CAUSES OF FAILURE IN* EUCHARIS CULTURE. 



197 



Good fibrous loam, with some sharp sand and a 7-inch potful of 

 bone-meal, and rather less of soot, added to every barrowful 

 suits them well. I cannot always get good yellow fibrous loam, 

 and object to the more spongy light fibrous soils. What I have 

 of late years found to answer remarkably well is a yellow loam 

 without a particle of fibre in it, lime being substituted for the 

 soot. It need hardly be added that the drainage of pots is both 

 heavy and good, moss being used to prevent the fine soil from 

 clogging the crocks. If I soaked the bulbs in anything previous 

 to repotting them it would be in clear water for not less than two 

 days, this being quite as likely to drive out or destroy the mite 

 (if there) as any strong insecticide, and that, too, without run- 

 ning the risk of injuring the bulbs. 



I hold that the most critical time in the life of a Eucharis is 

 during the first six weeks after being repotted or shifted from 

 smaller pots to larger ones. If once the fresh soil gets soured 

 from being kept too moist the plants will never thrive in it, and 

 that is a strong point against the plan of frequently repotting. 

 It may answer well when the man in charge knows what he is 

 about, but entrust the watering to a careless hand and failure is 

 most likely to occur. A brisk bottom-heat ought to hasten root- 

 action, but I do not like it nevertheless. It is the plunged plants 

 that are most likely to get too much water, and, seeing that 

 the Eucharis can be grown equally well, or even better, without 

 this aid, it is well to dispense with it. The fresh soil should be 

 kept just moist till well filled with roots, when water may be 

 given more freely ; but not till the roots are interlacing each 

 other ought liquid manure to be given. 



All the foregoing details may be carefully observed, and yet 

 so fickle are the plants that they will fail to do well if other 

 conditions are not exactly to their liking. They have their 

 favourite sites, and, once these are found out, be content to " let 

 well alone." To be plain, if a certain house, or part of a house, 

 suits them well, avoid shifting them to other quarters as much 

 as possible. That suitability of house or position has much to 

 do with successful culture is proved by the fact that many good 

 gardeners succeed well with them in one place and fail badly in 

 another, or in a fresh garden. Modern plant-stoves do not suit 

 them, as a rule, nearly so well as do the older structures in which 

 there is very much more woodwork and comparatively small 



