The Culture of Greenhouse Orchids 



respect. Odontoglots dwell at home upon branches 

 thirty feet above the ground — never less than 

 twenty feet, and never more than forty, as the great 

 RoezI observed ; and the trees, of course, are living. 

 Thus they are always shaded by foliage. But it 

 does not follow — most emphatically not — that they 

 do best in shade here. I shall presently show 

 that light in those countries is so vastly more 

 brilliant than ours, that shady places with us must 

 seem dark to a New Granadan orchid. They are 

 grateful for all the light we can give, though they 

 put up with less. But sunshine they dread far 

 more even than others. 



The reader mxist distinguish most carefully 

 between light and sunshine. Travellers will assure 

 him that they have seen orchids flourishing in the 

 blaze of noon when the thermometer marked some 

 awful degree of heat. Countless are the amateurs 

 who liave acted on this true report — and paid the 

 penalty. It is not to be said that all have suffered 

 — unfortunately, for the exceptions encourage an 

 error wliich is commonly fatal. There is record of 

 some most successful growers — Dr. Paterson, for 

 example — who never shaded their Cattleyas and 

 Dendrobes at all. I am not prepared to suggest a 

 reason why the usual consequences did not follow, 

 for I never had an opportunity to investigate ; but 



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