CULTURE OF THE PINE-APPLE. 



451 



abundant suiface-manuring, and earthing up, a greater weight of fi-uit 

 might perhaps be grown in a limited space and time by this mode than by 

 any other. The source of bottom heat might be a tank of water or of liquid 

 manure, of the same length and breadth as the interior of the pit, and over 

 this the soil might be supported on a flooring of pierced tiles, so as to admit 

 of the roots passing through them into the liquid manure. Or, it might 

 be a bed of stones or coarse gravel, heated by steam, a mode which has been 

 successfully employed in various parts of the country. (See G. M. vi. p. 50.) 

 Whichever mode of heating be adopted, all the minor details will readily 

 occur to those who have perused the preceding chapters of this work. 



C51. Fruiting suckers on the stools, and retaining the suckers on the stools 

 for some months or weeks after the fruit has been cut, are practices occasion- 

 ally resorted to for the sake of gaining time, and of employing the vigour 

 remaining in the old stock. Sometimes the suckers are earthed up, and 

 retained on the stock till they produce their fruit ; and sometimes they are 

 taken off and potted, and being supplied with abundant heat and moisture, 

 soon show fruit afterwards. Mr. Marsland, of Stockport^ has been very 

 successful in his treatment of the pine in this manner, and the following 

 extract will give a good idea of his practice : — " In November, 1819, as soon 

 as the fruit had been cut from the pine-plants, which were then two years 

 old, all the leaves were stripped off the old stocks, nothing being left but a 

 single sucker on each, and that the strongest on the plant. They were then 

 placed in a house where the heat was about 60*^, and they remained till 

 March, 1820. At this period the suckers were broken off from the old 

 stocks, and planted in pots from eight to twelve inches in diameter, varying 

 according to the size of the sucker. It may be proper, however, to observe 

 that the length of time which the young sucker is allowed to remain attached 

 to the mother plant depends, in some degree, upon the kind of pine : the tardy 

 fruiters, such as the black Antigua and others, require to be left longer than 

 the queen and those which fruit readily. After the suckers had been planted, 

 they were removed from the house, where they had remained while on the 

 old stock, to one in which the temperature was raised to 75°. Immediately 

 upon their striking root, the largest of the suckers showed fruit, w^hich 

 swelled well, and ripened between August and November, being on the 

 average ten months from the tune the fruit was cut from the old plant, and 

 seven months from the time the sucker was planted. The fruit so produced, 

 though, as may be expected, not of the largest description, I have invariably 

 found to be richer and higher flavoured than that grown on older plants. 

 The suckers of inferior strength will not show fruit in the same season, but 

 in the following they will yield good fruit, and strong suckers for a succeed- 

 ing year's supply. Those suckers are to be preferred which are produced on 

 plants that have ripened their fruit in November; for those taken from 

 plants whose fruit is cut in August, or earlier, are apt to show fruit in Janu- 

 ary or February, while yet remaining on the mother-plant. But whenever 

 this happens, the sucker should be broken off immediately upon being per- 

 ceived, and planted in a pit so as to form a root of its own to maintain its 

 fruit/' (Hort. Trans, vol. iv. p. S92.) 



952, To grow the pine-apple to an extraordinary size. — Begin with a 

 healthy vigorous sucker or crown, and supply it with abundant nutriment, 

 heat, and light, in so far as the two latter elements are imder control, shifting 

 it frequently from the smallest-sized pot to the largest, and gradually 



