454 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 239. 



nearly ruined the orchards of the state. Men were ripe for any 

 trial that promised relief. Nurserymen eagerly stocked up witli 

 Russian fruit-trees of all sorts. Enterprising- salesmen offered 

 them at fancy prices, and everybody was ready to buy. 



In an incredibly brief time the nurseries and orchards were 

 testing the strangers. Now, in 1892, ten years from the start, 

 a survey of the field is instructive. South of latitude fort3'-two 

 degrees I know of no nursery offering Russian fruit-trees, ex- 

 cept in a very limited way. Out of over three hundred vari- 

 eties of Apples, I am propagating only two, and these more and 

 more sparingly. Both are summer Apples, and, in my judg- 

 ment, must disappear after a few more years, and their places 

 be supplied with others. Cherries and Plums are in the same 

 ■condition, the Pears nearly so. Whether at the end of another 

 ten years anything but a memory of them will remain to south- 

 ern Iowa is questionable. 



Russian fruits are seldom seen in our markets. What have 

 been offered have been of medium or poor quality. The trees 

 in nursery and in orchard have suffered from various diseases, 

 blight being most fatal. Nurserymen south of forty-two de- 

 grees have almost entirely ceased to grow them. North of 

 that, the destruction and loss of credit have not been so great. 

 In short, the whole matter rests upon that of locality, latitude 

 and height above the sea. The centre of origin of the Russian 

 fruits imported is in about fifty-five to sixty degrees of north 

 latitude, and a change of ten or fifteen degrees of latitude is too 

 much. Theory indicated this before the experiment, and ex- 

 perience has confirmed scientific prediction. 



In the extreme north of New York Russian fruits may prove 

 desirable. In the great fruit-belt south of forty-two degrees 

 no experience justifies such a hope. The experience of EU- 

 wanger & Barry at Rochester, of the Berckmans in New Jersey 

 and of the very extensive and expensive trials in Iowa and_ ad- 

 joining states forbids it. 



Des Moines. la. <-. L. WatroUS. 



Albino Orchids. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — In your issue of August 17th one of your correspon- 

 dents speaks of finding Habenaria fimbriata in its white form 

 near Tannersville, New York. Perhaps it may interest her 

 and others to know that I have found the same near North- 

 east Harbor, Mount Desert, Maine. 



Baliimore. Mrs. Thomas Baxter Gresliain. 



California Roses. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — There are few places, and perhaps none, in the Union 

 where so many men of affairs devote their leisure to the culti- 

 vation of Roses as Oakland. The evidence of this can be seen 

 any day in the abundance of cut roses which are carried across 

 to the city. Many of these amateur cultivators are enthusiasts, 

 and their conversation is apt to centre on the merits of some 

 new or old Rose, for their collecfions include hundreds of dis- 

 tinct varieties. 



That the Rose is well at home in California goes without 

 saying. As a climber it goes skyward like a Wild Grape ; as a 

 standard it grows into trees eight and ten feet in height, with a 

 stem fit for a handspike, and as a shrub it rivals in luxuriance 

 the Willows by the brook-side. It requires, as a consequence, 

 plenty of room here. If the directions given in books for 

 other climates were followed, our Roses would be packed to- 

 gether like bristles in a brush. 



Some Roses that have a good reputation in the east or 

 abroad are of^ no value here, while some of our best kinds 

 have little reputation elsewhere. Of the first class we may 

 mention, among the Tea Roses, Marie Guillot, Madam 

 Bravy and Etoile de Lyon ; among the Hybrid Perpetuals, 

 General Washington, Madam Charles Wood and Dinsmore, 

 and among the Bourbons, Queen of Bedders and Appoline. 

 Of the other class the following are a few examples : The Tea 

 Rose Laurette, catalogued by only a few growers in the east, 

 grows into a tree eight feet high, with a stem two and a half 

 inches in diameter, in five years from the cutting, and its 

 flowers are exceedingly bountiful, beautiful and constant. 

 Reve d'Or, Noisette, is more valuable than Marechal Niel. It 

 is a wonderful grower, always in bloom, and the flowers lack 

 but little of being as fine as those of Marechal Niel. The little 

 Polyantha Rose, Cecile Brunner, so lightly esteemed at the 

 east that half the growers do not list it, within a few feet from 

 where I am writing forms a hedge four feet high, and this 

 would be much higher were it not cut back twice a year. 



There is scarcely a month in the season when it is not a mass 

 of bloom. The buds have few rivals for boutonnieres, and 

 the full-blown flowers, at least two inches across, are beautiful 

 almost beyond comparison for decorative purposes. Our 

 Italian florist says, "Everybody like-a de baby roses." Perle 

 d'Or is a fit companion for Cecile Brunner, and the two are 

 worth more here than all the rest of the Polyantha class. 



Of course, the behavior of Roses is not uniform in California, 

 for the state has such a wide range of altitude, latitude and 

 longitude that it affords almost every variety of climate, from 

 perpetual summer to eternal winter. 



Oakland, Cal. H. G. Pratt. 



Cypripedium Edwardii. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir, — A seedling Cypripedium of much interest has just 

 flowered in the collection of Mr. H. Graves, Orange, New Jer- 

 sey, which has been named Cypripedium Edwardii, in honor of 

 the son of Mr. Graves. It is a cross between C. superbiens 

 and C. Fairieanum, and was raised by Messrs. Pitcher & Manda 

 at the United States Nurseries. 



The plant is very compact ; leaves, about five inches long 

 and one and one-half broad, rounded at the ends, deep green, 

 faintly tessellated and glossy; scape, green, pubescent, erect, 

 monoflorous; flower, large; dorsal sepal, two inches long, 

 white, tinted with green at the base and vinous purple near 

 margin, rayed and reticulated with green, many of the rays 

 speckled with brown ; petals, two and one-half inches long, 

 undulated and drooping as in C. Fairieanum, margined with 

 black hairs ; the border is vinous purple speckled with black; 

 centre, translucent, with parallel veins running from base to 

 apex ; basal third, thickly dotted with black ; pouch, two inches 

 long, narrow, pale green, with brighter reticulations dotted at 

 base and on inside with vinous purple, shaded with brown on 

 front ; staminode, large, netted with bright green. 

 Orange, N. J. Robert M. Grey. 



Recent Publications. 



Annals of Horticulture in North America for the year jSgi. 

 By L. H. Bailey. Nevif York, The Rural Publishing Company. 



All persons who take more than a superficial interest in 

 horticulture will be grateful to Professor Bailey for this record 

 of the labors of a year in his special field, and still'more grateful 

 for the assurance it gives that these volumes can hereafter be 

 expected regularly. As the series grows it will be invaluable 

 for reference, a treasury of horticultural knowledge, and a his- 

 tory, let us hope, of steadily growing interest and continued 

 progress. Each of the volumes is much more than a mere 

 witness of current events. The first one, for example, contains 

 a list of kitchen-garden vegetables, and the most important 

 piece of work in the present volume is the elaborate census of 

 our native plants which are, or have been, cultivated. 



An examination of the list, which covers sixty pages, will 

 surprise most readers, for the extent to whicli our fields and 

 woods have enriched the gardens of the world is not generally 

 realized. Professor Bailey estimates that north of Mexico our 

 continent contains 10,150 known species of plants, distributed 

 in 1,555 genera and 168 families. This census makes record 

 of 2,416 species, representing 769 genera and 133 families. Of 

 these species 1,929 are now offered for sale in America ; 1,500 

 have been introduced into England, 487 of which are not in 

 cultivation in America. Nor does it follow that the species 

 introduced into England are all now cultivated there ; the 

 record simply shows that they were once introduced there and 

 when this occurred. Many of the southern species were pro- 

 cured by English collectors from the West Indies or from 

 Mexico. Some of these may never have been seen outside of 

 botanical gardens, and a few may have been lost to cilltivation. 



It is not strange, as Professor Bailey points out, that Ameri- 

 can plants should have been first cultivated in Europe, where 

 the growing of plants for ornament had been developed into 

 an art while the civilization of this country was yet in its 

 pioneer stage, and. of course, unfavorable to gardening of this 

 character. Besides, it seems to be the rule that horticulturists 

 are attracted by the unfamiliar and strange appearance of ex- 

 otics, and that novelty is quite as strong an influence as intrin- 

 sic merit in favoring the dissemination of plants. Drummond, 

 Eraser, Douglas, and theif contemporaries, as well as ourown 

 early botanists, with John Bartram at their head, were all as- 

 siduous in sending seeds and livinj^ plants to the gardens, and 

 especially the botanic gardens, of Europe. It is worth noting 

 that many of these early introductions have been so modified 

 by long domestication that their appearance seems strange to 



