ORCHIDS: now TO GROW THEM SUCCESSFULLY. 115 



would cost from 40s. to 60s. Good healthy young plants, which would 

 produce one spike with two or three flowers, and suitable for growing 

 on, should be purchased for about 21s. 



ANGRJECUM SANDERIANUM. From Madagascar. 



This is a much smaller growing species than the foregoing, and the 

 flowers, which are pure white and numerous, are arranged very neatly 

 on either side of a pendulous spike about one foot long, and forming a 

 beautiful natural spray, which can be used with charming effect in a 

 lady's toilette, either for the shoulder or hair. It should be grown in 

 small baskets or pans suspended from the roof in a moist and shady 

 part of the house, and requires exactly the same kind of treatment 

 as recommended for A. sesqiiipedale. The flower spikes commence 

 growing in the autumn, but do not open their blossoms until February 

 or March. 



Good strong plants should be from 10s. 6d. to 21s. for one leading 

 growth capable of producing one or two spikes each year. 



CALAXTIIE x VEITCHIT. Garden Hybrid. 



Calanthes are found in most of the large establishments, even 

 where Orchids generally are not cultivated, and being winter-blooming 

 plants they are popular favourites. A compost of good yellow turfy 

 loam, with a good amount of broken charcoal and coarse silver sand 

 added, is the best for it. The pot should be filled to one-third its 

 depth with good drainage, and the compost, which should be pressed 

 moderately firm, left half-an-inch below the rim in order that the plant 

 can be well watered. The bulbs should be potted singly, in from 4-inch 

 to 6-inch pots, or two or three smaller ones in a 6-inch, and should 

 have the old compost and roots entirely removed before being placed 

 into the new pots. The base must be inserted about half-an-inch deep 

 in the fresh compost, and secured in an upright position with a small 

 piece of stick to which the top of the bulb can be fastened, when new 

 roots will speedily be formed. Repotting should take place every year, 

 for it is highly injurious to these Calanthes to be kept in the same 

 soil two years in succession; doing it in February or March, when 

 the new growths are about one inch long and young roots begin to 

 push out and are ready to take firm hold of the new soil. 



Although many persons grow Calanthes extremely well, there are 

 numerous others who signally fail in doing so, owing to some details in 

 management not being understood, such as care in watering and the 

 position the plant occupies after the bulbs are potted. They should be 

 placed in the warmest house, quite near to the glass a high shelf being 

 a most suitable place where there is an abundance of light, and very 

 little water given, not commencing the watering until a week after 

 repotting and about once a week after, until the foliage is well up, say 



