XXiv PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL HORTICrTLTURAL SOCIETY. 



SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE. 



January 3, 1911. 



Mr. E. A. Bowles, M.A., F.L.S., F.E.S., in the Chair, and 

 nine members present. 



Sportmg in Begonias. — Mr. J. Hudson, V.M.H., sent specimens 

 showing sporting in winter-flowering Begonias. Last year a sport had 

 appeared in Begonia 'Agatha,' with flowers larger and of a brighter il 

 colour than those of the type. Plants were propagated from the 

 sport and came true, but on one plant one half again sported and pro- ' 

 duced flowers still larger than in the first sport and with foliage twice as 

 large. The Committee expressed the hope that specimens of each of 

 these sports should be kept and dried, so that comparisons could easily 

 be made in the future and the whole history of the sports followed. 



Fruiting of Mandevilla suaveolens. — Mr. Chittenden showed, on be- 

 half of Mr. Saunderson, of Joanville, Jersey, a pair of fruits of Mande- 

 villa suaveolens, which had ripened in the garden there. This plant; 

 can be grown outdoors only in warmer parts of England, and is not 

 often known to fruit. The fruits, as in so many of the Asclepiadaceae, 

 are pods about 12 inches in length and slender, and are produced in 

 pairs. 



Pine-apples with rotten core. — Some Pine-apples of excellent 

 flavour, but with a brown rot in the core, were received from Natal.} 

 Mr. Fawcett, F.L.S., said that the condition was very well known in! 

 the West Indies, and was particularly prevalent in the variety shown,! 

 which he recognized as the deliciously flavoured ' Eipley. ' Whatever | 

 the cause, he believed it originated before the Pines were cut, and, 

 therefore, whilst they were growing. The rot has been attributed to 

 different causes by different investigators. It has been examined in the 

 States and said to be connected with the growth of a species of 

 Fusarium,, which, presumably, gains an entrance into the root from the| 

 soil, but the disease does not appear to have been reproduced by inocuj 

 lation by this fungus (see Jamaica Botanical Bulletin, ser. ii. vol viii.' 

 (1901), p. 83, vol. xi. (1902), p. 165). Mr. G. Massee, V.M.H., ir 

 his " Diseases of Cultivated Plants," attributes the disease to physio, 

 logical causes, pointing out that it is prevalent when the plants ar(| 

 ripening during the rainy season, and associating it with excess oj 

 water in the atmosphere. A similar trouble occurs in pine-pits iii 

 this country, especially when the plants are subjected to a checj 

 through a sudden lowering of the temperature, j 



