didi ORCHID: REVIEW: 
VoL. Ala MAY, 1903. [No. 125. 
ORCHIDS AT ST. GILLES, BRUSSELS. 
WE have seen many Orchids of sterling quality from the establishment of 
M. A. A. Peeters, of St. Gilles, Brussels, last, but not least, being the magni- 
ficent group which gained the Gold Medal offered by His Majesty the King 
of the Belgians for the best group at the recent Ghent show, and which was. 
further distinguished by the award of a Gold Medal from the Royal Horti- 
cultural Society. We were therefore the more pleased when, a few days. 
later, the opportunity presented itself of seeing the famous establishment 
from which they came. The term might be spoken of in the plural, for there 
are three establishments, two others having been successively formed, at 
some distance away, when the original one was no longer equal to the 
demands upon it. Wewill take them in the order visited. 
A drive from M. Peeters’ residence brought us to the establishment 
which is almost entirely devoted to cut flowers, and the sight of nineteen 
large houses, filled from end to end with healthy plants, enabled us to 
realise to some extent how great a demand there must be for Orchid flowers, as. 
various other Belgian nurseries also cater for the market. We first went 
into a house of Odontoglossums, some 60 teet long, and computed to contain 
2,000 plants. The house is span-roofed, with the stages completely open 
so as to allow a full circulation of air. There are central and side stages, 
enabling the plants to be arranged at a convenient distance from the glass, 
and the necessary shade is provided by the use of lath roller blinds, both on 
the roof and at the ends of the house. The plants are grown entirely in 
leaf-compost, and we take it that its use on such an extensive scale indicates 
some economic advantage—at all events the results are satisfactory, for the 
plants were throwing up a forest of spikes. Looking underneath the stages 
we observed that the pipes were covered with old tobacco stalks, the use of 
which is a great help to the Belgian cultivator in keeping thrip down. 
We entered successively four other houses, similar in size and character, 
and in the number of plants contained, except that in the last we observed 
a large batch of Oncidium Marshallianum, and other Oncidiums, throwing 
“up hundreds of spikes. Then came about four houses containing back 
bulbs, which had been potted up and will ultimately develop into good 
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