146 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 424. 



him to undertake an extensive journey in western North 

 America, and the collection of cones, etc., which he then 

 formed is now in the Kew Museum. The synonymy of 

 Coniferae revealed by this list is appalling. Cultivators of 

 these plants will find the list valuable. T „ „. , 



London. »l. WalSOfl. 



Plant Notes. 



Ouercus Californica. 



KELLOGG'S Oak, a western representative of the Black 

 Oaks, is found distributed throughout the length of 

 California in the coast mountains and on the western slopes 

 of the Sierras, and in Oregon as far north as Eugene, ten 

 miles north of that city being its most northern limit. 



This tree, a photograph of which is reproduced on page 

 145, is one of large dimensions and of fine, open, widely 

 branching and symmetrical habit. The trunk is rather 

 short, but is thick and stout. The bark is dark in color 

 (whence the popular Oregon name, Black Oak), one and a 

 half inches thick and rather deeply fissured longitudinally. 

 The twigs and leaves when young are clothed with a dense 

 white pubescence, which, however, soon disappears. The 

 dark twigs are then smooth, straight and more slender than 

 those of the Garry Oak, giving the tree a cleaner, more 

 open appearance. The leaves are oval in outline, the lobes 

 cut moderately deep, and these and the lobules pointed with 

 delicate spines. The petioles are short and slender. The 

 scales of the cups are thin, ovate, obtuse, flat and imbri- 

 cated and light brown in color. 



The wood of this tree is especially worthy of notice. The 

 heart-wood has a reddish hue, the sap being darker and 

 lacking the red color. The pores of the wood are numer- 

 ous and slightly wavy ; the medullary rays are well marked 

 and not broad, but thick and pronounced in the tangential 

 and radial cut. Samples of the wood, even in an unpol- 

 ished state, are always admired. The tangential cut is 

 noticeably rich in figure, and the waviness of the vessels, 

 too, is more marked than in the radial or quartered cut. It 

 ought to be a great favorite for decoration and interior fin- 

 ish. It is, however, a little-known and still less appreciated 

 wood. 



The bark is said to be rich in tannin and brings about 

 twice as much in the market as Hemlock bark. 



The tree here reproduced is an old landmark standing in 

 Eugene, Oregon. It is something more than four feet in 

 diameter and is known in that locality as "Henderson's 

 Big Oak." . 



Pacific University, Fores! Grove, Oregon. rranCIS JL. l^loya. 



Andromeda Mariana. — A correspondent sends to this 

 office a branch of Andromeda Mariana in flower, with the 

 inquiry whether this shrub is ever planted for ornament. 

 Whether the branch was cut from a plant forced under glass 

 or whether it had merely been cut from a wild plant and 

 brought into flower by placing it in water, we are not in- 

 formed. We have never seen the latter method tested, 

 although, without much doubt, this Andromeda, like many 

 other plants whose flowers are produced on last year's 

 wood, would open its buds if treated in this way. The 

 flowers themselves, however produced, ought to be suffi- 

 cient evidence as to the desirability of this shrub for plant- 

 ing, at least in certain situations. It is found along fhe 

 coast as far north as Rhode Island and is abundant in the 

 Pine region of New Jersey and in Long Island in moist and 

 sandy situations. It is a comparatively low shrub, rarely 

 four feet high, with shining, leathery, deciduous leaves, 

 and large, white, waxy, bell-shaped flowers clustered 

 along the branches of the preceding year's growth. It 

 thrives without any special care, if planted in deep loam, 

 particularly if some peat is mixed with it. It is one of the 

 handsomest shrubs of a genus which includes such excel- 

 lent native plants as Andromeda speciosa and the ever- 

 green A. floribunda. In autumn its long wand-like 

 branches retain their foliage late, when it, turns to an in- 



tense scarlet color. It is said to poison sheep which 

 browse upon its leaves, and this gives significance to its 

 common name, the Stagger-bush. 



Iris Asiatica. — This is hardly to be classed among the 

 winter-flowering Irises, although it was flowering in a cool 

 house with Mr. Gerard a few days ago. It is an attractive 

 plant, akin to I. pallida, but inferior to good forms of this 

 species in the size of its flower and in distinction of habit. 

 The flower is of fair size, dark purple, and under artificial 

 light shows a reddish hue. There is a quite distinct 

 blotch of darker purple on the lip of falls. The scapes are 

 four-flowered. In a cool house, however, there are no 

 winter-flowering Irises as satisfactory as I. stylosa and its 

 varieties. If well cared for during the summer they make 

 strong growths and flower continuously during the winter 

 under any protection secure from frosts. The plants are 

 fairly hardy in this latitude, but the usual weather condi- 

 tions are too rigorous to admit of good flowers in the open. 

 This plant seems a favorite in the open in southern England, 

 but the latitude of Richmond, or possibly Washington, 

 would probably be as far north as they could be grown 

 with any satisfactory result in the garden. 



Kniphofia pauciflora. — This is a distinct species of 

 what is generally a showy genus, and it will flower very 

 early with little encouragement but only a botanist would 

 recognize this as one of the Red-hot Poker plants. The 

 tubular flowers, slightly less than one inch long, are borne 

 sparsely on one side and at the top of a thin scape some 

 eighteen inches long. They are of a light straw-color and 

 pretty, rather than striking. The leaves are very narrow 

 and deeply channeled. 



Cultural Department. 



The Earliest Spring Flowers. 



\\ HTH the flowering of the first Daffodils one feels that the 

 ** spring has fairly arrived now at the end of March. Nature 

 has broken no promises this season, for the weather has been 

 uniformly bad, for the garden at least, as the temperature 

 has been at all times low, with little chance for the winter- 

 flowering plants to progress, and only a rare flurry of snow to 

 protect green foliage. 



The impatient Snowdrops even have been discouraged this 

 year, and though they have been peeping since the holidays 

 they have waited for March. Some belated snow, melting 

 quickly, with less rigorous weather, has reminded the alpine 

 bulbs that it was time to waken ; and for the last fortnight the 

 garden has been rapidly gaining cheerful bits of color. Of 

 course, those early plants will vary in their flowering time very 

 much from year to year as the weather permits, but there are 

 other influences also at work each year. For instance, the 

 vigor of a plant at flowering time depends on the growth made 

 after flowering the previous year, and a weak growth one year 

 will retard its flowering time the year following. 



A number of new Snowdrops received from Mr. Whittall, 

 who had collected them in different locations, are not found 

 to be specially distinct from those already .known, but those 

 which last year were found in flower on Mount Taurus in May 

 were here among the earliest to open. Chionodoxas are becom- 

 ing plentiful, but the brightest blue effect in the garden is 

 made by the early Squills, Scilla Sibirica, which also came 

 from Asia. These Scillas are not only earlier than the typical 

 S. Sibirica, so long grown in gardens, but they are brighter in 

 color. They are now (April 1st) in full flower, though the 

 ordinary ones are scarcely started. The white variety, how- 

 ever, is rapidly advancing, and is rather earlier than the white 

 form of S. bifolia. Yellow Crocuses, C. aureus, have been 

 flowering bravely for some weeks, and very cheerful their 

 color is. Early spring and late fall Crocuses suffer many per- 

 secutions from the weather, which they do not withstand very 

 well, and natural selection does not seem to have been very 

 active among them. 



At present Iris Rosenbachiana is the handsomest individual 

 flower in the garden. This hardy plant from Bokhara has the 

 largest flowers of any of the early Irises, and they are some- 

 what variable in color, the ones now open being a rich vinous 

 red. A few Irises of the Reticulata class have flowered, the 

 dainty I. Kolpakowskyana and a nice form of I. Krelagii, and 

 there are a few collected ones in the corner, which, aside from 

 being wildings, are interesting since they came from Mrs. 



