320 



THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE OF AMERICA. 



EUCHARIAS AMAZONIEA. 



The accompan_\ing illustration, which shows a house 

 of the well known choice exotic plant Eucharias Amazon- 

 iea, is a collection grown by William Morrow, superin- 

 tendent of Mrs. H. (). Haverm}-er's estate, Palmer Hill, 

 Stamford. Conn. It should be grown more generally 

 where fine flowering stock is found, for there are few 

 flowers that can be called superior to the white flower of 

 the Eucharias. 



A side bench in the palm house, where they will have 

 some shade and bottom heat, will suit them nicely. They 

 would also do well on a back bench of a rose house, but 

 shade would be necessary in such a position. A bench 

 three feet wide, of cypress boards one and a half inches 

 thick, placed half an inch or more apart, so as to insure 

 good drainage, seems to suit them. Two inches of 

 roughly chopped, fibery sod, w'ith part of the soil shaken 

 out, should be spread over the boards or bench bottom 

 and pressed down level. The bench can then be filled 

 with cliopped sod and leaf mould or old manure in equal 

 parts and with a good cast of sheep manure and crushed 



with a few straggles between time, can be had. 

 A bench planted this way, three feet wide and 30 in 

 length, will give over 300 spikes at one crop after 

 the first year. And a house with several such benches 

 could be kept producing almost continuously with a little 

 juggling in growing and resting at dift'erent periods. 



A HOUSE OF El I ll.\klA> A.M.\ZUi\lEA. I HIS PLANT IS RARELY <;KUWX IX 



StrCH QUANTITY. 



charcoal well inixed in. This will subside an inch or 

 more after being planted and watered. Set the bulbs 

 in rows across the bench, about nine inches apart in the 

 row and sixteen inches between the rows. This may 

 seem rather wide at first, but during the second year the 

 space will nearly all be taken uji, they make sidings so 

 fast. 



There ought to be room for the hand with the hose to 

 get in to spray the under side of the leaves. This is 

 im]3ortant, as it is the only cleaning to keep down insects, 

 and should be done right along, except wdien the flowers 

 are open. When the bench has been filled with roots an 

 occasional dose of manure water should be given during 

 the six weeks of their growth. When the last leaf is 

 almost full size and no new ones coming up, it is time 

 to withhold water from the bench, except what they get 

 in the wav of spraying of the leaves, which will generally 

 keep the soil damp enough. 



Care should be taken not to let the soil get dust dry at 

 any time, even when resting, which will take five or si.x 

 weeks. As soon as they begin to send up a few flower 

 spikes the bench should get a thorough watering. Two 

 davs after give another, this . time with sheep or cow 

 manure. The temperature need not be over 55 at night 

 and better spikes of flowers will be obtained than if 

 more heat is given. In the growing period the heat had 

 better be kept up to 60 or more. The first year 

 one good crop of flowers is all that should be ex- 

 pected, but after that two or three good crops a year. 



PHEASANTS AS INSECTIVOROUS BIRDS. 



(Cuiitiniicd fruiii /'a^t' 31''.) 



As a table food, and also as a game bird, the pheas- 

 ant has been held as the leading bird for these two 

 qualities by the kings, royalty, wealth and educated 

 people of the world for more than two thousand years 

 as beirig of the greatest sport and richest delicacy. 

 No other bird has held such a position, and it will be 

 a long time before any other bird can gain such 

 distinction. 



The home of the Chinese ring-neck is largely in the 

 mountains, as well as in the valleys of China, and they 

 are accustomed to very severe weather, as it inhabits 

 the high altitudes, and yet adapts itself 

 to the lower altitudes, as low as sea level. 

 It is a thoroughbred bird and has been 

 imported into England in considerable 

 numbers to breed up the English 

 pheasant. Chinese ring-neck pheasants 

 are doing well liberated in the mountains 

 iif Colorado up to ''.000 feet altitude. 



The Feathered Jfoiid, Eondon : Erank 

 Einn, F. Z. S., says : "The Chinese 

 pheasant, like his human fellow country- 

 men, is very hardy, and will thrive any- 

 where, l:)earing the cold of a northern 

 United States winter and the heat of a 

 I'lengal summer quite well. It is also a 

 good breeder and bears confinement well."' 

 At the last annual meeting of the New 

 York Zoological Society $60,000 was 

 given to be used entirely for the study 

 of pheasants and the best methods to be 

 adopted for the introduction and distributing of these 

 birds into the United States. 



In a number of States the next Legislature will be 

 asked to pass liberal appropriations for propagating 

 the pheasant and other insectivorous and game birds 

 and the distribution of literature to instruct and aid 

 the people in the hatching of the eggs. 



THE VALUE OF CULTIVATING. 



Go where one may at this time one sees cultivators busily 

 at work in all the fields. This is one of the operations cease- 

 lessly iierfurmetl by farmers and gardeners, as the value of surface 

 scarifying, not only for the elimination and prevention of weed 

 growth, but for the conservation of moisture, lias been appreci- 

 ated for many years, and its value proclaimed from the house- 

 tops, so much so that the least experienced of growers knows 

 its value. We have had sufficient rains in most sections to keep 

 the heavier soils supjilied with moisture for the next five, six or 

 seven weeks, provided that this surface tillage is maintained. 

 \^'hat this cultivating does is not theoretical, and is a matter 

 of fact; it breaks the capillary tubes of the soil, and by choking 

 them over ^^ith a dust mulch, prevents evaporation. This evapo- 

 ration goes on all the day in caked and rain-beaten soil, whereas 

 the dust-like or broken surface is an antidote to it. 



(^ne thing should be noted in connection with irrigation sys- 

 tems: the grower is apt to water at short intervals and instead 

 of giving a soaking, gives comparatively .small amounts. This 

 causes a siu'face rooting tendency in the plants and develops 

 soft growth. The proper thing is to give eight or nine hoius of 

 steady overhead irrigation, which woidd be equal to about an 

 inch of rain, thereafter to allow the ground to dry out as it would 

 do naturally after rain, and instead of watering, to cultivate 

 .inst as one would if the irrigation system did not exist. — Florist 

 E.riliaiiric. 



