46 



nection with their distribution and probable classification. I 

 have been especially occupied with what appear to be the less 

 specialized forms of certain families and orders and their com- 

 parison with plants of families of suspected relationships, par- 

 ticularly in the groups with specialized placentation, the Pa- 

 rietales and Papaverales, with chiefly parietal placentation, 

 and the Centrospermae and Primulales, with chiefly central 

 placentation. Along these lines, a paper on "Comparisons 

 between the Cactaceae and the Aizoaceae" was presented before 

 the Systematic Section of the Botanical Society of America at 

 the Washington meeting. 



REPOI^T OF CURATOR OF PLANTS AND PLANTATIONS 



FOR 1924 



Dr. C. Stuart Gager, Director. 



Sir: The amount of new work accomplished is less than for 

 any previous year in the Garden's history. The following is 

 the record: 



1. Seeding down lawn between the museum and reservoir; about 



one fourth the total area to be seeded. 



2. Soil improvement o^'er balance of this area carried forward. 



3. Barbed wire fencing erected around Japanese Garden. 



There are two reasons why this record is so meagre. In- 

 sufficient men is, of course, the chief one. The other has to 

 do with the w^ay which circumstances practically force us to use 

 them. Two men go daily to the gardening force to replace help 

 lost with the graduation of Federal Board students. A third is 

 assigned to the experimental plot, and another to the paths, 

 leaving a daily average of eight men which is not enough to 

 properly maintain the grounds, much less begin new work on 

 any considerable scale. 



I should like to call attention to the increasing amount of 

 time spent in tinkering with the fence, wooden steps and bridges. 

 The replacement of these by more permanent structures will 

 release a good deal of time-consuming effort for new work. 



