38 
Choice Ferns for Amateurs. 
and little or no water should be given until the 
first fronds make their appearance, which they 
generally do in from ten to fifteen days after 
separation. In the case of exotic Ferns of an ever- 
green nature, the divisions must, for a few weeks, 
be put under glass in a frame, to which air and light 
should be gradually admitted until the young plants 
are strong enough to stand outside the case. It 
will also be found advisable to subject to the same 
treatment the crested and other abnormal forms of the 
Male Fern, N ephrodium (Lastrea) Filix-iuas, which 
are apt to develop several crowns, not by the process 
of fission, like the species above-named, but through 
the development of side buds. The removal of these 
buds undoubtedly beneficial to the mother-plant, 
which then produces a more vigorous and more sym- 
metrical growth, all its energies being concentrated in 
the development of its own growth. Like the divided 
crowns, the little plants produced from these buds 
are provided with a bunch of roots all ready to 
support the new subject as soon as it is separated 
from the parent. These young plants are then best 
pricked out round the edges of pots or small pans 
filled with a compost of an open and somewhat sandy 
nature. 
Ferns with creeping rhizomes may generally; be 
propagated freely by cutting these up into pi^es, 
particularly while the plants are still at rest. It 
is thus that the Oak Fern (Polypodium Dryopteris, 
Fig. 28), the Beech Fern (F. Phegopteris), the com- 
mon Polypody (P. vulgar e), and our native Maiden- 
hair {Adiantum CaijiUus-V eiieris) are usually propa- 
gated. Every piece of creeping rootstock bearing a 
couple of fronds and a few roots, or even rudiments 
of roots, usually produces a plant, when firmly 
pegged to the ground, with the rootlets well covered. 
Exotic Polypodiums, as also the majority of Daval- 
lias, numerous Acrostichums, &c., are easily in- 
creased by the layering of the points of their rhizomes ; 
or if these are cut into various lengths, they rapidly 
produce lateral growths, which in a short time 
form independent plants. Chopped sphagnum, 
