January 26, 1S07 



HORTICULTURE 



95 



this begonia well-covered with foliage, flowers and buds. 

 This plant was brought from Cincinnati by Mr. Peter- 

 son last fall and used by him as a sample in taking 

 orders. After he had got through with it, in Boston, 

 he presented it to the editor of Horticulture who, 

 after it had stood several days in the office, took it 

 home. ■ It has since done acceptable duty on the 

 Thanksgiving table and Christmas table and is still in 

 good order. What other begonia or, indeed, what other 

 flowering plant is there that would have withstood so 

 well a like experience? We know of none. Our 

 columns are open to anyono iiaving a reply. 



Cypripedium insigne 



Our frontispiece shows a group of this useful orchid 

 in bloom at the greenhouses in charge of M. J. Pope at 

 N'augatuck, Conn. These are not selected from a large 

 number but are the only plants grown there — twenty in 

 all. The pots are from 5-inch to 10-inch and carried 

 in the aggregate 385 blooms. Our object in giving 

 them prominence at this time is to impress on those who 

 are interested the commercial value of Cypripedium 

 insigne for cut flowers purposes. 



Mr. Pope writes as follows regarding their care : 



■'These plants have not been disturbed since May, 

 1902, when they were potted in a mixture of turfy 

 loam, fern root and lumps of old dried cow manure. 

 By this time there is little else but root in the pots, and 

 some of the plants will get another shift this winter. 

 All through the summer, until the first flowers ex- 

 pand, the plants are watered once or twice a week with 

 liquid cow and horse manure combined beside their 

 regiUar daily syringing overhead. 



"After the flowers are all open, the plants are removed 

 to cooler quarters for about two or three months, when 

 water is given very sparingly. The rest of the year 

 they are growing with the cattleyas, where the tempera- 

 ture is from 58 to 65 degrees at night, according to out- 

 side conditions, and correspondingly higher during day- 

 time. 



"A record of the number of flowers produced since re- 

 potting in ]9()-4 may not be out of place here as show- 

 ing that it is not wise to disturb cypripediums unless 

 absolutelv necessarv : In WO'i, 75 flow^ers; in 1903, 

 156; 1904, 226; ]9"05, 335; 1906, 385; a total of 1177 

 in five years. .Supposing the iilooms had been sold at 

 10 cents apiece, this would liave realized the sum of 

 $117.10 from twenty plants oceupying 45 square feet 

 of benchroom." 



Let Horticulture Work For You 



If you have anything to sell to florists, gardeners, 

 park superintendents, seedsmen, let this paper sell it 

 for you. It is the cheapest re])resentative you can send 

 out for it reaches thousands of good buyers once a week 

 and the cost is only a trifle. Tell your story in Hor- 

 ticulture's advertising columns and the best people 

 in the profession will surely see it and read it. 



Schlechtes Wetter 



Should 1 liappen to come across a Fatherlander of 

 the "rose-house wisdom" variety, and ask his opinion 

 as to the suitability of the weather of the month just 

 past in relation to his business, I am morally certain 

 that 1 would be answered in the above words, which, for 

 the' benefit of those who are not so versed in the German 

 language means "bad weather," a conclusion I cannot 

 other than assent to; for a more sunless, cheerless and 

 chaugeable weather for a December month would be hard 

 to find. It thorefo!re must have been a trying month for 

 my fellow craftsman, private as well as commercial. 

 Wliile the latter may feel the result of a sunless sky 

 more keenly as affecting more directly the weapons for 

 chasing the proverbial wolf from the door, it does not 

 follow that the former though receiving a stated salary 

 at the end of each month, sunshine or not, provided he 

 otherwise Ix'haves himself, is less affected by weather 

 conditions, for it does affect him as well as liis brother 

 riorist, if not in the same spot, in that which gives 

 cheer and pleasure to both. 



To be assured of a bountiful supply of presentable 

 ilowers all around at the yule-tide season, means to the 

 gardener that he will bo in good humor for the next 

 ■^ix months at least, regardless of salary, and I suppose 

 the florist is closely akin to him in this resp.ect, as he 

 too rises aloft beyond the mere pleasure a bank account 

 affords. But here comes the rib that I had in mind 

 when I started this note. Anxiety on the one hand to 

 ])rocure the wherewithal to successfully circumvent the 

 aforesaid wolf while the season is propitious and on 

 the other hand to secure a large supply simply to 

 jilivise, has an element of some danger. And in this 

 direction I would say, that it is the wise person, not 

 to say experienced, that does not yield to temptations, 

 particularly while Nature is against him. for what at 

 best can be but a fleeting advantage. 



The person that takes his plants through with the 

 least constitutional weakness under prolonged adverse 

 circumstances as prevailed in the month just past, or 

 any other month similarly disadvantageous, is one who 

 knows his business, and his assets are more likely to be 

 continuous and bulky at the end of the year than they 

 would be had he undermined the vitality of the stock 

 by overforcing. 



To provide against, and meet as well as that can be 

 done, the bad effect of a lengthened continuance of such 

 weather as we have been contemplating, calls forth the 

 subtlest skill of the plantsman's art, and I know of no 

 more scientific plan in plantsmanship than that which 

 relates to airing and watering under all conditions, and 

 especially the conditions that I have been relating. 

 Those are the situations calculated to test the true 

 merits of the plantsinan, when, I divine, our friend, the 

 "mechanical fellow," would necessarily take a back seat, 

 or otherwise go through an uncommon course of com- 

 plicated schoolincr. 



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