THE AQUARIUM, JULY, 1893. 



63 



AQUATIC PLANTS FROM SEED. 



To grow aquatic plants from seed, 

 take an ordinary square crockery pud- 

 ding-dish, cover the bottom of same 

 one half inch deep with clean, sharp 

 sand which has been baked in an oven 

 to kill all germs of convervae. On this 

 sand sprinkle sufficient cold water, 

 which has also been freed from any 

 spores by boiling, to make it reach to 

 just below the surface of the sand. On 

 this wet surface sow the seeds and cover 

 them by sifting dry sand prepared as 

 above over them to a thickness of less 

 than a straw. The moisture from the 

 sand below will soon penetrate to the 

 new surface and the seeds are thus 

 evenly imbedded. Cover the dish with 

 a pane of window glass to avoid too 

 rapid evaporation, keep in strong light 

 but protect against the direct rays of 

 the sun. Never allow the surface to 

 become dry, but when sprinkling always 

 use water that has been boiled ; of 

 course when used it should be of ordin- 

 ary temperature. When the seeds be- 

 gin to sprout and show above the sand, 

 use the water more liberal and keep on 

 raising the water depth from time to 

 time at the same rate as the young 

 seedlings grow. They should always 

 be near the water surface. If, in spite 

 of all precaution, fine green convervae 

 growth begins to appear on the young 

 plants or on top of the sand, introduce 

 some young frog-tadpoles, the younger 

 the better; these feeding on the conver- 

 vae will soon clean the plants without 

 injury to the latter. When the seed- 

 lings have completed their third or 

 fourth leaf, they should be transplanted 

 or thinned out, but they must be kept 

 under the same careful treatment until 

 they are strong enough to outgrow any 

 injuries. 



THE SAGITTARIA FRANCIS M. 



Our seedling Sagittaria, " Francis 

 M.," which is now two years old, proves 

 to be an aquarium plant of the very 

 highest order. All winter it is very 

 attractive through its broad ribbon-like 

 leaves (blades), which are of a delicate, 

 but brilliant green. The network of 

 veins in these leaves are almost as dis- 

 tinct as those of the Patamogeton 

 crispus. The leaves, although rather 

 strong, are by no means stiff looking ; 

 they are always in graceful curves, no 

 two being alike. Last February the 

 aireal leaves appeared. On a triangular 

 stem these rise eighteen inches above 

 the surface of the water. They are 

 lance-shaped, strong in texture and 

 gracefully curved. Never more than 

 five leaves are in perfection at once ; 

 whenever a sixth one appears, the oldest 

 one turns yellow and is promptly re- 

 moved with the knife. In the begin- 

 ning of March it sent up the first flower 

 spike, which bore twenty-four perfect 

 flowers. These opened in succession, 

 each day three, thus the spike remained 

 in bloom for nearly ten days. The in- 

 dividual flowers are of the size of a 

 quarter of a dollar, jiure white, with 

 rich yellow stamens. They are not fra- 

 grant however. We were just looking at 

 the last faded flowers when we noticed 

 a second flower spike shooting up above 

 the surface of the water ; this having 

 Ijloomed a third one appeared, and now, 

 June 30th, while we are writing this, 

 the fourth flower spike is about six 

 inches above the water and will display 

 its flowers in about three days. Now 

 if we consider that this plant was raised 

 from seed in an ordinary parlor aquar- 

 ium near a window in our room, from 

 seed which was obtained by crossing 

 two distinct species, which were also 



