1877.] 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



11 



healthy growth, selecting the best young shoots 

 only for propagating. Give the plants a dry airy 

 atmosphere with plenty of light, in preference to 

 a very damp, close green or hot-house atmos- 

 phere. 



VERBENA RUST AND VERBENA GROWING. 



BY J. M., PHILAd'A. 



The two communications in the Monthly with- 

 in a short time past on the Verbena and the rust 

 which attacks it, show an unabated interest in 

 this old and beautiful flower. The rust, for many 

 years past, has been a serious drawback to its 

 growth, many florists failing completely to cope 

 with it, and few indeed are the establishments 

 where the plant can be seen entirely free from 

 the obnoxious pest. Mr. Palmer, in the Septem- 

 ber number, has told us of a simple remedy of 

 his for the rust, viz., pulverized charcoal applied 

 to the rust spots, which if found a satisfactory 

 one by all, will place us under great obligations 

 to him. Preventives we know are better than 

 remedies, yet it has never been my fortune to see 

 them so well applied that there was no rust to 

 remedy. The Verbena likes nothing better than 

 good rich soil and a cool atmosphere. It will 

 not do to starve it in poor soil — or, look out for 

 the rust. It does not object to a small pot, pro- 

 vided plenty of good food be supplied, and it be 

 not checked in any way. I have seen to-day, as 

 healthy a lot of Verbenas in thumb pots as one 

 could wish for. They were struck in the end of 

 August, from plants from which all rusty ones 

 had been thrown out as they appeared; and pot- 

 ted iia soil enriched with manure. No rus* has 

 yet appeared, but it most likely will to a small 

 extent, as no collection seems for long entirely 

 free from it. Rust, in my experience, is the con- 

 sequence of starvation, or of a checked growth 

 from some other cause. This is shown by the 

 fact that even rusty plants when bedded out in 

 Spring, will to a great extent grow out of it, and 

 make healthy growth ; and it is said, in Califor- 

 nia where the Verbena stands out winter and 

 summer, and makes a strong vigorous growth, 

 the rust is unknown. 



THE VERBENA. 



BY W. C. L. DREAV, EL DORADO, CAL. 



The Verbena is a native of Buenos Ayres, and 

 was first introduced into England about 1825, 

 imported into this country about ten years 



later, and created quite a sensation among the 

 florists of those times, maintaining its position 

 as a first-class flower for florists and amateurs 

 ever since. 



Within the last twelve years the improvement 

 in this plant, both as regards size and color of 

 the flower, have been wonderful, but it is one of 

 the saddest truths of floriculture that this great 

 improvement in the flower has destroyed the ro- 

 bust, healthy, and good constitutioned plant of 

 old, and given us a more magniflcent flowering 

 plant, with a sickly constitution, liable to the at- 

 tack of insects and disease. With this plant as 

 it now is, we must now deal, and though it 

 seems impossible to restore its former vigor by 

 any means in our power, yet by careful cultiva- 

 tion we can have healthy plants, not it is true, as 

 strong as formerly but still healthy. 



First we must have good, young plants, raised 

 from seed; slips will not do, for I find that plants 

 raised from slips are more liable to be assailed 

 by the disease known as rust, and in fact it is al- 

 ways the case that plants attacked by this disease 

 are old plants saved over two or more years, or 

 plants started from slips ; therefore I advise all 

 desiring healthy plants to use seedlings. 



I sow seed in the Spring as early as possible in 

 hotbeds, and by the time frost is over we have fine 

 little plants ; the frames must be opened every 

 day that they can be open with safety. 



Have your bed prepared, good and rich with 

 well decayed manure; have the soil rather sandy, 

 but if not naturally so, get sandy soil and mix 

 with it, and have it in as warm and sunshiny place 

 as possible ; by the middle of May transplant 

 your seedlings; doing so on a cloudy but warm 

 day; see that the soil does not get too dry and I 

 think you will have no cause to complain. To 

 avoid root-lice do not plant two years in succes- 

 sion in the same bed. If you would avoid rust, 

 use no old plants saved over, or plants raised 

 from slips ; if a plant gets rusty pull it up and 

 throw it away ; better lose one plant than a bed. 



FLOWERING OF THE EUCHARIS AMAZONICA 

 UNDER DIFFICULTIES. 



BY CIIAS. J. HAETTEL, SAN JOSE, CAL. 



After many trials I have at last succeeded in 

 flowering the Eucharis Amazonica. Last winter 

 was very hard out here on all kinds of plants 

 that needed more heat than was afforded by 

 Nature. 



From the middle of January we could make 



