January 30, 1919. 



The Florists^ Review 



17 



SEASONABLE NOTES. 



Cypripediiuns. 



I have never known a month when 

 cypripediums have found so ready and 

 profitable a market as the one through 

 which we are now passing. One great 

 feature with them is that it is not neces- 

 sary to cut them as soon as they open, 

 as they will keep many weeks, or even 

 months, on the plants in perfect condi- 

 tion. While cypripediums lack the bril- 

 liant coloring of cattleyas, they are 

 fascinating flowers and the care of the 

 better known sorts is so easy that no 

 one possessing a greenhouse need be 

 afraid to essay their culture. Fortu- 

 nately, we are not dependent on impor- 

 tations for keeping up our stock of 

 these useful terrestrial orchids, as they 

 increase in size rapidly and are easily 

 propagated by division. By far the 

 most useful of all the lady's slippers 

 is Cypripedium insigne. There are 

 many varieties of this, and the yellow 

 forms, once scarce and high-priced, are 

 now reasonable in price. C. insigne 

 Sanderse is still the best, but C. San- 

 derianum, C. Laura Kimball and 

 others are beautiful. All true 

 cypripediums succeed well in a winter' 

 minimum of 50 degrees to 55 degrees. 

 They will stand more heat, but if grown 

 in the cooler temperature the flowers 

 possess more substance. As these cypri- 

 pediums pass out of flower, any divid- 

 ing, surface dressing or repotting that 

 may be necessary can be done. For , 

 compost I find a mixture of fern fiber 

 and fibrous loam, with sphagnum and 

 broken charcoal added, suits the insigne 

 section. Other cypripediums, such as 

 C. Harrisianum, C. villosum and C. 

 Leeanum, probably the next best com- 

 mercial cypripedium after insigne; C. 

 Lawrenceanum, etc., succeed well in a 

 compost of fern fiber, charcoal and 

 fresh sphagnum. Cypripediums enjoy 

 a closer and moister atmosphere than 

 cattleyas. In an arid atmosphere, 

 thrips, red spider and other pests 

 are sure to attack them. There is good 

 money in cyps. Their culture is easy 

 and all possessing them should take 

 good care of them and, when occasion 

 offers to procure more of them at a rea- 

 sonable cost, embrace it. 



Dendroblums. 



^ The season for dendrobiums has ar- 

 rived. Of course there are usually some 

 members of this interesting family in 

 bloom, but for the next two months or 

 more, the many varieties of D. nobile 

 and that showy variety, D. Wardianum, 

 will be at their best. Keep the plants 



cool and dry until you are sure the nodes 

 or swellings on their pseudobulbs will 

 produce flowers and not growths. D. 

 nobile is an old orchid, introduced as 

 long ago as 1836, according to M. Andre. 

 It is one of the orchids which change 

 their odor during the periods of the day. 

 The scent resembles grass in the early 

 morning, honey at noon and primroses 

 in the evening. On a clear day it is 

 certainly delightful. While one of 

 the oldest varieties of orchids, D. 

 nobile remains one of the best and a 

 specimen plant carrying 100 to 1,400 

 blooms will outclass any cattleya which 

 is placed beside it. All the dendrobes 

 like heat and moisture while making 

 their growth. The nobiles then need 

 cooler and drier treatment to produce 

 a satisfactory crop of flowers. We are 

 dependent on the East Indies for all our 

 dendrobiums, phalsenopsis, etc., and will 

 miss them indeed. D. nobile can be 



propagated easily, however, by laying 

 its pseudobulbs, when mature, in pans 

 or flats of sphagnum and packing them 

 down. If placed in a warm house and 

 occasionally sprayed, young plants will 

 start from many of the joints. These 

 can later be potted in a mixture of 

 sphagnum and fern fiber, which suits 

 dendrobiums better than a compost of 

 fern fiber only. Young plants succeed 

 splendidly in sphagnum only. 



Odontoglossums. 



In the winter all the odontoglos- 

 sums should have a clear house and full 

 sunshine. The foliage of the beautiful 

 crispum section will take on a bronze 

 hue and become much hardier. These 

 plants will come through the torrid sum- 

 mer months much better than those kept 

 in a north house where no sun reaches 

 them in midwinter. The flower spikes 

 on all odontoglossums should be pro- 

 tected by a wrapping of cotton wool 

 as a protection from shell snails, which 

 lurk in the moss and eat the spikes of 

 odontoglossums and oncidiums with 

 avidity. Give the plants a fair supply 

 of moisture now and spray them on all 

 clear days. The pretty, pure white, 

 sweetly scented Odontoglossum pulchel- 

 lum majus is now in bloom. It has been 

 commonly called the lily of the valley 

 orchid and its spikes are splendid for 

 use in choice bouquets or other floral 

 work. It is of easy culture. It likes 

 a little more heat than the crispum sec- 

 tion and does well at the cool end of 

 the cattleya house, where also O. cit- 

 rosmum and O. grande succeed well. 



MUM MIDGE. 



We are sending you a sample of the 

 soil in which our mums were grown, also 

 a few of the mums attacked by the red 

 fly. Do you consider this soil suitable 

 for growing mumsf Do you know of 

 anything we can use to get rid of the 

 flies t H. G. E.— Wash. 



The soil submitted is good enough to 

 grow mums, but the shoots enclosed were 

 badly infested with mum midge. If the 

 whole planting is as badly infested as 

 the stock sent, I would suggest that you 

 destroy and burn your entire stock of 

 mums and start in with new stock. 



Midge is a pest so well known that it 

 is, perhaps, hardly necessary to go into 

 details describing it. The midge lays its 

 eggs in the tissues of the leaf and the 

 larvffi hatch out immediately and soon 

 begin reproducing in their turn and this 

 process continues indefinitely. When 

 specimens are so badly infested as the 

 leaves submitted, the growth of the 

 plants is stunted. 



Midge can be eliminated by persistent 

 use of fumigants. Fumigate with to- 

 bacco dust, or some other tobacco prep- 

 aration strong enough to kill the flies, 

 every other night for four or five weeks 

 during the winter months. The plants 

 come out entirely clean after the nightly 

 fumigation, which kills the flies as they 

 hatch out. The best thing for fumigat- 



ing is tobacco dust, on account of its 

 long-continued smoking. I imagine this 

 midge will pass along in a year or two, 

 as in the case of the mum rust and other 

 ills to which mum plants have been heir 

 at different times. 



One trouble about the mum midge is 

 that it will reproduce outside in Shasta 

 daisies and plants of a like character. 

 In fact, the Shasta daisy acts as a host 

 plant for this pest when there are no 

 mums around for it to feed on. A work- 

 ing knowledge of this pest, its habits 

 and host plants, is necessary in order 

 to eliminate it. 



We have found that stock grown in 

 the greenhouse and afterwards used for 

 propagating is more liable to be infest- 

 ed with insects and diseases such as this 

 than stock planted outdoors and used 

 for propagation purposes, since the 

 greenhouse plants have used up nearly 

 all their vitality in flowering the pre- 

 vious fall, and are less able to resist 

 these diseases and insects. C. H. T. 



Torresdale, Pa. — George B. Morrell 

 reports that he had fine results from his 

 advertisement of lettuce plants, selling 

 37,000. 



Arkansas City, Kan. — L. E. Flindt 

 and W. H. Magner, proprietors of the 

 A. C. Floral Co., will open a downtown 

 retail store February 1 on Summit 



street. 



