SCHOOLINO EHIZOME-SnOOTS AND CtTTTINfla. 207 



upper extremity just below the surface of the soil, which should be 

 loose and rich and always kept in a nearly saturated condition. 

 Both ends should be cut clean and obliquely. Rootlets and root- 

 fibres should be preserved, only ragged ends and wounded portions 

 being removed with a clean cut. 



General rbmakks. — Plants raised from suckers generally ex- 

 aggerate the original tendency of the species to produce suckers ; 

 and on that account, while they may be well adapted for covering 

 up bare land or forming a hedge rapidly, they cannot produce as 

 tall, regular and sound timber as seedling trees. Hence propaga- 

 tion by suckers is of extremely rare occurrence in forest nurseries, 

 and this all the more for the additional reason that suckers succeed, 

 in the few cases in which their use is to recommended, quite or 

 almost as well without any preliminary schooling in a nursery. 



The fruit and flower gardener often finds the method of propaga- 

 tion by suckers a useful means of perpetuating good varieties. 



§ 4. — Rhizome shoots. 

 Propagation by means of such shoots is a kind of propagation 

 by division, that is to say the various rhizomes, with their shoots 

 if any, which form a single bamboo clump, are parted and put 

 down again separately, it is thus an excellent method of increas- 

 ing the stock of bamboos in a nursery. It is also used, when seed 

 is not available, to raise transplants from clumps growing in the 

 forest ; but this practice is subject to the drawback, often serious, 

 of the propagated plants seeding and dying off at the same time 

 as the parents clumps. To minimise this drawback, the rhizomes 

 should be obtained from the youngest clumps available. The 

 simple rhizome, the success of which is, however, never certain, 

 and which should on that account seldom be used except on a small 

 scale, may be put into the giound in the same manner as root- 

 cuttings. But if the leafy stem has developed, the whole should 

 be treated exactly like seedlings of the same size, except that when 

 the stem is | inch or upwards in diameter, it should be cut down 

 to the top of the second or third internode. This amputation is 

 necessary to prevent the excessive transpiration that would other- 

 wise inevitably follow from the diminished absorption of moisture 

 due to the loss of the greater portion of the root fibres, and the 

 disconnection of the rhizome from the rest of the clump. 



§ 5. — Cuttings. 



Cuttings are used only for propagating species that do not 

 seed or for obtaining at once plants of some size. Only a com- 



