TEMPERATURE AND MOISTURE. 31 



the healthy growth of plants than the proper application 

 of temperature and moisture. 



CHAPTER VI. 



TEMPERATURE AND MOISTURE. 



In a recent number of the New York Horticulturist, I 

 took occasion to express my views on this matter, under 

 the head of " Don't Mistake the Causes," which I again 

 present here, with some additions. 



Many young gardeners and amateurs flounder befogged, 

 attributing failure of crops in the garden, or want of 

 health of plants in the green-house, to bad seeds, uncon- 

 genial soil or fertilizers, when it is much oftener the case 

 that the cause is of a totally different nature, and entirely 

 within their control. A temperature at which seeds are 

 sown and plants grown must be congenial to the nature 

 of the variety, else success can not follow. In a tempera- 

 ture at which a Portulaca will vigorously germinate, a 

 Pansy seed would lie dormant, or at least show a sickly 

 existence, and vice versa. Nearly half of the Lima beans 

 sown annually perish by being sown from two to three 

 weeks too early, by the impatience of our embryo horticul- 

 turists. On the other hand, the colder-blooded Carrot or 

 Turnip seed all but refuse to germinate in the sultry days 

 of July. Seeds of Calceolarias, Cinerarias, Chinese Prim- 

 roses, and Pansies, will germinate more freely and make 

 better plants by delaying the sowing until the middle of 

 September than if sown earlier. Many failures are attrib- 

 utable to want of knowledge of this fact, and, without 

 question, laid to the charge of the seedsman. 



The same necessity of accommodating the temperature 



