PROPAGATION BY CUTTINGS, ETC. 65 



plants from the old leaf and pot them off in a 

 sandy soil with lots of leafmould in it. 



The pretty little marble-leaved peper- 

 omia is another plant propagated from the 

 leaf, but instead of cutting the leaf it is laid 

 on the sand and the leaf stalk covered up. 

 The gloxinia may also be propagated by 

 tubers forming at the cuts. 



The umbrella plant {Cyperus alterni- 

 folius) is perhaps the easiest of all plants 

 to propagate by rooting the leaves. It 

 is the simplest anyway. Cut off the bunch of 

 leaves with, perhaps, one-quarter or one- 

 eighth of an inch of stem, and put it in water. 

 Never allow the water to become stale, 

 which is best done by adding to it a few 

 pieces of charcoal. In a few weeks a new 

 plant will be seen pushing up from among 

 the leaflets. Carefully separate it from 

 the old leaf and pot it up. 



PROPAGATING BY OFFSET 



Some plants produce a lot of suckers 

 or rosettes at the base of the plant, near 

 the ground. Familiar examples of this are 

 hen and chickens, and the screw pine 

 {Pandanus Veitchii). The former forms 



