January 28. 1004. 



The Weekly Florists^ Review. 



457 



of hardy pompon chrysanthemums that 

 are grown outdoors in the vicinity in 

 which this correspondent resides, I will 

 not undertake to answer the gentleman 

 as to what special variety he has ref- 

 erence to. There are many good varie- 

 ties which stand the winters in the New 

 England states. In yellows such varie- 

 ties as Donkelarii and Mrs. Snyder are 

 of the large-flowering type. What I 

 mean is that they make flowers from two 

 to two and one-half inches in diameter 

 without disbudding. For small flowers 

 there are Golden Fleece, Eagle d'Or, Gold 

 Standard, etc. For white I would sug- 

 gest Pi-ince of Wales, Queen of Whites 

 and Souvenir Melaine for large flower- 

 ing, the best for cutting, and for small 

 Ehoda, Labanah, Snowflake and Maid of 

 Kent as among the best. In pinks there 

 are Mrs. Vincent, St. Illoria and Day- 

 break for large, and Edna. Captivation. 

 Ivanhoe, President and Nellie Ely for 

 small. In red or bronze use Georgiana, 

 Grandeur and Julia Lagravere for large 

 flowers, and Druid Hill, Gold Finch and 

 Princess Louise for small. While this 

 would make up a list that would some- 

 what cover the ground, it is only a sam- 

 ple of the good things found in the col- 

 lection of any first-class nurseryman or 

 florist who makes a specialty of such 

 stock. E. A. Vincent. 



TO RCX)T REX BEGONIAS. 



I would like to know the best tem- 

 perature of house, sand and air for root- 

 ing Kcx and flowering begonias'? 



W. E. G. 



The Eex begonias, which are propa- 

 gated by sections of the leaf, require a 

 higher temperature than the great ma- 

 jority of the flowering species and va- 

 rieties, and therefore the Eex is most 

 easily propagated at the time that you 

 are firing briskly, say from the middle 

 of December to March 1, but the earlier 

 you put them in the sand the better 

 plants you will have for summer use. An 

 ideal temperature for the Eex type woiild 

 be 75 degrees for the sand and 60 de- 

 grees for the atmosphere. For the flow- 

 ering varieties 6.5 degrees for the sand 

 and 50 degrees for the atmosphere will 

 do very well. As most florists know, 

 nearly all flowering begonias propagate 

 freely by cuttings in May and June, 

 when the air of the house is warmer 

 than the sand, but I never could root 

 the Eex varieties at that season. 



W. S. 



GIVE THE DETAILS. 



To those who wish replies to heating 

 questions we would say that the dimen- 

 sions of the houses, the purpose for 

 which they are to be used, as well as 

 specifications of boilers when these are 

 at hand, must be included in all ques- 

 tions, otherwise a part of the data must 

 be assumed by the person answering the 

 questions. L. C. C. 



PLAN FOR WATER HEATING. 



How shall we arrange our heating 

 plant for this range: Houses run east 

 and west, without partition walls. One 

 house is 32x100, twelve feet to ridge, 

 one house is 20x68 and two are 16x54, 

 the three latter ten feet to ridge. There 

 is glass in the ends and thirty-two inches 

 in the south wall. All the houses have 

 solid beds eighteen inches high. The 

 boiler pit, eight feet deep, is at the east 



end of the largest house. A ten horse- 

 power traction boiler is used, with thir- 

 ty-five 2-inch flues. The top of the sup- 

 ply tank is twenty feet above the boiler 

 floor. J. W. M. 



I believe that the best plan would 

 be to use overhead or top heat supplied 

 by a 3-inch riser under the ridge of the 

 thirty-two-foot house and returning bv 

 twenty-two 1%-inch pipes over the 

 benches at a height of eighteen to twen- 

 ty-four inches, depending upon the cron 

 to be grown. The other houses should 

 be piped in like manner. The 20x68 

 house will require a 2-inch riser and fif- 

 teen 1%-ineh return pipes, while the 

 houses 16x54 will each require a 2-inch 

 riser and eleven return pipes to main- 

 tain a temperature of 70 degrees dur- 

 ing zero weather. If a lower tempera- 

 ture will answer fewer pipes can be 

 used. If steam is substituted a consid- 

 erable reduction in heating- surface can 

 be made. If it is practicable to run 

 compact coils built out of manifold T's 

 along the partitions or under the walks 

 much less light will be obstructed and 

 equally as good results obtained with 

 many crops. I doubt if the ten horse- 

 power boiler has capacity enough to 

 heat these houses. It certainly has not 

 capacity enough to carry the piping 

 specified, which gives 1,932 feet of radi- 

 ation, while the boiler is capable of sup- 

 plying about 1,600 feet. If, as before 

 stated, you can get along with a lower 

 temperature and use less radiating pipe 

 the boiler may carry it. It is poor econ- 

 omy, however, to attempt to get along 

 with a small boiler. L. C. C. 



GREENHOUSE HEATING. 



That little article that I innocently 

 sent to St. Louis, which I never dreamed 

 would get into print, has gotten me into 

 lots of trouble. It's been a regular hot 

 water circulator. Now I stand by all I 

 said, only the system I attempted to 

 describe was the ideal if starting under 

 favorable circumstances. I did not go 

 into particulars as to what could be done 

 under unfavorable conditions. A com- 

 munication like that of Edw. Aleck Wal- 

 lace I like, but the long personal letters 

 from people in trouble I must refer to 

 the hot water professional expert. Mr. 

 Wallace invites me to explain one or 

 two points at which he is at variance 

 and, as briefly as I can word it, I will. 



He says: "How about the water be- 

 coming lighter under the influence of 

 heat and thus rising to the highest point? 

 Surtiy, this is as important a factor as 

 the gravitation back to the boiler." I 

 am sure it is but a small factor. The 

 warm particles of the water would rise 

 and do where there is no circulation at 

 all, as the warm particles rise from the 

 bottom of the tea kettle to the surface 

 .and surface colder ones drop to the bot- 

 tom. If there was not the motive power 

 (if it may be called so) of the return 

 pipe the colder particles of water ten 

 feet from the boiler would be pressing 

 back or filtering back through the hotter 

 particles that had later left the boiler. 

 The water in the . heater, improperly 

 called boiler, is made lighter than that 

 in the return pipe and its superior weight 

 displaces or forces the hot water out of 

 the flow pipe; therefore the heavier the 

 column of water in the return pipe the 

 faster will it displace the hot and lighter 

 water in the heater. And the speed of 



the circulation will depend entirely on 

 the difference in weight of the water in 

 the heater and that in the return pipe. 

 Supposing you have two columns of wa- 

 ter each six feet high, say iu 2-ineh 

 pipes or any size you like. They are 

 connected at the bottom by a cross pipe 

 or like the letter U. Half way in this 

 cross pipe you have a valve. Close the 

 valve, fill one of the vertical pipes with 

 boiling water and the other with cold 

 water. They are both the same height. 

 Open the valve connecting these two col- 

 umns of water and immediately there 

 will be an overflow of the hot water and 

 the cold water will go down in its pipe 

 an inch or two, and that is the power 

 or force which gives us the circulation. 



I must admit that Mr. Wallace is cor- 

 rect in stating that according to the sci- 

 ence of hydrostatics it makes no differ- 

 ence whether the drop in the return pipe 

 is six feet in 100 feet or a perpendicular 

 drop of six feet. The pressure where 

 the return water entered the boiler would 

 be l!ie same. Yet in practice the per- 

 peuflicular drop has been proved to be 

 the better method. Perhaps it makes lit- 

 tle difference whether there is a rise of 

 two inches in 100 feet or a drop of two 

 inches in the flow pipe, but after leaving 

 the rising flow pipe near the boiler, to 

 enter the house as near as possible level 

 is much better than any great devia- 

 tion from level. 



'['he arraugeraent of heating pipes is 

 too large a subject, so I will conclude 

 by referring to the overhead pipe which 

 I "so summarily dismissed." If you 

 were heating the second floor of a fac- 

 tory it would be foUy to do anything 

 but place the heater on the ground floor. 

 There are many instaEces where a heater 

 cannot be placed mere than a-foot or two 

 below the level of the greenhouse floor 

 on account of the drainage or some other 

 cause. Then 1o run the main flow pipe 

 near the ridge v/ill undoubtedly help the 

 circulation; tut you are wasting the 

 heat and that flow pipe near the roof 

 should be so encased with some asbestos 

 or mineral wool thqt not a particle of 

 radiation could escape till the water en- 

 tered the pipes on the walls or beneath 

 the benches. William Scott. 



THE READERS' CORNER. 



Twinned Boilers. 



Ed. Eeview: — On page 362, in your 

 issue for January 14, F. W. tells how the 

 water is driven out of one boiler into the 

 other, the boilers being set level and 

 twinned, w-ithout check valves in the re- 

 turns. He also asks how a uniform 

 level can be kept in both boilers. In re- 

 ply to this we would say that this dif- 

 ficulty mostly occurs if the header, the 

 main cross steam connection, is too small 

 to provide an equal pressure in both 

 boilers. It will be necessary to enlarge 

 the present header, or better, place a 

 large equalizing pipe from one boiler to 

 the other. By so doing the pressure will 

 be equal in both boilers, even if one is 

 fired and the other not. With the above 

 arrangement it will not be necessary to 

 have check valves, but cheek valves are 

 advisable wherever the boilers are valved 

 off. E. & R. 



The Rose Society. 



Editoe Eeview: I have just read the 

 article by Benjamin Dorrance, "The 

 Eose Society." It is a shame that he 

 has to make such an appeal to the ros& 



