Rhyme in Season 
Toward the end of every year 
Our hearts get filled with Christmas cheer, 
With friendly thoughts about our 
neighbors 
And how to do each other favors. 
What can we give to Dick and Marty? 
Perhaps the Smiths like something arty. 
Let's gather all the outgrown toys 
For not-so-fortunate girls and boys. 
These thoughts though being far from 
wrong 
Would make more sense if all year long 
We tried to help those who are needy 
And share instead of being greedy. 
The world, it oft’ occurs to me 
Would be a better place to be 
If we would spread the time for giving 
Through every hour while we're living. 
| H ugh Evans 
"The time draws near the birth of 
Christ.’ Christmas aside from its original 
observance is now the occasion for giving 
and receiving presents. 
No small part of the interest of a gar- 
den to the owner is contained in the mem- 
ories and associations evoked by the plants 
themselves. A garden should be full of 
memories, of friends who are still living 
and of some perhaps who have passed 
behind the veil, and as we stroll around 
our garden in the evening, we pause and 
say, that plant was given to me by so and 
so, and that beautiful tree there was be- 
stowed on me by a friend years ago; and 
this shrub here, | sought for for years be- 
fore | finally discovered a lone plant of it. 
Since we are alluding, though so briefly, 
to Christmas and gardens and _ friends, 
what more fitting and seemly gift could 
you bestow on your friend than a living 
plant, that as it grows and blooms will 
awake fragrant memories of the giver? 
There cannot be any more gracious gift 
from one friend to another. ''Flowers are 
lovely, love is flower-like. Friendship is a 
sheltering tree. 
THIS IS A PLANT? 
REINDEER FERN 
"The Platyceriums may be considered 
at once amongst the grandest, most beau- 
tiful, and most extraordinary of ferns''— 
so said Mr. George Nicholson when he 
published his celebrated ‘Dictionary of 
Gardening’ in London in 1888. Mr. Nich- 
olson was praising the plants which we com- 
monly call "STAGHORN FERNS" but 
which themselves are far from common. 
If you were to behold a Platycerium for 
the first time with no prior coaching, the 
vernacular name would immediately sug- 
gest itself, unless you want to quibble 
about Elks or Reindeer or some other ant- 
lered quadruped. (Our staff photographer 
has attempted to illustrate). The species 
depicted is Platycerium bifurcatum. It used 
to be P. alcicorne, but now that we are 
smarter we call it P. bifurcatum. 
Ferns don't have flowers but they man- 
age. In fern talk ''frond'' means leaf; you 
won't believe this but half the fronds on 
Staghorn Ferns lay eggs so to speak, and 
the other half will have nothing to do with 
the process. They even go their separate 
ways on the plant. The drone or-non-pro- 
ductive fronds spread out from the base 
of the plant, over the pot, basket or tree 
on which the fern is growing, enveloping 
the entire root area, while the maternal 
fronds form the structure which gives the 
genus its vernacular name. 
Platyceriums are epiphytic—they live on 
the climate in their native haunts (sub-trop- 
ical Australia in the case of P. bifurcatum). 
In captivity they will settle for sphagnum 
moss, leaf mold, tree fern fiber, etc., or 
best of all a slab of tree fern trunk. On 
such fine young plants $7.50. M.E. 
