NEWS NOTES 



Dr. Williard M. Porterfield, whose article on "Two hardy 

 bamboos of East China," appears in this issue, went to China as 

 instructor in botany at St. Johns University, Shanghai, in 1916. 



From 1922 till he resigned to return home in 1933, he was pro- 

 fessor of biology and head of the biology department of the 

 I Fniversity. While in China he made a special study of bamboos, 

 publishing numerous papers on them. He also made a general 

 survey of bamboo and its uses in China for the Government 

 Bureau of Economic Information. 



At the International Flower Show held in New York in 

 March, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden received a medal for an 

 exhibit showing "Garden Operations." The exhibit included the 

 preparation of soil, the planting of seeds, the transplanting of 

 seedlings, and many other features of gardening. Two types of 

 hot beds were also shown, the old, manure-heated form and a 

 new, electrically heated one. In connection with the exhibit a 

 special leaflet on gardening processes was published and dis- 

 tributed. 



At the Flower Show the New York Botanical Garden had an 

 exhibit of South African plants arranged in an informal manner 

 suited to a border in the south or southwest. Among the plants 

 were some cultivated ones such as freesias and calla lilies repre- 

 sented by garden varieties, others, as Watsonia and Tritonia, 

 represented by the wild forms. There were many succulents, — 

 Aloes, Euphorbias, Senecios, Staphelias and many forms of the 

 curious stone plants — Lithops, Conophytum and other genera 

 closely related to Mesembryanthemum, of which several species 

 were shown. One of the Cycads, Stangeria, was shown in fruit. 

 The exhibit was awarded a special gold medal by the Interna- 

 tional Flower Show and a gold medal by the Garden Club of 

 America. 



Dr. Harold St. John, professor of botany at the University 

 of Hawaii, has been elected a corresponding member of the 

 Czechoslavakian Botanical Society. (Science) 



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