(65 ) 
REPORT OF THE HEAD GARDENER 
To THE DirecTorR-In-CHIEF. 
Sir: I have the honor to submit herewith my report as 
Head Gardener for the year 1905. 
The additional assistance given to me the past year has 
been of great service in the prosecution of curatorial work. 
It has thus been possible to check up all the collections and 
compare them with the card catalogue, so that this now be- 
comes an index to the collections. A system of checking 
slips has been devised and put into operation. By a method 
of cross-references the accession books and the card catalogue 
become indices one to the other; this ensures the ready restor- 
ation of data if data-labels be defaced or entirely destroyed, 
excepting in extreme cases. The outdoor collections are 
checked up once and sometimes twice a year, spring and 
fall, and all missing data or labels supplied. The checking 
of the past fall revealed the loss of many of these labels, 
especially in the collections installed at the fruticetum and 
the deciduous arboretum. There is evidence that this trouble 
with the labels is the work of meddlers, and not due to natu- 
ral causes, for frequently a portion of the label is missing, or 
the entire label is gone, leaving nothing but the wire, or in 
many cases wire and label are both gone; this last is pretty 
certain indication of human agency; it may become neces- 
sary, in the woody collections, to have plans locating the 
positions of the specimens, so that the data may be supplied 
from location. 
Herbaceous Grounds. The arrangement of families here 
remains as it was last year. There have been grown the past 
year in this collection, including those at the trial grounds in 
the nursery, 2,950 species and varieties. It is especially de- 
sirable in this collection that no plants be incorporated until 
their names have been verified, so that a show-label may 
accompany each plant. For this reason all plants are retained 
at the trial grounds until this object can be accomplished. 
