66 
METHODS OF TRAINING CLIMBING PLANTS. 
sun and the action of the air, — -unavoidably induces a most luxuriant but really 
unhealthy or unfruitful growth ; and however beneficially the upper portions of a 
plant may be acted upon by the agencies which sustain it in vigour, it is never 
found to flower or fruit profusely while the water that accumulates and stagnates 
about its roots is unlimited, particularly if those roots lie beyond the reach of 
atmospheric action, and in a comparatively unconfined medium. This, then, is one 
of the incentives to infertility in climbers so circumstanced. 
A second matter to which an indisposition to flower may be ascribed, is the 
purely perpendicular, or partially or thoroughly horizontal, posture in which the 
stems are trained. A straight-growing shoot of a scandent species can be carried 
directly to an amazing distance, if its course continue the same year after year ; 
and all its lower parts will in time become destitute of buds, and perfectly bare. 
But if its natural mode of elongation be diverted, if it be turned in various directions, 
and, still more strikingly, should it be twisted or bent abruptly from its course, its 
juices may be made to concentrate in given places, to concoct and put forth buds 
and lateral branches, and, according to the observed laws of vegetable function, it 
will flower speedier and with greater prolificness. The unvarying straightness, 
therefore, with which the stems and branches of climbers are permitted to grow, is 
another check to the formation of flowers. 
Keeping these facts before us, the reasons for the inordinate proliferousness 
attained under the treatment here advocated, will be immediately obvious. Plants 
whose roots are confined in pots, and can thus be watered at pleasure, — the soil in 
which they grow being, moreover, preserved from saturation, and kept in an open 
and suitable state by the influence of light and air, — while their branches are so 
curved as to repress extra luxuriance, and present their principal surface more 
perfectly to the sun, — must, in accordance with all theory, bloom earlier and better ; 
and in practice, the assumption is most fully confirmed. 
How far such a method is practicable with species that attain a remarkable 
length of stem in one year, or eventually reach any extraordinary dimensions, may 
well be doubted. Still there are numbers which can, with the greatest propriety, 
be submitted to the foregoing routine, and which will reward the cultivator by 
constituting some of the most beautiful dwarf objects that it is within the province 
of art to prepare. Both herbaceous and shrubby species are fit subjects for the 
operation, and there are only two or three points which need be at all regarded. 
The quality of the soil is of prime importance, and a sandy, rather than an enriched 
earth, should be selected. The trellis ought likewise to be secured to the outside 
of the pot, because it can then be more readily replaced by a larger one, should it 
be requisite, and the roots will not be injured by having the sticks pressing upon 
them. Pruning may be fearlessly effected where the peculiar habit of the plants 
seems to demand it, and will always further the final purport of the system. 
When the shoots gain the top of the trellis, they can very easily be turned back 
again, and fastened between the ascending ones ; leaving, however, the space at 
the summit quite open, for the admission of the solar rays. 
