Decemeek 5, 1901. 



The Weekly Florists' Review. 



39 



MISCELLANEOUS 

 SEASONABLE HINTS. 



Christmas Plants. 



Plants are used now quite largely as 

 holiday gifts. Not so much so perhaps 

 as at Easter, yet many houses near our 

 large cities are now filled with beauti- 

 ful flowering plants for this trade. With 

 us the four principal plants are the 

 azalea, cyclamen, poinsettia and Be- 

 gonia Lorraine. 



Azaleas. 



The azalea needs a strong heat to get 

 them well out by Christmas. Ten days 

 more would help us very much, partic- 

 ularly with the beautiful deep rose pink 

 Simon Mardner, about the only colored 

 one worth forcing. Deutsche Perle will 

 open its beautiful flowers readily for us 

 by Christmas. Be sure not to let these 

 azaleas that you are keeping ,in so 

 strong a heat suflTer for water. Give 

 them an abundance of water and plenty 

 of syringing. A moist atmosphere will 

 help much in opening the buds. Per- 

 haps you have noticed that when an 

 azalea is in bloom and it gets a severe 

 drying out the petals shrivel up and 

 will never assume their shape of beauty 

 again. So never neglect the watering. 



Cyclamen. 



The cyclamen does best in a tempera- 

 ture of 55. You can give them 10 de- 

 grees higher to force out the flowers, but 

 a very few days would ruin them and 

 they never should be sold from such a 

 temperature. A light, airy house with 

 the temperature at 50 to 55 degrees fin- 

 ishes off' the cyclamen in fine style. And 

 when well grown it is almost or quite 

 the most beautiful flowering plant that 

 is grown, and with any kind of care it 

 is a good house plant; one of the best. 

 Tell your patrons to keep it in the win- 

 dow and as far from the radiator or fire 

 as possible. 



The people in this country live in 

 very warm houses ; our living room we 

 consider chilly if it is not 70, and 

 when we come downstairs to breakfast 

 we prefer to have it 80. I' am not go- 

 ing to pretend, because I don't know, 

 whether this is unhealthy or not. Peo- 

 ple live just as long as they do in the 

 country, where the wood stove goes ouv 

 at night, water freezes in your bedroom 

 and "bairnies cuddle doon" close to kec:i 

 warm. But this great, steady heat thit 

 we have in city houses is not good for 

 plants, especially the colder blooded 

 ones. A rubber, pandanus or a kentia 

 likes the heat, but it's hard on the cy- 

 clamen, azalea, and almost all flower- 

 ing plants. 



Begonia Lorraine. 



Begonia Lorraine is no longer a very 

 expensive plant. We have grown them 

 in a night temperature of 65 degrees. 

 They should for a week or two before 

 Christmas have a lower temperature, 

 and as much ventilation as it is possible 

 to give. The degree of temperature is 

 not of so much consequence as the ven- 

 tilation. Give them all you can on 

 favorable days and then they will be 



more satisfactory or last at least a 

 week in fair order. 



Poinsettias. 



We have persisently grown the poin- 

 settia for the last thirty years and now 

 it is with us almost the leading Christ- 

 mas plant. But the style of plant has 

 very much changed. For many years 

 we grew but the single stemmed plant in 

 a 5 or 6-inch pot, but they no longer are 

 the favorite. Last year we had several 

 hundred that grew 6 and 7 feet high and 

 so did our neighbor's. They were early 

 propagated, it is true, but that did not 



they will be in a state of collapse just 

 when you want them at their best. We 

 put half a dozen plants a foot high in 

 large rouud baskets and with a dollar's 

 worth of ribbon to match the scarlet 

 flower they go at $8 and $10. Some 

 want 5 or 6 plants in a 12-inch azalea 

 pot, and more still are sold with us in 

 10 and 12-inch pans in which 10 or 12 

 small dwarf plants have been grown. 



There are two causes of their losing 

 their leaves. A low temperature and 

 starving for root room. If healthy and 

 \igorous they will do with a lower tem- 

 perature, but they should never Iw below 

 00 degrees. If you think they are suf- 

 fering for more root room give them 

 liquid manure, weak but at every wa- 

 tering. We find for cutting that the 

 potgrown flowers last much better than 

 those grown on benches or solid beds. 



The wilting of the bracts (they are not 

 petals) is one of the worst faults of the 

 poinsettia as a cut flower. When wanted, 

 cut them the night before and put the 

 stems in water and keep them in a 



New Chrysanthemum Convention Hall. 



entirely account for it. This year we 

 have not one over 30 inches, and hun- 

 dreds not over a foot. 



I have often given the advice never to 

 disturb the roots of poinsettias after the 

 first of October, and that is good advice, 

 for they will assuredly lose the foliage, 

 but there is no harm in squeezing four 

 or five plants into a pan a day or so be- 

 fore you sell or deliver them. They will 

 lose their leaves in ten days anyway, 

 and those you have ju.st transplanted 

 will lose them no sooner. But don't be 

 doing it ten days before Christmas, or 



warm room. An ice box would be the 

 very worst place for them. 



Decorative Plants. 



If you are not well supplied with a 

 general assortment of decorative plants, 

 you should get them at once and not 

 wait till Christmas eve. There is al- 

 ways a good sale for a nice ficus, Bos- 

 ton fern, and several other ferns; one 

 of the best is Cyrtomium falca- 

 tum in a 5 or 6-inch pot ; it is 

 a splendid house plant, and so is Poly- 

 podium aureuni. When Peter Crowe, of 



