372 THE ORCHID REVIEW. 
Answers to the four following questions may be interesting here :— 
(t) Cattleya Dowiana from Costa Rica failing to flower. Can I 
suggest a reason? All the plants have made strong growth this season, 
but no sheaths or flower spikes have appeared. They are grown in a lean-to 
house facing south, specially built for Orchids; are near the glass, and 
have but little shading indeed, only on hot bright days; the temperature 
has been kept as per your instructions, if anything, a degree or two higher. 
——In the first place I must say that this Cattleya Dowiana coming from 
Costa Rica is a notoriously shy-flowering one. It is not so with the variety 
C. Dowiana aurea, though so far as the flowers are concerned there is 
practically no difference between them. There is, however, a slight differ- 
ence in growth. Both the leaves and pseudo-bulbs of C. Dowiana are 
shorter and stouter than those of C. D. aurea. The latter will push up 
flowers almost before the bulb can be said to be quite completed ; whilst 
the former stays a few weeks before doing so. But the greatest difference 
is that the Costa Rica variety is most shy to bloom, whilst the other, which 
comes from the State of Antioquia, about six hundred miles further south, 
is very free, in fact almost too free to flower. The cultivation seems all 
that is to be desired. Do what you will with the variety you have, there is 
sure to be a large percentage each year that will fail to flower. With a 
view of causing bloom I would not advise you to go into extremes with 
either bright sunshine or with drought, because if these are excessively 
given the plants may become stunted and weakly, which would, of course, 
have the reversed effect. The main object to have in view is to grow the 
plants as healthy and the pseudo-bulbs as large as possible, for the greater 
the strength the more freely will they bloom. 
(2) In the same house are growing a number of Epidendrum ciliare. 
The new growths are covered with a sticky substance, so much so as to 
interfere with the growth. Had the plants been growing properly I think 
better results would have been arrived at. Iam afraid to put them with 
my cool Orchids, although I know when cool Orchids are grown too warm 
the same thing as regards this gummy substance occurs with them. The 
cause of this over-abundance of sticky substance on Epidendrum ciliare is 
Not so easy to explain. It is certain, however, that the position the plants 
occupy does not agree with them in some way or another. 1 am inclined 
to think that they have too much sun or warmth, or perhaps both. Ours 
are grown in rather a shady Intermediate house, alongside such plants as 
Odontoglossum grande and Miltonia vexillaria, where the temperature 
ranges in winter from 50° to 60°, with sun 65°; and I have not noticed this 
sticky matter. You could experiment with one plant at the warmest end 
of your Cool house. But the remainder I should give an intermediate 
temperature, with not too much bright sunshine. 
