ANDEOSACE 



PBIMBOSE OBDEB 



ANDEOSACE 621 



It is therefore only necessary in such 

 cases to transplant the seedlings in mild 

 showery weather to keep up a good supply 

 and perhaps secure improved varieties. 

 Where, however, it is desired to keep any 

 particular variety true to colour the only 

 sure way to increase it is by division of 

 the tufts. 



ANDROSACE.— A genus containing 

 about 40 species of small tufted alpine 

 annuals or perennials with sessile or 

 stalked, entire, serrate, toothed, or 

 incised-lobed leaves. Mowers small, 

 often white or rose. Calyx 5- cleft or 

 parted. CoroUa hypogynous, salver- 

 shaped or funnel-shaped, with a short 

 tube constricted at the mouth, and 5 

 oblong, wedge-shaped or obcordate 

 imbricated lobes. Stamens 5. Ovary 

 superior, round, or turbinate ; style 

 xisuaUy short. Capsule ovoid or round, 

 few- or many-seeded. 



Culture and Propagation. — Andro- 

 saces as a rule are found high up on the 

 mountain sides amid frost and snow, and 

 are intensely hardy. They like to grow 

 in the chinks and fissures formed by big 

 stones in the rockery, sending their roots 

 into a deep, rich, sandy peat soil, or sandy 

 loam. They siiffer from drought and 

 stagnant moisture, and should be so 

 raised up by means of small pieces of 

 sandstone that the winter rains drain 

 readily away from them, especially the 

 woolly-leaved kinds, which are apt to 

 retain the wet much longer than the 

 smoother kinds. Many of them may be 

 grown in pots in cold frames, and the 

 choicer kinds may be sunk here and 

 there in the rockery from spring to 

 autumn, and then transferred back to the 

 frames for protection from the wet during 

 the winter months. 



Androsaces may be increased by care- 

 ful division in autumn or spring, by cut- 

 tings inserted in sandy soil in cold frames ; 

 or by seeds sown as soon as ripe in shallow 

 pans or boxes and raised in cold frames. 

 The seedlings should be pricked off into 

 light soil when large enough, and are safer 

 wintered in cold frames until mild weather 

 in spring. 



A. albana. — A pretty biennial or 

 perennial native of the central and 

 eastern Caucasus, where it grows at an 

 elevation of 8000-10,000 ft. It makes 

 pretty little rosettes of bright green leaves 

 toothed on the margins, and from April 



to July produces dense compact umbels of 

 pinkish-white flowers. 



Culture dc. as above. This species 

 flourishes in hght sandy soil, in open sunny 

 situations. It is easily reproduced, from 

 seed and may be treated as a biennial. 



A. alpina {A. glacial/is). — A pretty 

 Swiss species 2-3 in. high, with small 

 rosettes of crowded tongue-shaped leaves. 

 Flowers in June, solitary, purpUsh-rose, 

 throat and tube yellow, on stalks about 

 ' 5 in. long. 



Culture and Propagation. — Eequires 

 a rather shaded situation, and should 

 be planted almost perpendicularly in a 

 mixture of peat, loam, leaf-soil and 

 sharp sand, between the chmks of rock 

 or stone. 



A. argentea (A. imhricata). — A Swiss 

 species about 2 inches high. Leaves 

 closely overlapping, lance-shaped oblong, 

 covered with short hairs, forming silver- 

 grey rosettes. Flowers in June, white, 

 very numerous, without stalks. 



Culture dc. as ahoYe. Best in a sunny 

 chink in well-drained soil. 



A. carnea (A. LachenaU ; A. puher- 

 ula). — A charming little Swiss evergreen 

 3-4 in. high, with smooth awl-shaped 

 pointed leaves not in rosettes. Flowers 

 from May to July, pink or rose, about 

 li in. across, with a yellow eye, 3-7, on 

 hairy stalked umbels. 



This plant is best left alone for' a few 

 years in rich, weU-drained soil, when it 

 wUl make fine mossy masses of foliage, 

 just above which appear the bright httle 

 flowers. 



The variety eximia is a more vigorous 

 and rapid-growing plant, forming dense 

 rosettes of leaves, above which on stalks 

 2-3 in. high are borne heads of rosy- 

 crimson flowers with a yellow centre. 



Culture dc. as above. It requires 

 moist sunny ledges in chinks, in deep 

 sandy loam and peat. 



A. caucasica. — A pretty dwarf species 

 native of the Caucasus, where it grows at 

 an elevation of 10,000-11,000 ft. The 

 leaves are narrow and toothed, and form 

 more or less dense rosettes from the centre 

 of which the bright pink flowers appear 

 in dense umbels during the summer 

 months. 



Culture and Propagation.— ks this 

 species is more or less biennial in cha- 

 racter it should be raised from seeds every 



