THE FLORISTS MANUAL. 



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have been many blocks of houses built 

 for roses and carnations, and some for 

 palms containing from five or six to a 

 dozen houses, and with no partition of 

 any kind between them. Some of the 

 blocks cover several acres. Now it is 

 evident that these houses would not be 

 suitable for plants requiring a differ 

 ence of temperature. They are all right 

 if occupied by all carnations or all 

 roses, needing about the same heat. We 

 have seen several such blocks and the 

 results have been good. There are some 

 advantages in construction and main 

 tenance. They are certainly less costly 

 than detached houses, are convenient and 

 cheap to heat ; the only shade is from the 

 gutters and that little is continuously 

 moving with the elevation of the sun. 

 There is a great and equal diffusion 

 of light in these connecting houses. 

 There is still another style of house 

 built in several places which can be any 

 desired length and some fifty feet in 

 width. There is no plate on the sides 

 where the bar ends, but the bar goes 

 down to a low wall, and where the plate 

 ordinarily would be is a bent glass, so 

 that there is no possible place for snow 

 and ice to lodge. With the sole excep 

 tion of this last house being .very lofty 

 and requiring a good deal of heating 

 power, it must be equal to a bellglass 

 for light. 



Ideal flowers have been produced in 

 all these different styles of houses. The 

 best bench of roses the writer ever saw 

 in midwinter Avas in one of these blocks 

 of connected houses, and the best carna 

 tions in an 18-foot house with two 

 6-foot raised benches, but that is noth 

 ing. The same growers may do as well 

 in very different houses. The principal 

 object sought in building for commercial 

 growing is to get all the light possible, 

 and the next is to build durably. 

 Twenty years ago we built with the idea, 

 that ten years was the life of a house. 

 Nowadays men are willing to put more 

 money into a house, but don t look for 

 ward to its rebuilding. And with all 

 the woodwork of a house of good 

 cypress and the outside walls up to the 

 glass of cement there seems to be noth 

 ing to rot or wear out. A coat of paint 

 is always in order both inside and out. 

 It preserves the wood, keeps iron ppsts 

 and purlins from rusting, and makes 

 the house light, bright and good as new. 

 It is money well spent. 



Some object to painting the steam 

 pipes. I can see no harm. They radiate 

 just as much heat and it adds light to 

 the house if they are on partition posts 

 or anywhere visible. There is of late a 

 decided dislike to building benches 

 against a front or back wall. If the 

 walls are upright glass the plants will 

 get light, but they often are not, and 

 if of posts and boards the bench, with 

 its continual wetting from the plants on 

 the bench, will soon rot, and if your 

 crops should be roses or carnations you 

 can only get to one side of them to 

 syringe or work. Let your path be be 

 tween the wall and the bench always 

 when possible and in laying out a new 

 house it will not only be possible but 

 easy. 



Rose House, Showing Bench Construction, Brick Walls with Tile Bottoms. 



Benches. 



There is no part of the greenhouse 

 structure that has received more ex 

 perimenting of late years than the 

 benches or beds. The quick and con 

 tinual rotting of the ordinary hemlock 

 or pine benches is the cause of that, for 

 it is a big item of expense. There are 

 so many different styles of benches and 

 semi-solid beds, that it would be tedious 

 to describe them all and I will only 

 describe those I consider best adapted 

 for the different kinds of houses. 



First then in a house of moderate 

 width, with side walls of wood, anything 

 but a raised bench would be out of the 

 question, as a low bed would not re 

 ceive sufficient light. For raised benches 

 we have lately received a boon, we 

 think, in the so-called pecky cypress. 

 We had a carload of this material laid 

 down in Buffalo at not more than five 

 per cent cost over hemlock. It is rough 

 looking stuff, and you would think some 

 species of borer had riddled the tree, 

 but it is not the work of borer or worm, 

 for this material comes from the heart 

 of the tree. Sellable men tell us it 

 will outlast hemlock three or four times. 

 If so, then it is a boon. All sizes of 

 this lumber can be procured. 



Another raised bench is a framework 

 of IV-L-inch pipe and crosspieces of tee- 

 iron on which are laid hollow tile or 

 brick. These are made in many sizes. 

 A convenient size is ten inches wide, 

 thirteen inches long and two and one- 

 half inches thick. This makes a fine 

 bench, either for planted out stuff or 

 plants in pots. Many growers in place 

 of the hollow brick use for bench floor 

 a common 2-inch round tile, which is 

 about three inches outside. As tile now 

 enters very largely into bench and bed 

 construction its expense depends on how 

 near you are to a manufacturing yard. 



Where it is but a short and direct rail 

 road haul, you will find both the hollow 

 brick and the tile cheaper than 2-inch 

 plauk and then think of the excellence 

 of the drainage qualities and the dura 

 bility. 



For a semi-solid bed there are many 

 different methods. A low wall of cement, 

 say one foot high, four inches at bottom 

 tapering to two inches at top, then filled 

 in with six or seven inches of rubble 

 stone and finished off to the top with 

 your compost. One very large grower 

 of roses tells me he wants no other 

 bench. 



A bench I prefer is the cement walls 

 filled firmly and evenly to the top with 

 any old soil you have, then a floor of 

 the hollow brick or 2-inch tile and a 

 cement edging of four or five inches. 

 This would be very nearly everlasting 

 and would bring the surface of the bed 

 twenty inches above the floor, a good 

 convenient height for anything planted 

 out. The Dale Estate, of Brampton, 

 Ont., which has miles of these beds, in 

 stead of cement walls has four or five 

 brick laid up, then filled in with earth 

 and the tile floor and cement edge. This 

 is precisely the same but more expensive 

 than the cement walls. 



Now what I am going to say is from 

 observation and some tests with the 

 thermometer. These low beds will be 

 a success or failure depending largely 

 upon where your heating pipes are 

 placed. If your benches are raised and 

 there are two feet of free air space 

 between the floor and the bottom of 

 bench, and your heating pipes are on 

 side walls or partition posts, the air be 

 neath the benches will in time become 

 the same as that of the rest of the 

 house. But where the surface of bed 

 is only a foot or fifteen inches above 

 the floor, the temperature of the bed 

 even where there is tile will be cooler 



