230 - Tue Orrawa NATURALIST. [March 
as Mr. Alexander, of the Customs Department, brings it down 
every year from his island in Georgian Bay. I saw a lovely bunch 
of it in his garden in bloom, but he said it jslipped away and he 
did not expect to see it again next year ; Cypripediwm montanum, 
which blossomed all right and bore four or five small white blos- 
soms on a stem, the sabot pure white with purple dots inside and 
red wings, not curled as in pubescens. It is not a native here but 
of the west beyond the Rockies ; Cypripedium spectabile, which 
was gorgeous in the extreme. I had three clumps with ten or 
eleven blossoms on at once. Two clumps had each two stems 
with twin blooms on a stem. I had them photographed, they 
looked so rare and lovely, as if they came from the ‘‘ Garden of 
Allah” ; Habenarta blephariglotiis, which grew but did not bloom; 
Hlabenaria ciliaris, which grew but did not blossom. I hope to see 
them next year ; Lzparis /ilitfolia, which blossomed with a raceme 
of six or seven purple-brown flowers, a true orchid but incon- 
spicuous ; Pogonta ophioglossoides, a lovely pink and white flower 
which blossomed successfully ; Spzranthes cernua (ladies’ tresses) 
grew but did not blossom. 
As to the growing of our native orchids, nature must be imi- 
tated as much as possible both in location of planting and nature 
of soil. Those found in sphagnum moss in bogs and swamps 
should be planted in about a foot of sphagnum moss with a top 
dressing cf four or five inches of swamp muck and leaf mould, 
and the ground and place prepared with as much care, and no 
manure of any kind used with them other than pine needles or 
cedar leaves, and a sprinkling of powdered charcoal which can be 
given them every three years, as it sets the color and makes it of = 
a richer hue. These take the place of more violent manures. 
Cypripedium acaule and Calypso borealis are the hardiest to 
grow. I think in a bed made of chopped granite mixed with coal 
ashes, with plants set in rotten leaf mould and pine needles well 
rotted, the turpentine would kill insect pests and cut-worms, and 
the undersoil would be too poor for cut-worms and other enemies 
to exist in. I inferred this from the fact that in Manitoba and 
Parry Sound, where it is so hard to get worms for bait for fishing, 
the ground seems denuded of them, and the earth seems free from 
the pests that attack most plants. 
eS Sa ee eT Se ee ee a ee 
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