158 Milady's House Plants 



Heating System Must be Perfect 



The question of providing heat is one of the first 

 to be considered and, technically, one of the most 

 difficult. If the conservatory is to be an addition to 

 an existing house it is often quite an expensive opera- 

 tion to bring pipes from the heater into an additional 

 room through the main foundations. Of course, the 

 perfect way would be to extend the main cellar under 

 the new structure, in this way furnishing a permanent 

 foundation, warmth under the floor and facilities for 

 introducing pipes for heating, draining and watering. 

 In nearly all of the conservatories visited, very little 

 thought had been given to placing the heating pipes 

 with regard to the plants and none whatever to 

 graduating the degree of heat. The theory evidently 

 has been that when the main dwelling needed heat, 

 the conservatory would need it to the same degree 

 and vice versa; so all that was necessary was to install 

 enough radiators to keep the place at 75° in coldest 

 weather and trust to the janitor to do the rest. Sel- 

 dom had advantage been taken of the many devices 

 used by horticultural builders to provide for distribu- 

 tion and control of heat or ventilation. In fact, 

 very little evidence was apparent of a knowledge of 

 the requirements of the plants or a desire to provide 

 for them and, consequently, the very purpose of the 

 building was frustrated and more or less of failure 

 and disappointment resulted. 



A coil of ordinary steam pipes carried around the 

 three sides of the room and kept close to the walls is 

 much preferable to any system of radiators. This is 

 true with either steam or hot water. The pipes take 

 up much less room, they distribute the heat more 



