- 
THE REGAL LILY 9 
maritime location the bulbs will retain their vitality for months in 
moderately low temperatures when exposed to ordinary atmospheric 
conditions. In dry situations, however, the sooner the bulbs are 
smothered with dry earth the better. There is very great difference 
between the behavior of the bulbs out of the soil at Bellingham, 
Wash., and at the Arlington Experiment Farm, Rosslyn, Va. They 
dry out much less in August at Bellingham than they do in Novem- 
oer on Arlington Farm. 
REPRODUCTION FROM STEM BULBLETS 
Under certain conditions the Regal lily produces an abundance of 
bulblets on the base of the stem contiguous to and among the surface- 
feeding stem roots. When the lily is thriving, however, no such 
reproduction seems to take place. To the writer this form of repro- 
duction has appeared to be a reaction to unfavorable conditions, and 
it has seemed that the production of these bulblets usually, if not 
invariably, is an indication of uncongeniality of cultural sur- 
roundings. 
Plate 1, A, shows the first bulb purchased for these investigations 
in 1917. This bulb produced no stem bulblets in the six years that 
it grew in good border soil. A progeny of this bulb, grown on a 
heavy clay soil worked only about 10 inches deep and underlain by 
heavy clay, produced an abundance of stem bulblets as shown in 
Plate 4. On this soil it was not possible to maintain good health in 
the bulbs. The bases decayed and there was a paucity of normal 
roots. The development of bulblets seems to be in proportion to the 
imperfection of the bulbs and in consequence of it. 
The stocks, after three years of poor behavior under these condi- 
tions, were moved to a well-drained sandy loam soil. They recovered 
slowly in health, vigor, and growth, and the production of bulblets 
gradually ceased, until at the last digging they did not average one 
bulbiet to two stems in the lot of 250 bulbs. ; 
On Puget Sound, at Bellingham, Wash., the lily has behaved very 
satisfactorily on both Whatcom silt and Lynden sandy loams. In 
- both soils the development of beautiful, large, healthy bulbs with no 
stem bulblets is the rule. 
It is likely that the grower has in this stem-bulblet reaction a very 
good indicator as to the suitability of his conditions to the produc- 
tion of the bulbs. If an abundance of the bulblets is produced, 
something wrong may be suspected. It may be, as in the writer’s 
case, that this effort to perpetuate the species is a reaction to poor 
drainage and bad soil conditions, or it may be brought about by other 
untoward circumstances, such as raw manures too close to the bulbs, 
causing more or less basal rot. 
It is asserted that bulblet production can be accelerated by pre- 
venting seed production. This information is given on a suggestion 
from a very gocd authority. The writer’s experience on this point 
has not been conclusive. In all cases in the work of the Denpart- 
ment of Agriculture, stem-bulblet production has been accompanied 
by an imperfection in the main bulb. 
The first method used to induce the production of stem bulblets 
was to dig down beside the plant and sever the stem just above the 
bulb with as little disturbance as possible. This was done when the 
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