30 



The Weekly Florists' Review. 



Mat 7, 1008. 



ruffled strains of Mr. Kunderd, and my 

 own as well, were to be lost, neither he 

 nor I would have any definite idea as to 

 just what parent stocks to use in the at- 

 tempt to reproduce them from seed. 1 

 should have no hesitation in classifying 

 them as sports, a form of variation un- 

 usual, it is true, in gladioli, but which 

 cannot be denied to the species. Prob- 

 ably a true and permanent instance of 

 a well-defined sport in gladioli is as yet 

 unknown, unless we except the redund- 

 ancy of petalage in some varieties, which 

 has raised hopes of the production of a 

 genuine "flore pleno" sort, but no one 

 can say that sports will not appear here, 

 as in other sections of plant life. 



The Power of Intensive Culture. 



Now, I think it will be conceded that 

 the potent factor in the production of a 

 sport is not seed-variation, but rather 

 intensive, high culture. Under this 

 stimulus the plant, impelled far beyond 

 the range of its ordinary routine, re- 

 sponds by a redundance, a real extrava- 

 gance of growth unknown before, and 

 breaks into new manifestation of form, 

 color or habit. That which had for ages 

 been bound up in the heart of the plant, 

 as heretofore simply an innate "capabil- 

 ity of development," becomes, under the 

 stress of the unaccustomed environment, 

 a "developed capability," and, if fos- 

 tered and fixed, becomes a new form or 

 strain. There is no need to seek for 

 other causes than simply this one of in- 

 tense, persistent high culture — every 

 need of the plant supplied to the utmost 

 and all its capacity of development 

 urged to responsive activity, until it 

 breaks over the bounds of its ordinary 

 limitations in the very exuberance of its 

 increased vitality. 



There is also, I believe, a cumulative 

 power in such high culture, gaining 

 strength as successive seasons pass, un- 

 til the time is reached when the con- 

 servative forces of plant life give way 

 before its insistence and produce va- 

 riants from its ordinary type, just as a 

 pendulum is set widely vibrating by the 

 repeated impact of a breath that at first 

 would scarcely disturb its repose. A 

 case in point is that of the Boston fern, 

 which may be cited as an illustration. 

 A remarkable number of variants from 

 the type have appeared within a short 

 time, not one of which is put forth as 

 a seedling, but all as sports. And the 

 fact of their origin being so nearly 

 simultaneous indicates, as I have pointed 

 out, that a period had been reached when 

 the inherited vital forces of the plant, 

 which conserve its homogeneity, gave 

 way before the insistence, the unyield- 

 ing pull, of long continued high culture. 

 The same is true also of the sports from 

 some strains of carnations. 



Illustrations from Farm Life. 



Such results are, of course, more read- 

 ily attained and more to be looked for 

 under greenhouse conditions than in the 

 open field, but who will say that the rule 

 is not the same for each? I remember 

 still an instance from farm life, in the 

 selection of ears of corn after a fixed 

 standard, from the field, when at least 

 nine-tenths of the amount selected as 

 coming up to the ideal was obtained 

 from a small portion of the field 

 that had been most highly fertilized and 

 most carefully cultivated. The seed 

 from which it was produced — and hence 

 the possibility of development — was the 



Tuberoses |i 



Excelsior Dwarf Pearl 



3x4 $0.60 per 100; $5.00 per 1000 



4x« LOOperlOO; 8.00 per 1000 



<^0 Satdof Stre/\C^ 



Mention The Rerlew when yon write. 



SWEET PEAS 



Price list of my Winter F]o\7erinfir Sweet Peas 

 will be out in Jime. If you have not erowa them, 

 send for it. To my old customers, will be mailed 

 \vithout asliinR. New crop of seed will be ready 

 in August next. 



ANT. C. ZVOLANEK, itound Brook, N. J. 



Mention The Review when yoa write. 



same for all the field, but these capa* 

 bilities lay dormant except where 

 brought out by high culture. It is a 

 matter of record that the creation of 

 the short-horn breed of cattle was ac- 

 complished fully as much by a system 

 of high feeding, which amounted almost 

 to forcing, as by any fixed method of 

 mating. Certain it is that without this 

 high feeding the noble breed would not 

 have come into existence as it did. 



Now, I would not depreciate the use 

 of the forces of heredity locked up in 

 the seed, and the mingling of these by 

 hand-pollinating, but I feel that other 

 factors should not be neglected. There 



jraVERY now and tlien a well 

 iS pleased reader speaks the word 

 which is the means of bringing a new 

 advertiser to 



m 



Such friendly assistance is thoroughly 

 appreciated. 



Give us the name of anyone from 

 v^hom you are buying, not an adver- 

 tiser. We especially wish to interest 

 those selling articles of florists' use 

 not at present advertised. 



FLORISTS* PUBLISHING CO. 

 530-60 Caxton Bldg. Chicago 



is a tendency at the present time among 

 growers, dazzled by achievements of 

 others in this line, to attribute every- 

 thing to the influence of seed-heredity 

 and the supposed skill of the so-called 

 hybridist, and to forget that high cul- 

 ture is at least as potent a factor in the 

 evolution of the unattained. There are 

 unsuspected possibilities in all forms of 

 plant life, but, obliged in their native 

 habitat to struggle for mere existence, 

 with adverse conditions and often mid 

 unfavorable surroundings, these possi- 

 bilities, while not lost, still remain em- 

 bryonic, and it is left to the hand of 

 man to supply the conditions under 

 which they may manifest themselves. 



Breeding Without Feeding. 



Breeding without feeding is a vain ex- 

 penditure in the animal world. Is it not 



ASPARMS 



Plumosus Nanus 



True greenhouse grown seed, 100 seeds, 

 60c; 250 seeds, $1.20; 1000 seeds. $4.00; 6000 

 seeds, $18.00; 10,000 seeds, $85.00. 



Aaparagrus Bprencarl, 250 seeds, 25c: 

 1000 seeds, 75c; 5000 seeds, $3.00. 



Dracaena Indivlaa (seeds), 1 oz., 

 30c; >4 lb., $1.00. 



PandanuB Utllla Seed, $1.00 per 100; 

 $8.00 per 1000. 



Catalogues Free 



ARTHUR T. B0DDIN6T0K 



SEEDSMAN 



342 W. Uth St., NEW YORK CITY 



Mentloo The Rerlew when yon write. 



COLD STORAGE 



VALLEY PI PS 



OF THK HIGHEST QUAUTT 



$1.50 per 100; $13.00 per 1000; per case (2500), 

 $30 00 



ASPARAGUS SEED 



Irm Greenhouse Grown, of High Gerniaetion 



Per 100 Per 1000 Per 5000 

 seeds seeds seeds 

 PlumoBUS Nanus, $0.50 $8.25 $15.00 



Per 250 

 Sprengrerl $0.SS .85 8.00 



n J A ^'^ Market 8t.. 



Johnson Seed Co., Philadelphia. Pa. 



Mention The Review when yoa write. 



RELUBLE SEEDS 



■Sow Nowi 



Tr. 

 Pkt. 

 Primula Obconica Grandi- 

 flora, new hybrids, as: blue, 

 blood red, carmine, 

 l>liik, purple, violet, 

 pure v^Iilte, oompaota. 

 glKantea, fringred mixed 



Hybrids, eaoh separate 60c 



For other Seeds ask for my 

 price list. 

 O. V ZANGEN 

 Seedsman, HOBOKKN, 



$2.50 



N. J. 



Mention The Review when yon write. 



GLADIOLI 



I can still supply color sections, mixtures and 

 named kinds. Good stock. See display ads. in 

 Issues of April 16, 23 and 90. 



E. E. STEWART, "'^s^t'O"- 



Mention The Beriew when yon write. 



