206 



The Weekly Florists' Review. 



for himself, as you wan! the following 

 quantity for each 1,000 cubic feet of 

 air space in your house: Water. 1 



,',,nii ■ sulphuric a. id. 1 quart; cyanide 

 ,,, potassium, 5 ounces. These quanti- 

 ties must be a. rural.'. Of com-.'. I tal- 

 il thai lie is familiar with tins < 1 . • ; . « 11 > 

 stuff and will take proper care in doing 

 the work, reiiHinhcrni..' that, as a medi- 

 cal friend of mine told me once, ••there 

 is no antidote except the undertaker" 

 it a man onee breathe- it. 



U. E. Shtjphelt. 



EASTER LILIES FROM SEED. 

 ...„,... w Oliver of the United States 



of the Eastei 111; 



suits me set fort 

 sue. I .111110 24, 1 



indu-m has assumed uim prop.., was 

 in recent years. In Bermuda more than 

 3,000,000 'bulbs are exported annually to 

 the United States. In Japan, at the 

 present day millions of bulbs are grown 

 from seed 'each year, the demand being 

 so large that enough cannot be grown 

 from vegetative reproduction. But, un- 

 fortunately, up to the present time there 

 lias been no selection from the seedlings. 

 This i- the reason why with each im- 

 portation from Japan 'many bulbs are 

 found which, when the plants begin to 

 bloom, lack uniformity in size of stem, 

 foliage, time of flowering and other char- 

 acteristics. It is owing principally to 

 the decadence of the Bermuda crop that 

 the demand for bulbs from Japan has in- 

 creased so very markedly in recent years. 

 In 1895 the value of the bulbs export.. I 

 from that country was $40,000. In 1899 

 the figures jumped to $130,000 and the 

 increase during the past three seasons 

 has doubtless been correspondingly large. 

 Owing to the frequent and constantly 

 increasing number of complaints rela- 

 tive to the diseased condition of the Ber- 

 muda and Japan grown bulbs, the grow- 

 ers of this country are confronted with 

 a condition to which considerable atten- 

 tion has already been given with a view- 

 to mitigating the troubles with which 

 they have to contend in forcing the bulbs 

 into bloom. When it is considered that 

 probably over 5.000,000 lily bulbs are 

 forced each spring, it will be seen that 

 the crop is of great value; but expei 

 ences indicate that profits are very much 

 curtailed by the diseased condition of 

 the bulbs. During the past year com- 

 plaints have been received from some of 

 the largest growers that from 20 to 60 



re- 



cent of the bulbs were 



Lily glowing in Bermuda is an ex- 

 ceedingly profitable industry. Prac- 

 tically all the land available for the pro- 

 duction of bulbs is utilized for this pur- 

 pose, and, while a few growers use care, 

 lax methods prevail because of the greater 

 immediate gain. For instance, in the 

 growing of bulbs for the American mar- 

 ket the smaller sizes are planted in the 

 fall and harvested in July, or befon thi 

 bulbs have thoroughly ripened. In the 

 process of handling, many immature 

 scales .hop from the bulbs. These are 

 not thrown away, as they should be. but 

 are carefully saved and planted with a 

 view to raising small bulbs. These 

 bulb- ultimately form a large part of the 

 general crop. 



As a result of investigation by the 



United States Department of Agriculture, 

 it has been shown that by the use of 

 -reds instead of scales, larger bulbs can 

 be secured in a much shorter time than 

 by the scale method. If the general crop 

 were raised from seeds there would be a 

 saving of at least a year in the produc- 

 tii n of a marketable bulb. Moreover, it 

 has been demonstrated that in this wai 

 plants can be grown which are entirely 

 free from disease, and, most important 

 of all, that the seedlings give an oppor- 

 tunity to select better types than exist 

 at the present time. 



In a large number of seedlings at 

 least 50 per cent can be counted on to 

 -how desirable characteristics, which will 

 be shown the first year following that in 

 which the seed is sown, by the plants 

 coming into llowcr. The remainder can 



Liltum HarriMi x L. Longiflorum. 



(Showing bulb 18 weeks after germination 



be discarded and the good ones grown 

 on for forcing, the size necessary for 

 which will lie attained the season fol- 

 lowing, or within two year- from the 

 time the seeds are sown. By keeping urj 

 the process of selection there will de- 

 velop in a very few years strains from 

 seed which will be superior to most of 

 the plants placed upon the market at the 

 present day. 



The beginning of experimental work 

 along this line has been .allied on with 

 the utmost care. Several bulbs of the 

 true Lilium longiflorum and its principal 

 form- were secured. The bulb- -bowed no 

 trace of disease" and as orowth developed, 

 those plants which showed signs of ab- 

 normal development were removed from 

 the greenhouse and destroyed. A rigid 

 process of selection was kept up until 

 the plants came into flower. 



A series of crosses were affected. The 

 flowers of several plants of L. longiflo- 

 rum were fecundated with pollen take" 

 from the flowers of L. Harrisii, and vice 

 versa. The seedlings from these crosses 

 have already flowered and the results are 

 very satisfactory. The progress made 



by the lliiui- as a resuli of these 



crosses i- somewhat, remarkable in that 

 they bore flowers in a comparatively 

 -hint time after germinating. The seed- 

 lings were in 2-inch pots about five weeks 

 after making their appearance above the 

 -oil. Ten weeks after germinating they 



had made from two to four character 

 leaves. From this stage onward the 

 growth was quite rapid. 



The smaller illustration shows a seed- 

 ling with all the radical leaves showing, 

 but not fully developed, eighteen weeks 

 after germination. This is the stage 

 just previous to the development of the 

 flower stem. The bulb at this period is 

 nearly three inches in circumference a".i 

 is wholly formed of the bases of the 

 leaves. This particular bulb was in no 

 way injured by the soil being washed 

 from the roots; it was repotted and 

 formed a stem which bore two flowers. 

 The bulbs shown in the larger illustra- 

 tion are the largest developed in the ex- 

 periment. They were of the batch of L. 

 Harrisii x L. longiflorum and were har- 

 vested August 15, ten months and four- 

 teen days after the seed germinated. 

 These bulbs measure six inches in circum- 

 ference and each bulb produced three 

 flowers above the average size. Where 

 Harrisii was crossed with longiflorum, 

 the plants in full bloom six months and 

 thirteen days after germinating, the flow- 

 ers were almost always longer than with 

 the reciprocal cross, usually full two 

 inches longer. 



Lily farming in the United States is 

 so new that one must not be discouraged 

 if at first partial failure results. But 

 so easy is it to raise flowering plants 

 from seed that the writer is inclined to 

 believe that should the time come when 

 the disease is more rampant than at pres- 

 ent, growers will, when the subject is 

 better understood, be able to raise their 

 own bulbs by a system of greenhouse 

 treatment and have the plants from seed 

 flowering in pots ready to be sold with 

 a year. 



This will probably seem like a fairy 

 tale to the participants of the lily con- 

 ference held in London in 1901. One of 

 the papers read at that time states that 

 many Bpecies of lilium must have from 

 ten t.. twelve years to develop a flower- 

 ing bulb from seed. Elwes. in his Mono- 

 graph on the Genus Lilium, says of L. 

 longiflorum, "in three or four "years at 

 most, flowering bulbs will be produced 

 from seed if the young plants are prop- 

 erly treated." 



ASTERS AND DAHLIAS. 



A reader of the Review modest enough 

 to sign himself Ignorant sends me an 

 aster plant and says that I will see that 

 its roofs are full of lice and "there is 

 also a white grub," and he wants to 

 know if there is any way to get rid of 

 them. I must confess that without the 

 aid of a microscope I could discover 

 neither. Perhaps in the few days' trav- 

 el both had disappeared. The plant 

 looked fairly thrifty and the roots 

 healthy. The only remedy I can think 

 of, and one which, if not too much 

 trouble, would be effectual, is tobacco. 

 Dilute the rose leaf extract of tobacco 

 to seventy-five times its weight or its 

 measurement in water, or the nicotine 

 to three hundred times, and give the 

 plants a watering sufficient to wet the 

 soil well. I would add that if the same 

 plot of ground is to be used again next 

 year for any such crops, a good dressing 

 of slaked quicklime should" be harrowed 

 in next spring. 



The same reader asks: "Will dahlias 

 of different colors planted in the same 

 field mix -.. that plants grown from 

 these roots will -how the crossing here- 

 after, and will you also tell me if one 

 foot apart is too close to set seedling 



