506 
Medicinal  Plant  Gardens. 
(  Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
I   November,  1914. 
MEDICINAL  PLANT  GARDENS.* 
By  Dr.  W.  W.  Stockberger,  Physiologist  in  Charge  of  Drug- Plant  and 
Poisonous-Plant  Investigations,  Bureau  of  Plant  Industry,  United 
States  Department  of  Agriculture. 
It  is  not  my  intention  in  this  paper  to  present  a  descriptive 
account  of  medicinal  plant  gardens  in  general,  or  even  to  discuss 
the  more  important  ones  of  this  country,  except  in  so  far  as  refer- 
ence to  them  may  be  necessary  by  way  of  illustration.  I  shall 
endeavor,  however,  to  point  out  what  to  me  appear  to  be  some 
popular  misconceptions  concerning  the  scope  and  function  of  such 
gardens,  and  to  suggest  how  they  may  be  made  to  increase  their 
usefulness  to  Materia  Medica  and  Pharmacognosy. 
For  the  purpose  of  this  discussion,  medicinal  plant  gardens 
may  be  regarded  as  falling  under  one  of  two  general  classes,  the 
first  being  pedagogic,  the  second  industrial.  The  pedagogic  garden 
is,  naturally,  an  adjunct  of  a  school  of  pharmacy  or  of  a  botanic 
garden.  Its  scope  includes  all  medicinal  plants  that  are  adapted  to 
existing  soil  and  climatic  conditions,  supplemented  by  greenhouse 
facilities.  Its  function  is  to  familiarize  students  with  the  habit  and 
appearance  of  the  entire  living  plant,  some  part  of  which  is  used 
as  a  plant  drug,  to  supply  the  need  for  authentic  specimens  for 
observation  and  demonstration  in  the  classroom,  and  to  furnish 
materials  for  research  work  on  the  morphology  and  chemical  con- 
stituents of  drug  plants.  Necessarily  it  will  be  found,  desirable  to 
grow  a  large  number  of  species  in  this  type  of  garden,  but,  owing 
to  the  cost  of  maintenance,  the  space  which  can  be  devoted  to  any 
one  species  will  be  very  small. 
The  industrial  garden,  on  the  other  hand,  is  an  adjunct  of  public 
or  private  enterprise,  the  object  of  which  is  to  give  additional  infor- 
mation concerning  our  agricultural  resources.  Its  scope  is  the  same 
as  that  of  the  pedagogic  garden,  but  it  differs  very  materially  in 
function,  which  is  to  serve  for  the  determination  of  the  adaptability 
of  medicinal  plants,  not  only  to  soil  and  climatic  conditions,  but 
to  economic  conditions  as  well.  In  the  industrial  garden  a  large 
number  of  species  will  be  tested  on  a  small  scale  to  determine 
whether  the  soil  and  climate  are  suitable  for  their  growth ;  then  the 
*  A  paper  read  before  the  Scientific  Section  of  the  A.  Ph.  A.  at  the 
Detroit  meeting,  1914. 
