ; neither these nor the 

 tubers, however, being made bare or exposed. The grassy surface 

 should also be removed before planting, as, be this ever so dwarf in 

 its native habitat, it soon becomes tall and rank when lirought 

 under cultivation, causing endless trouble, and often resulting in 

 the death of the plants. Of those who have successfully cultivated 

 most British orchids, not the least remarkable, and perhaps the 

 earliest, was Gerarde, who in 1597 mentions that he had then a 

 plant of Cijpripedium Calccolus in his garden, and also gives a 

 remarkably accurate figure of the species. Later, about the begin- 

 ning of the nineteenth century, a number of terrestrial orchids, 

 principally British and Silician, were cultivated successfully in the 

 Botanic Gardens of Glasgow and Liverpool. About the same time 

 (1824) a number of these plants, including Orchis injramklalis, 0. 

 latifolia, 0. conopsea, 0. morio alba, Ilahenaria hifolia, Aceras aiithro- 

 pophora, Herminium monorchis, Ophrys apifera, 0. muscifera and 

 Epipadis patens, as well as a considerable number of North 

 American species, were, it is said, " cultivated with perfect 

 success in the Epsom nursery ; " and at the same time most 

 of our British orchids " were cultivated and domesticated with 

 satisfactory results " in the gardens at Welbeck. In the first 

 volume of the Horticultural Register, published in 1831, a Mr. 

 Thomas Appleby of Horsforth Hall, is stated to have grown certain 

 species of hardy orchids very successfully in a newly-formed Rhodo- 

 dendron bed. The late Kev. H. Harper Crewe, of Drayton-Beau- 

 champ Eectory, was a great admirer as well as successful cultivator 

 of these plants. He succeeded in getting many of the species of 

 orchis to become established in his garden. A most interesting 

 account of his experiments, with both failures and successes, was 

 given in The Garden, volume 21. At Edge Hall, in Cheshire, ^Nlr. 

 AVolley Dod has also been more or less successful with certain 

 native orchids, although his soil and situation are anything but 

 favourable for their culture. At the Trinity College Botanical 

 Gardens, under Mr. Burbidge's care, several rare native orchids have 

 been cultivated, but amongst all those enumerated perhaps no one 

 grows these plants more successfully or enthusiastically than ]\Ir. 

 Elwes, of Preston, near Cirencester. Numerous other examples 

 might be adduced, but enough have already been given to show 



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