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23 A Ee: 
x The Orchid Review 4 
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VoL. XXV. APRIL, 1917. No. 292. 
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ee OUR NOTE BOOK. Fe] 
|’ is interesting to watch the steady accession of secondary and more 
complex hybrids of the popular genera which now appear so regularly 
at our horticultural meetings, and which so largely monopolise the award 
lists. To take the meetings of the Royal Horticultural Society for the 
first three months of the present year, we find that fifteen of the twenty 
certificates issued have been gained by plants of this kind, while four others. 
have been primary hybrids, leaving one solitary example—Cymbidium 
insigne album—for an imported plant. In addition to those which 
gained certificates there were several other promising hybrids that will be 
heard of again when they have attained their full development. Here lies- 
a great field for development in the future. Many of the more popular 
garden Orchids have been combined in various ways, and the best of the 
primary hybrids have been again united among themselves, especially those 
which promise to yield new developments, the result being a vast number 
of seedlings from which desirable parents can be selected for future work. 
This continued crossing combined with selection of the parents is already 
yielding good results, and promises further developments in the future. In 
fact, the foundation of several distinct races of florists’ Orchids is being 
securely laid. 
In the case of Odontoglossum the additions group themselves largely 
round the popular O. crispum, which has been crossed with almost every 
other species of note, also with species of the allied genera, and selections 
from the resulting hybrids have been recrossed in almost every possible way, 
so much so that some of the more complex hybrids chiefly differ in the 
proportions of their specific composition. This fact,and the wide range of 
variation seen in batches of seedlings from the same capsule, makes it 
impossible in many cases to tell their precise origin by comparison alone, 
and all one can do is to trace the characters of the species entering into 
their composition without knowing their exact descent. 
Something of this kind must have happened with O. crispum in a wild 
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