PRODUCTION" OF GRAPE-HYACINTH BULBS 7 
PACKING FOR SHIPMENT 
The same cautions apply to packing for shipment as to drying in 
storage. The pack should be as well aerated as possible to prevent 
heating or an accumulation of moisture. 
Foreign growers pack in grain chaff, but it is not believed that 
this sort of packing is necessary for transporting bulbs between 
points in this country unless the package is very large. In 1921 
the Department of Agriculture shipped varieties of Muscari conicvm 
and M. comosum in quantities of 100,000 in large perforated sacks 
holding 300 large bulbs, using ordinary tulip crates. They carried 
satisfactorily in a box car which was four weeks in transit across 
the continent. 
In the leading commercial varieties the grower can protect his 
pack a great deal by his method of cleaning. If the planting is hoed 
off before digging there remain attached to the bulbs about 2 inches 
of stem and leaf bases. It has been the practice of the Department 
of Agriculture to leave these old stem and leaf bases attached when 
cleaning. This aerates the pack very decidedly and does not neces- 
sarily detract much from the appearance of the bulbs. 
A POSSIBLE ADVANTAGEOUS METHOD OF GROWING 
One of the difficulties in growing grape hyacinths and some other 
genera of the minor bulb lists is the weedy tendency of many of the 
varieties. It is not possible to get them all out in digging, nor does 
subsequent tillage kill them. Even if plowed under when in full 
vegetative vigor the bulbs seldom die but will appear the next season 
when left within 6 or 8 inches of the surface. 
Since the yields can be made so large and the areas required are 
so small, it is suggested that the plan of a permanent planting like 
that adopted by some foreign growers may have decided advantages. 
In this method of handling, the bulbs are grown on the same ground 
continuously, the fertility being made up by liberal top-dressings of 
manure during the dormant season. The bulbs may be harvested 
annually or biennially, but when digging is done the merchantable 
bulbs are separated in the field and the bulblets immediately put back 
in the ground in rows the same as before. If the soil is naturally 
friable and fertility is maintained this plan for the production of 
these and other miscellaneous stocks inclined to be weedy seems to 
work satisfactorily. 
Another advantage of this method is that it enables the grower to 
dig just what he needs in any particular season. If sales do not 
demand all the stock it can be^ left in the ground to grow. Within 
certain limits it will improve in quantity for several years at least, 
the bulbs often piling up on each other when the plantings become 
old. 
The different species of the group will, of course, need different 
treatments. They are not all adapted to handling on the perma- 
nent-planting plan. The method is suited to those forms which are 
propagated vegetatively, like the varieties of Muscari botryoides, 
for they are the weedy ones. Forms reproduced from seed, like M. 
azurea, are not weedy and are more adapted to a treatment wherein 
