240 



PROPAGATION BY SUCKERS, SLIPS, ETC. 



Fig. 190. 



Fig. 191. 



down the entire plants, when a stem-sucker will be produced, as in 

 fig. 190, in consequence of the check given to the ascending sap by the 



acute angle formed by the bend, 

 after which all the other branches 

 of the plant may be cut off close to 

 the stem-sucker. Cuttings of the 

 side branches of Cunninghamia 

 lanceolata have by this treatment 

 made as good plants as seedlings ; 

 and we believe it has also been 

 successful with Araucaria excelsa. 

 Offsets. An offset is a term for 

 the most part confined to the small 

 bulbs, corms, tubers, or under- 

 ground stems, which are formed 

 The branches of a coniferous plant pegged at the gide of the bage of } 

 down to force ^t to throw up a stem- j T_ r i .1 i 



sucker as a leader. ones > and b 7 whlch the P lailt 



producing them may be propa- 

 gated. They are very readily observed in the hyacinth, tulip, and 

 crocus, in which they afford the only means of propagation, excepting 

 by seed. All offsets have a natural tendency to separate from the 

 parent bulb, excepting when they are very small and young; in 

 which case they are left adhering to the parent 

 bulb or tuber for another growing season. When 

 offsets are to be separated, the bulb, when it is 

 in a dormant state, is taken up, and the offsets 

 are removed and planted by themselves, at 

 various depths, according to the size and nature 

 of the offset ; and bearing in mind that all bulbs 

 are buds, and consequently that they would all 

 grow if placed on the surface of moist soil, and 

 pressed firmly against it, without any covering 

 of soil. Offsets may be produced from bulbs, 

 by searing or otherwise destroying their central 

 bud by mutilation, or by cutting them over a 

 little above the plate from which the scales 

 proceed, as in the hyacinth, and the concentric 

 The buds in the axils of coats, or rudiments of tubular leaves, as in the 

 the scales of a bulb de- onion the budg in both cases bein in the axilg 

 veloped in consequence , , ^-i / 



of injuries sustained by of tlie members. Sometimes the frost destroying 

 the scales from frost, the outer scales of a bulb will stimulate the buds 

 in their axils to develop themselves (fig. 191) ; 



and sometimes, when the scales are very closely compressed at top, the 

 buds in their axils will be developed, and will protrude below (fig. 192). 

 A bulb of Crinum canaliculatum, cut over a little above the plate, was 

 found by M. Syringe to throw out no fewer than forty offsets. 



Runners are long slender shoots, with joints at distant intervals, 

 which are protruded from the collar of perennial herbaceous or sub- 

 herbaceous plants, such as the strawberry, many grasses, some saxi- 



