338 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



winter, but about the time the flower-bud shows, the growth is 

 suddenly arrested. The leaves become brown at the ends, and 

 if the bulb is examined it is found rootless and dropsical. The 

 tunic at its base is soft and rotten ; the spaces between the 

 coats of the bulb seem to be filled with water, and it generally 

 dies slowly, for want of power to complete a fresh growth. This 

 disease is encouraged by cold wet seasons, and is commonest on 

 wet heavy soils, and amongst bulbs which have increased rapidly 

 without being transplanted, and are found in a lump massed 

 closely round a small central base. If transplanted at once into 

 very dry soil, as soon as the mischief appears, some of them 

 recover, but do not flower again for at least two years. The 

 incomparabilis section is not liable to be attacked ; the white- 

 flowered trumpets suffer most ; then come Ard Righ, and several 

 others of the concolor section. Those of the mtiticus class are 

 nearly exempt. In the spring of 1889 nearly one-third of my 

 trumpet Daffodils perished in this way. This I attributed to two 

 causes : first, that transplanting had been neglected too long, 

 owing to absence from home ; and, secondly, that the ripening 

 season of 1888 was exceptionally wet and cold. Another but 

 less extensive cause of loss is a habit in the young growth of 

 rotting off during the end of winter. It is worst when the 

 season is too forward, and hard frost succeeds wet. The leaves 

 rot through at the base where they join the bulb, and no fresh 

 start can be made. 



A parasitic fungus, called Puccinia Schraeterl, has for two or 

 three years infested my triandrus, which were imported from 

 Portugal. I have not yet determined to what extent it is 

 destructive to the bulb. Last year I observed it on the leaves 

 of a clump of the large double yellow Daffodil, which I carefully 

 marked. The disease has reappeared there this year, and the 

 leaves attacked seemed less vigorous than the others. 



About the end of March in the present year many of my 

 Daffodil flowers suddenly became spotty. An expert who has 

 examined them thinks the attack very like the Lily spot, which 

 in the spring of 1889 was very prevalent amongst young Lilies 

 and Tulips in the same bed. 



