260 



THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST. 



fail to bring success either to profes- 

 sional or amateur. — E. L. Toplin, in 

 Rural New- Yorker. 



PRIMULA OBCONICA. 



This pretty perpetual-blooming prim- 

 rose is a native of the Tchang Valley, 

 China, and was collected by Charles 

 Maries for Messrs. Yeitch, of London, 

 some four or five years ago. It has 

 many good points which make it at 

 once a friend of the florist, and, when 

 more generally known, it will undoubt- 

 edly be grown extensively. The heads 

 of bloom can be cut with a long stem 

 bearing sixteen to twenty flowers, each 

 about an inch in diameter, which will 

 last two weeks or more after being cut, 

 and travel well. The color of the 

 flowers is pure white, sometimes chang- 

 ing to lilac, and where several plants 

 are grown you might imagine there 

 were two or three varieties. I have 

 seen plants at the Cambridge (Mass.) 

 botanic garden with over lOU spikes of 

 bloom at one time. Mr. Manda propa- 

 gates it by division of the roots in the 

 same manner as the double primrose. 

 It thrives well in a cool green-house 

 under clear glass in winter. The flow- 

 ers should be kept picked off* from June 

 to September, as the plant will bloom 

 and thrive better the following win- 

 ter. — American Florist. 



It will be noticed that Primula Cash- 

 meriana is among the premiums for 

 1887.— Ed. 



HOW TO POT A PLANT. 



Who does not know howl may be 

 asked. We venture to say that a mat- 

 ter weighing as lightly as this often 

 does with growers is very often the one 

 point between future success and failure 

 in plant culture. 



The engraving almost shows how 

 without further explanation. A cbief 

 point is drainage. This, so far as under- 



drainage is concerned, is clearly set 

 forth in the cut. There is first some- 

 thing like an inch of broken pot-shreds. 



coarse soil 

 ■""moss 



PoTSHERDS 



POTTING — THE PLACING OF THE MATERIALS. 



carefully laid, for shedding water. 

 Then — and a very important part — 

 comes a strata of moss or sphagnum to 

 keep the earth above from settling into 

 the drainage below. A clogged drain 

 is of no use. Above this comes the 

 soil, seeing that coarse parts, such as 

 roll down the sides of the heap, go to 

 the bottom as shown in the cut. 



Besides such underdrainage, there is 

 clear gain in a similar direction, by 

 having the sides of the pots clean and 

 porous, the dealers in painted pots to 

 the contrary notwithstanding. For 

 plants to do their best there needs to 

 be not only porousness, for the escape 

 of water, for the admission of air to 

 the roots. A painted or dirty pot or a 

 a wooden box or cask in a large mea- 

 sure obstructs the admission of air from 

 the sides. 



The larger the pot the more needful 

 is underdrainage, and the less needful 

 is side porousness. Hence pots smaller 

 than three inches across scarcely need 

 the former, while receptacles larger 



