212 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
March 23; 1907. 
soil, when they should be uncovered and 
taken into a greenhouse or oold frame. 
1643. Seeds to Give Flowers in Winter. 
Will you please give me a list of seeds 
I can plant during the summer to have a 
good show during winter. I can get heat 
up to 65 degs. in my greenhouse. (Ama¬ 
teur, Hull). 
It would not be advisable to raise the 
temperature of your greenhouse to 65 degs. 
at night by artificial means even if you 
could. A temperature of 50 degs. by night 
is quite sufficient even for flowering 
plants in a greenhouse, rising 5 degs. by 
day or 10 degs. by sun heat. Most of 'the 
plants usually termed greenhouse subjects 
are propagated by cuttings, although such 
plants are not so widely grown at the pre¬ 
sent day as they used to be. You can, how¬ 
ever, raise a number of soft-wooded plants 
from seeds to flower during winter. For 
instance, you could raise Marguerite Car¬ 
nations in May to flower during the early 
part of winter in pots. Many of the Stocks 
are very suitable for winter flower’ng and 
may be sown in May or June, and grown in 
pots throughout the summer. These would 
include Ten-week Stock Princess Alice, 
which is sweetly scented; Intermediate 
Stocks in a variety of colours may also be 
sown in May or June. The race of winter 
flowering Stocks, including All the Tear 
Round and Riviera Market, are particularly 
well suited for flowering during winter in a 
greenhouse temperature. For the purpose of 
keeping up a succession some plants require 
to be sown at,.frequent intervals, but these 
Stocks keep on throwing up side branches 
and flowering for months together. \ou 
should also bear in mind Chinese Primulas, 
Star Primulas, Cinerarias of the large 
flowering strain, and also Cineraria stel- 
lata. These plants require a little more 
skill to grow them successfully than the 
Stocks. Cyclamen may be sown in October 
or November for flowering in the following 
winter. They also require careful manage¬ 
ment. Some of the Wallflowers are very 
useful under glass in winter, and for this 
purpose you might sow in August or Sep¬ 
tember Winter Brown and Early Parisian 
Wallflowers. The above should make a very 
gay house even if you only grow some of 
the kinds. 
COLD FRAMES. 
1644. How to See the Whole Plant in 
Growth. 
How can I grow plants, etc., so that chil¬ 
dren can actually see the whole plant in 
growth? (Nature Study, Kent). 
In order to bring the whole life history of 
plants under the eye at once it would be 
necessary to sow seeds of something, grow 
them to the flowering stage, and in the 
meantime, at suitable intervals, sow more 
seeds of the same plants in order to show 
the plant in various of its early stages. A 
last sowing might be made SO’ as to show 
the seedling which is newly germinated. 
Soane dry seeds would then complete the 
series. The length of the intervals between 
each sowing would depend very much upon 
how many stages of the plant you want to 
show. With this object in view you should 
commence with some common seeds, which 
you can guess at the time of being in bloom, 
and to make a sufficient number of sowings 
afterwards at intervals. 
1643. Plants for Nature Study. 
What are the plants, grasses, etc., I can 
grow in the above way? (Nature Study, 
Kent.) 
There is practically no limit as to what you 
might grow for th§ purpose of demonstrating 
the life history of plants, because anything 
that can be grown under artificial conditions 
will answer the purpose. We may say, how¬ 
ever, at once that the commonest of plants 
which you can find or get seeds of are suitable 
for this form of instruction. For instance, we 
need only name such as Cornflower, pot 
Marigold, Sweet Pea, Bread Bean, and gar¬ 
den Bean, which you could grow to the 
flowering stage in a few months. If you 
want to raise grasses, one of the most com¬ 
monly used for botanical instruction is In¬ 
dian Corn or Maize. Oats, Wheat, Barley 
or Rye are equally suitable and more easy 
to fruit under ou.r climatic conditions. A 
great point about instruction of this kind 
is to think out what you wish to illustrate 
by comparison or contrast and then gat seeds 
of some subjects which will show it. For 
instance, you would scarcely attempt to grow 
the Oak or Beech with the object of flower¬ 
ing them, but you could germinate them with 
the object of showing that the fleshy cotyle¬ 
dons of the Oak remain , in the soil during 
germination, while those of the Beech come 
above ground and become green. Ash and 
Maple seeds, if gathered in autumn and kept 
dry fill spring, would probably not ger¬ 
minate at all, but by keeping them in moist 
sand during winter and then sowing them 
out of doors they would come up ?n spring. 
You could even sow them out of doors in 
autumn and they would come up in spring. 
Quite of another type are the fruits or 
berries of the Holly and Hawthorn, which 
require to be laid in a heap out of doors 
in the autumn, when ripe, and left there to 
rot for a twelvemonth and sown just one year 
after gathering. In the following spring 
these will germinate. These are merely a 
few hints as to what you might sow, because 
it all depends upon the object you have in 
view. For an elementary class some of the 
annuals which would come into bloom in a 
few months’ time would be the more suitable 
to use. 
ROOM PLANTS. 
1646. Potting Aspidistras. 
Being a constant reader of The Garden¬ 
ing World, I should like to know through 
your paper what composition Aspidistras 
thrive best in. Also the best time for re¬ 
potting to produce fair sized leaves. Last 
year the leaves split as they unfolded them¬ 
selves. Will_you kindly tell me the cause of 
that? I may add they are blooming now. 
(L. E. W., Essex.) 
■Compost is a better word than composition 
for the mixture of soils you require fox 
plants. Aspidistras are not very particular, 
provided you make the drainage good, so 
that superfluous water will run away. 
Neither should you 1 U9e pots that are too 
large for the plants, but just sufficient to 
contain the roots and crowns comfortably. 
If they are crowded, then get pots just a 
size larger and drain them well with crocks. 
A good compost would consist of three parts 
of good fibrous loam, one part of leaf mould 
and one part of sand. You can re-pet them 
about the beginning of April, and be careful 
not to over-water them till the plants com¬ 
mence growing, although it would be equally 
a mistake to let them get dry. The splitting 
of the .leaves may be due to a variety of 
circumstances, such as cats, or by wind, if 
the plants are out of doors at the time. They 
might split if the crowns are very much 
overcrowded, though we have never 1 seen 
such a thing happen. The youing leaves 
should not be handled, bult left to unroll 
naturally. The after treatment, to get leaves 
of good size, consists chiefly in placing the 
plants where they will get a fair amount 
of light and air during the season and ibe 
regularly attended to in the matter of water¬ 
ing. 
FERNS . 
1647. Treatment of Ferns. 
'Can you give me some hints on the pre¬ 
servation of Ferns in living rooms? The 
only attention 1 give them is an occasional 1 
watering either with tepid water or by ex¬ 
posing them to a gentle rain, yet they m- 1 
variably flag and ultimately die. Any 
hints om their culture will be very accept- | 
able. (Amicus, Surrey.) 
\Ye are afraid it is the “ occasional water- ' 
ing ” that is the cause of all your trouble, 
or at least a great deal of it, in the cultiva¬ 
tion of Ferns in a room. Tepid water is 
of no advantage at all. All that is neces¬ 
sary is to use some water that has beea 
standing for some hours in the house^ We 
should impress upon you the necessity of look¬ 
ing at the plants once a day either in the i 
morning or the afternoon, just before sun¬ 
down, being a very good time to do it. We do 
not advise you to give them water on each 
of these occasions, but to learn by observa¬ 
tion whether the soil is beginning to get 
dry or not and if it is getting brown or ! 
grey in colour or feels dusty to the finger; 
it is then high time to give them sufficient 1 
water to run through the soil and out at the 
bottom of the pots. Ferns being evergreen, 
or at least those which are cultivated ir 
rooms, should never be allowed to becom< j 
dry for one whole day at any time, Whe: 
once you get familiar with the plants voi j 
will scon come to recognise when waterin' 
is .necessary. Most of them may be culti i 
vated in loam containing a fair propertio: j 
of sand, but we think you would even fe | 
more successful if you had some leaf mcuh I 
or peat for mixing with the soil, say t\v i 
parts loam to one part peat, to which ma 
be added sufficient silver sand to make th 
soil gritty. The plants should also hav 
a fair exposure to light at all times of '.h 
year. If you keep’them in a dark sp< 
they must get weaker and weaker and nit 
mutely die. They are liable to get dust' 
and in attempts to clean them with a spang 
the fronds get crushed or pieces broke 
away, but you can avoid this by taking the) 
out of doors and syringing them, ot el.- 
using a coarse-rcised watering pot to gfl 
them a good .shower of winter to remove tl 
dust. The water may have to be shake 
off them partly and the plants taken indoo 
immediately if the season is winter. \c 
thus 'see that 1 the whole question lies tvii 
soil, a sufficient amount of light and regul; 
attention to watering and cleaning throug. 
out the year. 
1648. Growing Todea superba. 
Last year I got a good plant of Todi 
superba, and tried to grow it ulnder a be 
glass in' the window, but the glass was t< 
small and the fronds gelt spoiled by pushi: 
against it. I have no greenhouse, b 
should like to be able to grow this fine ler 
Can you suggest some way to succeed 
growing it? (Filix, Durham.) 
By selecting a warm or sheltered situ 
tion close to your dwelling house or a: 
outhouse, you could construct a small frai 
or pit that would grow this plapt bett 
than in a window. The accompany! 
illustration shows how you could at sm; 
