October, 1913-] 



THE ORCHID WORLD. 



5 



seedling would flower this season has been 

 turned to disappointment. Two spikes, one 

 on each side of the last made bulb, made 

 their appearance early in the summer, and 

 have continued to grow until a length of 

 about eighteen inches has been reached, but 

 these spikes have produced leaves instead of 

 flower-buds, and the apex of each is formed 

 by a pair of small bright green leaves. The 

 spikes have, in fact, become vegetative in 

 habit, a transition thought by some botanists 

 to be due to increased nutrition. Of course, 

 it does not follow from this example that the 

 same result will occur again next year, or 

 that any other plants of this parentage will 

 follow a similar habit. Flower-buds will no 

 doubt be ultimately produced, and the uniting 

 of this hybrid with the Colombian Odonto- 

 glossums will then be an apparently easy task. 



NOMENCLATURE OF HYBRIDS. 



ON the general question of how hybrids 

 should be named in accordance with 

 the species in their production (see 

 V^ol. III., p. 33), it always seems to me a pity 

 to upset or confuse a recognised existing 

 name of a cross having its own distinct 

 connotation by calling a lot of similar things 

 by the same name. Take Cypripedium 

 aureum, it practically should guarantee that a 

 plant sold as such should be one-half 

 .Spicerianum, one-quarter villosum, and one- 

 quarter insigne. To suggest that all Cypri- 

 pediums having different proportions of these 

 species in them should be called aureum 

 seems calculated to mislead greatly. The 

 name aureum means either nitens x Spicer- 

 ianum, the reverse cross, or possibly Leeanum 

 X Lathamianum, having some proportion of 

 the species, though differently arranged, 

 might be permitted to be called aureum, but 

 the probabilities are that some of the latter 

 would be practically Leeanum, Lathamianum, 

 or nitens, through two of the species alone 

 combining, whereas in the true aureum 

 Spicerianum would be bound to show, one 

 side at least being pure. 



If some such ending as " formis or eides " 

 were added by some rule to be made, plants 



having practically the characteristics of some 

 well-known type of hybrid could be called, 

 say, aureiformis or Lathamiformis without 

 conveying any guarantee as to the exact 

 constituent of the plant, but simply sug- 

 gesting that it was of the type of aureum or 

 Lathamianum, being like the one or the other. 



As things stand a person buying a plant as 

 aureum at a sale, which has some other blood 

 in it than the three species in the true aureum, 

 may have all his calculations upset when his 

 seedlings reach flowering stage, through some 

 of them showing some hitherto concealed 

 ancestry. 



Another deceptive thing is the calling a 

 plant by name, such as John Jones, etc., 

 instead of Jonesi or Jonesianum. This is a 

 proper noun and means an individual with 

 people, and with plants should also mean an 

 individual, or at least an identical variety 

 from the same seed-pod, or the divisions of 

 one plant. Otherwise, a person may buy 

 something entirely different, and, on com- 

 plaining, be told it is from the same cross, and 

 therefore rightly named, when he assumed he 

 was getting part of the original plant. For 

 the clear name of the hybrid, whatever the 

 variety, some ending like ianum, or ii, if from 

 the raiser, is much better, however complex 

 the ancestry. 



Primary hybrids should no doubt be in 

 Latin form, preferably really classical. 

 Secondary or tertiary need not be so much 

 so, but surely the calling of hybrids, as a class, 

 by the name of individuals should be avoided. 

 I hat IS only needed for distinct individual 

 plants. Let the names of crosses have a clear 

 name and" ending applicable to all falling 

 under it. — Eustace F. Clark, Evershot, Dorset. 



NEW HYBRIDS. 



L.-elio-Cattleya Perdita. — A rather 

 distinct hybrid between C. granulosa and 

 L.-C. Tydea (pumila x Trianae) was exhibited 

 by Mr. H. T. Pitt, at the Royal Horticultural 

 Society, August 26th, 1913. The flowers 

 resembled the mother parent in shape and in 

 the tawny-yellow colour, which had an 

 overtint of rose-mauve. 



VOL. IV. 



2 



