CCXXXvi PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



14. DISTRIBUTION OF SURPLUS PLANTS. 



In a recent Eeport the Council drew attention to the way in which 

 the annual distribution of surplus plants has arisen. In a large garden 

 there must always be a great deal of surplus stock which must either 

 be given away or go to the waste heap. A few Fellows noticing this, 

 asked for plants which would otherwise be discarded ; and they valued 

 what was so obtained. Others hearing of it asked for a share, until the 

 Council felt they must either systematise this haphazard distribution 

 or else put a stop to it altogether. To take the latter step seemed 

 undesirable. Why should not such Fellows have them as cared to receive 

 such surplus plants ? It was therefore decided to keep all plants till 

 the early spring, and then give all Fellows alike the option of claiming 

 a share of them by ballot. 



Fellows are therefore particularly requested to notice that only waste 

 and surplus plants raised from seeds or cuttings are available for dis- 

 tribution. Many of them may be of very little intrinsic value, and it is 

 only to avoid their being absolutely wasted that the distribution was 

 established. The great majority also are of necessity very small, and 

 may require careful treatment for a time. 



Fellows are particularly requested to note that a Form of Application 

 and list to choose from of the plants available for distribution is sent in 

 January every year to every Fellow, enclosed in the "Report of the 

 Council." To avoid all possibility of favour, all application lists are kept 

 until the last day of February, when they are all thrown into a Ballot ; 

 and as the lists are drawn out, so is the order of their execution, the plants 

 being despatched as quickly as possible after March 1. 



Of some of the varieties enumerated the stock is small, perhaps not 

 more than twenty-five or fifty plants being available. It is therefore 

 obvious that when the Ballot is kind to any Fellow he will receive all the 

 plants exactly as he has selected, but when the Ballot has given him an 

 unfavourable place he may find the stock of the majority of plants he has 

 chosen exhausted. A little consideration would show that all Fellows 

 cannot be first, and some must be last, in the Ballot. Application forms 

 received after March 1 and before April 30 are kept till all those previously 

 received have been dealt with, and are then balloted in a similar way. 

 Fellows having omitted to fill up their application form before April 30 

 must be content to wait till the next year's distribution. The work of 

 the Gardens cannot be disorganised by the sending-out of plants at any 

 later time in the year. All Fellows can participate in the annual dis- 

 tribution following their election. 



The Society does not pay the cost of packing and carriage. The 

 charge for this will be collected by the carriers on delivery of the 

 plants, which will be addressed exactly as given by each Fellow on 

 his application form. It is impracticable to send plants by post owing 

 to the lack of Post Office facilities for despatch without prepayment of 

 postage. 



Fellows residing beyond a radius of thirty-five miles from London 

 are permitted to choose double the number of plants to which they are 

 otherwise entitled. 



