NOTES ON SOME CURIOSITIES OF ORCHID BREEDING. 



453 



which have now flowered (nine in number), have not been exactly 

 alike, either in flower or foliage, nor exactly like the seed parent 

 C. barbaturn : one plant has flowered with miserably small blooms, 

 much inferior to the parent C. barbaturn, and this although other- 

 wise the plant appeared healthy and strong. . . . One or two, 

 I may say two certainly, showed more white in the dorsal sepal 

 than the others, or than the seed parent, but not sufficient to 

 show as a C. barbaturn $ C. niveum $ cross. The foliage, too, 

 varies slightly in substance and markings." (In litt., September 3, 

 1897.) Mr. Young also tells me that the one plant of 

 C. callosum $ x C. x microchilum $ , which flowered C. callosum, 

 is not at all like the mother variety in form. Mr. Winn writes 

 to me that the five plants of C. venustum $ x C. concolor $ 

 that he flowered " each differed from the other slightly in 

 flower and leaf, but all were very bad C. venustum, . . . while 

 the mother plant was C. venustum Pardinum variety, a very 

 good form." (In litt., September 20, 1897.) Mr. E. 0. Orpett, of 

 South Lancaster, Mass., U.S.A., informs me (in litt., September 24, 

 1897) that Mr. McWilliams's C. Spicerianum $ y niveum $ 

 seedlings, which " came true C. Spicerianum, differed much in 

 themselves, especially in some of them, being but poor forms, 

 while the mother plant was a superb form that I have not seen 

 equalled in other C. Spicerianum." 



It is therefore evident that these curiosities were not pro- 

 duced without pollen, and we are consequently almost bound to 

 conclude that they were caused by accidental self- fertilisation. 

 It is difficult to say exactly how this happened, but Mr. Young 

 tells me that at the time (1891) his C. barbaturn ? C. niveum $ 

 cross was made he did not remove the pollen masses of the seed 

 parent C. barbaturn ; and a short time ago I observed a flower 

 of C. Spicerianum, one pollen mass of which had fallen down, 

 and had stuck on the edge of the stigma, with the result that a 

 pod is now set. I have also frequently observed large spiders and 

 smaller flies settled on and crawling over the pollen masses of 

 Cypripediums, and it is just possible that the sticky pollen might 

 be carried on to the stigma in this way. With regard to the 

 pollen of the foreign species that was applied by hand, it would 

 no doubt fertilise some of the ovules, but the self -fertilised seeds 

 would have a better chance in the struggle for existence, and 

 would grow away quicker and stronger in the earlier stages than 



