MussouRI JBROTANICAL
GARDEN JBULLETIN

VOLUME XLII

1354

ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI

PUBLISHED MONTHLY EXCEPT JULY AND AUGUST,
BY THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES

SUBSCRIPTION PRICE: $2.50 A YEAR

MiSsOUR! BotKWreat
GARDEN LIBRARY

MISSOURI BOTANICAL
GARDEN BULLETIN

CONTENTS

Tower Grove in the 1870's

Growing Roses Tree Feeding
Plants for a St. Louis Garden Book Review: Weber’s “Plants of the
Colorado Front Range”

Notes

Volume XLII Josacen 1054 Number 1

Cover: Tower Grove in the 1870’s. See opposite page.

Office of — 306 E. Simmons Street, Galesburg, Illinois.
Editorial Office: issouri Botanical Garden, 2315 Tower Grove Avenue,
St. Louis, 10, Misea
Published — except ae and August by the Board of asa of the
uri Botanical Garden. Subscription price: $2.50 a
Entered as second-class matter January 26, ees at the post- ‘is at Gales-
burg, Illinois, under the Act of March 3

Please: vi not saab a hae 44 of the Bulletin. If you have no further use for
it Prceaee friend or return it to the Garden. Return sees will

Missouri Botanical
Garden Bulletin

Vol. XLII JANUARY, 1954 No. 1

TOWER GROVE IN THE 1870's
EDGAR ANDERSON

This charming sketch is a portion of one of the plates from Compton’s
Views of St. Louis, published in 1876. It shows Mr. Shaw’s country home
“Tower Grove” nearly twenty years after Henry Shaw had definitely set out
to make it into a first-class botanical garden. At the left of the picture is
Tower Grove itself, or the “Old Residence” as it is usually called today. It
is shown in its original form before the east half was torn down and rebuilt.
The present Tower Grove Avenue runs diagonally across the picture with
the high limestone wall which still shuts off the Garden from the outside
world. The Cleveland Avenue Gate is at the right-hand margin of the picture
substantially as it is today, and to the left of it is the Museum built by Mr.
Shaw in 1859. In back of the Museum is the original grove, beloved by
Mr. Shaw and responsible for the latter half of the name he chose for -his
country home. Though this picture was made more than ten years before
Mr. Shaw’s death, his mausoleum is shown already in place in the Grove.

Of some general interest are the large evergreen trees which figure so
prominently in the sketch. They were a feature of this part of the Garden
in Mr. Shaw’s day, but as the city grew out around the garden and the smoke
problem became worse and worse the entire collection virtually disappeared.
By the time smoke control made it possible to grow some evergreens again,
only one or two ailing Austrian Pines were left.

A NOTE ABOUT THIS SPECIAL NUMBER OF THE BULLETIN
The annual report which has been for years a feature of the January
BULLETIN will this year be prepared in a somewhat condensed mimeographed
form for the staff and the trustees. Subscribers who would care to see the
report may obtain a copy by writing the editor of the BULLETIN.
month we are devoting the entire number to articles previously
published in the BULLETIN and now out of print, for which there is a con-
tinuing demand,

(1)

2 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

GROWING ROSES
PAUL A. KOHL

The rose is the only flower that every one knows and loves. Many books
on rose culture have been written, and every garden magazine devotes pages
to this flower each year. New varieties are constantly being added to the
already-long list of hybrid tea roses; membership in the American Rose
Society is on the increase; local rose societies are being formed in many com-
munities, one of the most recent being in St. Louis; and so the interest in the
rose continues unabated. Small wonder, then, that information is constantly
being sought by those who are just taking up rose culture, or by those who
are meeting with difficulties or are interested in enlarging their collections.

Current rose catalogues place considerable emphasis on hybrid tea roses.
They are first, if the popularity of the different groups of roses is measured
by the number of varieties offered in the catalogues, some nurseries listing
between seventy and eighty varieties. Polyanthas and their large-flowered
cousins, called floribundas, are second with twenty to thirty varieties; and
climbing roses are third, the list of available varieties being from twelve to
thirty-five. Other groups, but of less importance, are the pillar roses, the
shrub roses, the old-fashioned roses and the miniatures.

Hybrid Tea Roses.—These roses are practically ever-blooming; they
commence flowering in May and continue until frost. Given a reasonably
good soil all varieties will thrive in the garden, and if they are protected
during the winter they will grow in succeeding years. Roses, like people,
are individuals, and some varieties are sturdier than others. Thus, in time
certain roses are recognized throughout the country as being superior, and
these maintain their popularity for many years. The rose catalogues picture
and describe many new roses each year. A beginner will find it difficult to
select a few good varieties without some guidance, but he can be assured of
purchasing good ones if he selects those marked with the insignia bearing
the letters “AARS.” Varieties so marked represent the “All American Rose
Selections,” being reliable roses after they have had a thorough trial in all
parts of the United States. Another source of information is the “Proof of
the Pudding” in the American Rose Society’s annuals, which contains com-
ments on the performance of the newest roses by rose growers from different
parts of the United States. Each year the American Rose Society also issues a
Guide for Buying Roses which includes the national ratings. A score of 10
would be the perfect rose, but the nearest approach to perfection in the 1953
guide is “Crimson Glory” with a score of 9.5, followed by “Peace” with 9.4.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 3

Polyantha Roses—The word “‘polyantha” means many-flowered. For-
merly most of the roses in this group had small flowers, but in recent years
hybridizers have created varieties with flowers nearly as large as the hybrid
teas, and these have been called “‘floribundas.” As a group they are very
popular because they bloom so freely throughout the season and are fine for
mass displays in the garden.

Hybrid Perpetuals—Many years ago hybrid perpetuals were almost the
only roses grown. They can stand the changeable winter weather better
than the hybrid tea roses. The flowers, for the most part, are double, pink,
red, or white, with a few partly yellow; some are very fragrant, others
slightly so or not at all. The plants are tall, and some varieties have very
thorny canes. Their best period of bloom is in June, only a few varieties, as
“Frau Karl Druschki,” producing a second crop of flowers in late summer.

Shrub Roses.—Closely resembling the hybrid perpetuals in hardiness and
vigorous growth are the various shrub roses, such as rugosa roses, sweetbriers,
and the species roses of which our native prairie rose, Rosa setigera, is an
example.

Climbing Roses.—From the standpoint of flower size and time of bloom
the climbing roses may be divided into two groups: the large-flowered ones
which commence to bloom about May 15, and the small, cluster-flowered
ramblers which bloom during the first and second week of June. The climb-
ing hybrid tea roses represent a class that blooms during the summer and
fall. They require several years to become established and must be protected
during the winter.

Miniature Roses.—These dwarf fairy roses are charming reproductions of
the large-flowered hybrid tea roses. The buds of some of them measure less
than one-quarter of an inch and yet they are as perfectly formed as any of
the larger roses. Since the plants are small they should be grown in separate
beds or in pots.

The Rose Bed.—Hybrid tea roses may be grown along the front of shrub
beds or planted among perennials, but when a dozen or more are grown it is
simpler to care for them in one bed. Roses should receive at least half a day
of sunshine. If they are planted near shallow-rooted trees, such as the elm
and maple, they suffer not only from the shade cast by the trees but also
from lack of water and food which the tree roots take. Low places are un-
desirable for rose beds. Because the soil is wet most of the year, the plants
are in danger of being heaved by the frost in winter and finally killed.

Soil.—tIn this area the soil is a fairly heavy clay loam, and if other plants
have been grown successfully in it for some years it is in reasonably goo
condition for roses. So often, however, the soil about the home consists

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

HYBRID TEA AND SHRUB ROSES IN A ST. LOUIS GARDEN

mostly of subsoil which was spread after the house was built. In the process
of leveling much of the building material, such as sand, mortar, and broken
bricks, was covered with a few inches of soil. It is a chore like the removal
of this building trash from the soil that takes the joy out of gardening, but
it must be done. About the best way to proceed with the preparation of a
rose bed is to remove the upper six inches of soil and throw it to one side.
Superphosphate is then spread in the trench at the rate of about three pounds
to every 100 square feet of bed area. This is spaded into the subsoil and then
the topsoil is returned to the bed. Both layers of soil will be improved by
the addition of leafmold or peat moss at the rate of two to four bushels to
every 100 square feet of bed. A good compost pile should be maintained in
every garden to supply additional humus whenever it is needed. A newly
spaded rose bed should be allowed to settle several weeks before the roses
are planted. If this is not possible, then the soil should be firmed as it is
returned to the bed.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 5

Rose Plants——Almost all the roses that are purchased from nurseries or
stores are budded plants, as this is the method by which roses are produced
commercially. Dormant roses should be planted in March if possible, and
planting may be continued into April. The later in spring dormant roses are
planted the less chance they have of becoming established before warm
weather sets in. Pot-grown roses may be planted any time and will grow if
carefully handled so that the ball of soil surrounding the roots does not fall
apart. Roses may also be planted in October or November providing the
plants are obtainable. In December weather conditions usually prevent proper
planting, and the soil is too cold for any root action.

Planting.—Roses should be unpacked soon after being received. If it is
impossible to plant them immediately they should be “‘heeled-in,” that is, the
roots and most of the tops covered with damp soil.

It is surprising how rapidly roses dry out when they are exposed to the
wind and sun while the holes are being dug. To avoid this, the plants may
be taken to the garden in a bucket of water or the roots may be dipped in
water and the plants wrapped in paper or burlap.

The hole to receive the rose should be large enough to accommodate the
roots without crowding. Leave a slight mound or cone of soil in the center
and on this spread the roots. The knob (that place where the rose is budded)
should be level with the surface of the soil. This will allow for settling
and eventually the budded portion will be an inch beneath the surface. Work
the soil between the roots with the fingers. (A good pair of leather gloves
will be found indispensable for this work.) Add more soil as needed and
finally firm with the feet. Leave a depression around each plant, into which
pour a half pail of water after all the roses are planted. This helps to settle
the soil and prevents any loss of roses from drying out. When the water has
drained away the remaining soil is drawn around the plants and mounded to
about six inches to protect the buds until they form new shoots. Later this
soil is washed down by rains or leveled off when the beds are cultivated.

Planting Distances—The dwarf polyanthas and the majority of hybrid
tea roses should be planted fifteen to twenty inches apart; large hybrid tea
roses, as “Radiance,” two feet; hybrid perpetuals, two to three feet; and
rugosa and shrub roses at least four feet apart. Climbing and rambler roses
are planted singly at the bases of arches or pillars. On fences or trellises
they should be spaced eight to ten feet apart, while unusually strong- growing
varieties, like “Dr. Van Fleet,” may be even farther apart.

Watering —Drought periods may occur in June, July or August. When
the upper layer of soil becomes dry the growth of the bush roses is checked.

6 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

HYBRID TEA ROSE IN MARCH
Remove weak and dead canes and
sucker at left

PROPER PRUNING CUT ABOVE
A BUD

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN Z

Shrub and climbing roses have a deeper root system and do not show the
effects of drought so quickly. Rose beds should be soaked once or twice a
week during dry periods, the early morning being a good time if a fountain
sprinkler is used. Wetting of the foliage in the evening tends to spread
diseases. If the rose beds are watered in the evening it is better to use a
canvas hose soaker or to flood the beds with the open end of the hose laid
on a board to prevent washing the soil.

Insects.—Since the insects which attack roses do most of their damage
early in the season it is wise to have the materials on hand with which to
fight them, also sprayers and dusters in working order. Gardeners should
learn to recognize the kind of insects which feed on roses and know the
remedy.

Aphis appear each spring. They are easily controlled if the roses are
sprayed with any contact insecticide containing nicotine or pyrethrum.
Sometimes they are tough and a double-strength solution is needed to kill
them. Another infestation occurs a few days later when those with wings
are blown in by the wind, and this calls for a second and third spraying.

A number of chewing insects appear every year, of which the rose slugs
are the worst. They skeletonize the leaves so quickly that the damage is
done before the spray gun has been brought into play. They begin feeding
on the underside of the leaves in May and do most of the damage by early
June. If the roses are sprayed in early May with arsenate of lead and again
after heavy rains in anticipation of an attack, the slugs will be controlled.
Several kinds of beetles eat the tips of rose buds or bore into them. Leaf
cutter bees cut perfect circles from the leaves, and, like the beetles, they are
difficult to control. Stem borers sometimes injure rose canes. They enter
the stem where it has been recently pruned and as they bore down they inter-
fere with the flow of sap. Very little can be done to prevent this type of
injury. The pruning cuts are sometimes painted or covered with grafting
wax, but it is questionable whether the time spent in treating each wound
is worth the effort. New pesticides are being introduced every year and are
usually more effective than the ones previously used. However, they are also
toxic to man and must be used with caution.

In some years red spider mites cause partial defoliation of the roses during
June and July. These mites draw the sap from the underside of the leaves,
and to dislodge them the plants should be syringed with a strong stream of
water. When spider mites become a serious pest use Aramite.

Some roses, particularly the rugosas, are subject to various scale insects,
such as oyster shell and scurfy scale. When the entire cane is covered with
scale it should be cut away at the base of the plant and burned. Spray these
roses with an oil spray during the winter.

8 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

MILDEW BLACK SPOT

CATERPILLARS

DISEASES AND INSECTS

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 9

If tender rose tips wither and turn black and few flower buds develop
during the summer, it is quite certain that rose midge has invaded the garden
and the injury is not due to heat as was formerly supposed. This insect has
been prevalent in greenhouses for many years, but only about ten years ago
was it recognized as a serious garden pest. Dr. W. E. Blauvelt, of Cornell
University, studied this insect and its control and on various occasions re-
ported his observations in the American Rose Annuals. In describing his
work in the 1946 Annual, Dr. Blauvelt considered DDT the most promising
insecticide and recommended about 1'% tablespoonfuls of 25% wettable
DDT powder to one gallon of water. This may be combined with the other
new spray material “‘Fermate,” and if the Grasselli Spreader Sticker is added
we have one of the best combination sprays, that will control a number of
insects and the diseases affecting the rose.

Diseases.—Several fungous diseases plague the roses, the most serious one
being black spot. It occurs in every rose garden, and the intensity of the
attack varies each year with weather conditions. The disease is on the roses
long before it is recognized, but by the time the leaves develop the character-
istic spots and drop to the ground it has made such inroads that nothing can
be done to prevent premature defoliation. The control of black spot calls
for a spraying or dusting program that continues uninterruptedly from
spring until fall. For many years Massey dust (named for Dr. L. M. Massey,
of Cornell University, who has done much research on black spot) has been
the standard spray or dust in controlling this disease. Massey dust consists
of 9 parts dusting sulphur and 1 part arsenate of lead. If roses are dusted or
sprayed at ten-day intervals, and with an occasional extra dusting during
rainy periods, one can feel reasonably sure of checking this disease. It is not
possible to stamp it out but it can be held in check. The new material,
“Fermate,” has given promising results in black spot control. Any other
diseases which affect roses will be controlled by the same fungicides used
for black spot, with one exception—Fermate will not control mildew.

Dusting and Spraying.—Gardeners have a choice of dusting or spraying
their roses. Either way is effective and each has certain advantages. Dusting
guns are quickly loaded and can be used on short notice, as just before a rain.
They are also cheaper than sprayers, and the latest types weigh less and
are very easy to use. In order to get good coverage, dusting must be done
when there is little wind, in the morning or the evening. The wearing of
goggles is recommended, for if sulphur gets in the eyes they smart for some

time.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

1. SCURFY SCALE ON RUGOSA ROSE
3. SMALL DUSTER

2. COMPRESSED-AIR SPRAYER
4. LARGE DUSTER WITH BELLOWS

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 11

Fermate can be stirred into dusting sulphur in a bucket in much the same
way that paint is mixed, using 10 per cent Fermate and 90 per cent dusting
sulphur. DuPont’s Garden Dust contains DDT, Fermate, Rotenone, and
several other materials which makes it an all-purpose dust. Pomo-green
with nicotine is another fungicide easily used in the duster, as is also Massey
dust which has already been mentioned.

Good quart-size compressed-air sprayers and the larger two- and three-
gallon ones are available for those who prefer to use liquids instead of dusts.
Tri-ogen, the all-purpose spray, will control sucking and chewing insects and
fungous diseases. Wettable sulphur can be used at the rate of 2 tablespoon-
fuls to one gallon of water, plus 5 to 8 drops of Grasselli Spreader Sticker.
Fermate is used at the rate of 2 tablespoonfuls to the gallon of water or, if
combined with sulphur, 2 teaspoonfuls of Fermate and 2 tablespoonfuls of
sulphur to the gallon. A set of aluminum measuring spoons is an indispensable
item for the gardener’s spray shelf. Fermate and DDT do not mix well wit
water. DDT should be shaken with a cupful of water in a Mason jar before
being added to the full amount of water. When Fermate is to be mixed
with water, stir a few drops of spreader-sticker in a glass jar of about two
quarts capacity, add two tablespoonfuls of Fermate, clamp the lid, and shake
vigorously. Pour this mixture into the spray tank and add water to make
a gallon of solution.

The success or failure of the various fungicides is directly dependent
upon the timing of the applications. Frequent rains necessitate several dust-
ings or sprayings. During dry weather the applications can be spaced at
two-week intervals and during the hottest and driest weather dispensed with
entirely. Sulphur injures the leaves if used when the temperature is above
90 degrees. Fermate can be used alone during those periods as a spray or
combined with talc instead of sulphur.

Fertilizing.—The following fertilizers for roses are suggested:

Commercial fertilizers with a 4-12-4 or similar formula. Apply half a
handful to a plant and cultivate it into the soil in April and June. Use more
for large climbing and shrub roses.

Rose food (7-8-5).

Dried and shredded cattle manure.

Completely soluble fertilizers have come into use in the last few years.
They are more expensive than commercial fertilizers but they are very easily
used. A teaspoonful of fertilizer to a quart of water dissolves instantly and
can be poured over the plant without any danger of burning the foliage.
Feeding plants through their leaves has captured the imagination of many
gardeners, and while foliar feeding is effective, plants will also improve if
fed through the roots.

12 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

CLIMBING ROSES ON LINNEAN HOUSE

From left to right: Purity, Milky Way, Wartburg, Christine Wright, Purity, Mary
Wallace, Dr. W. Van Fleet, Paul’s Scarlet Climber.

Discontinue feeding roses by August 15.

The problem of rose fertilization is complex, and there is still much to
be learned. Almost every issue of the American Rose Annual or The Rose
Magazine contains infermation on this subject which gives a fuller apprecia-
tion of the problems involved.

Summer Mulching.—An artificial mulch during summer prevents weeds,
conserves moisture, and insulates the soil against the hot rays of the sun.
Peat, buckwheat hulls, and spent hops may be used. About a two-inch layer
of any of these materials should be applied to the rose beds in early June and
left until the end of August or early September. Mulching material should
not be heaped around the base of the roses as the stems are sometimes burned
when the weather is damp and hot. Some rose growers contend that artificial
mulches aid the spread of black spot.

Pruning Climbing Roses—The term “climbing roses” is applied to the
large-flowered varieties whose flowers are borne on laterals a foot or more
ong. These roses do not produce numerous canes from the base of the
plants each year but many of the new growths start from the two- and
three-year-old canes. The “rambler” roses, “Dorothy Perkins,” for instance,

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 13

wood is two or more years old and the other half of the current season’s
growth. Varieties such as “Dr. Van Fleet” grow so rapidly after the summer
pruning that it becomes necessary to do some additional thining in the
spring.

It might be well to pause for a moment in the discussion of pruning to
say a few words about the pruning tools. The pruning shears are used more
than any other tool. They should be strong, made of good steel, and may be
either single-edged or double cut. To cut canes a half inch or more in
diameter, a pair of lopping shears, with 24-inch handles, is the proper tool.
Climbing roses are thorny and have a nasty way of catching in clothing. The
lopping shears will be found indispensable in picking up long and unruly
canes and dragging them away. When the crowded condition of the stems
makes it impossible to cut heavy basal canes with lopping shears a key-hole
saw is the tool to use.

In pruning rambler roses almost all the canes which bore flowers in June
should be removed. There will be many new canes at the base of the plants
to replace them. Such treatment seems drastic, but it is surprising how fast
the new shoots grow. Before pruning, all of the canes should be removed
from the trellis and laid on the ground. The old canes are then severed at
the base and the new ones tied in place. When the ramblers are badly
tangled, the old canes must be cut away in sections. It may be stated at this
point that if rose canes have been tied to one side of the trellis, instead of
being woven between the bars, it is much easier to remove them before
pruning. Ramblers on large arches or trellises are not pruned so severely.

Propagating Roses.—A great deal of the interest and fascination of grow-
ing roses is centered in their propagation, and nearly all rose-growers
practice it with varying results. Some of the climbing, polyantha, and
strong-growing bush roses thrive as well on their own roots as do the budded
plants. Many of these roses are rooted by the popular Mason-jar method.
The cuttings are usually made in the autumn from blooming wood. About
three inches of the stem immediately beneath the spent flower is cut away,
the next six inches of wood yielding a good cutting. The basal cut is made
immediately beneath a bud. Remove all leaves except the upper two or
three. A rose leaf is a compound leaf, each leaf usually being composed of
five or seven leaflets. When it is said that all of the leaves, except the upper
two or three, should be removed, the statement refers to the compound
leaves and not to the leaflets. Several additional cuttings can usually be
made from the same stem. These cuttings are inserted at least two inches
deep in light soil and covered with a glass jar pressed into the soil. When
colder weather occurs some additional soil is heaped around the base of the

14 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Thin canes yield the best summer cuttings Winter cuttings under glass jar

PROPAGATING ROSES

HILLING ROSES IN NOVEMBER ROSES PROTECTED WIT
PENNISETUM pogheltle

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 15

jars. The cuttings may be placed in a spot where the rose bush is to grow
or they may be started in a specially prepared bed and transplanted a year
later. They are kept under the jar during the fall and winter but in late
April or May they are gradually hardened by removing the jar a few hours
each day.

Roses may also be grown from cuttings made in June, or August and
September. Such cuttings are made three to four inches long, from firm,
twiggy wood, with one leaf at the top. Rooting can be hastened and im-
proved by first dipping the cuttings in one of the root-forming chemicals.
Moisten the end of the cutting, shake off the water, dip in the hormone
powder, tap the cutting on the edge of the container to remove the surplus
powder, and then insert it in the rooting medium with a dibber. Summer
cuttings are inserted in flats or pans of sand and placed in a cool and shaded
spot. Meramec sand packs tightly and does not need as much water as the
coarser Mississippi River sand. Spray the cuttings several times a day the
first two weeks and always shield them from the wind with cloth or, better
still, polyethylene sheeting. After the third week some varieties will have
rooted, and these are potted when the roots are at least an inch long. The
most recent medium in which to root cuttings is vermiculite. The grade
best suited is sold under the trade name ““Terra-Lite.” It is sterile, very light
weight, retains a great deal of moisture, yet drains well. Try it and you can
be assured of excellent results. Incidentally, there is no better material in
which to sow seeds.

Climbing roses can be rooted by layering. This is done in early spring
by bending some of the long canes to the ground and covering the bent sec-
tions with six inches of soil. A piece of wire, shaped like a hair pin, will
hold the stem in place. The loose end of the cane is tied to a stake or the
trellis. In March of the following year the cane is severed from the parent
plant and set in its new location. Climbing roses will root more quickly
if a cut is made half way through the stem and a small stone inserted in the
cut surfaces before it is pegged down and covered. They also root easily
from thin, but firm, greenwood cuttings.

Winter Protection—About mid-November the soil should be hilled up
around the base of the hybrid tea roses, with the work completed by Thanks-
giving. Soil from the border of the bed and from between the plants is
used. This is the best way to protect hybrid tea roses, but additional pro-
tection can be given when material is available. Baled straw is useless as
most of it is too short. Excelsior is fairly good; ornamental grasses, both
annual and perennial, furnish good mulching material; and oak leaves can
be used if held in place with chicken netting. In late November the plants
are given a winter mulch to shield them against the wind and the sun.

16 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Polyantha, hybrid perpetual, and climbing roses pass through normal wint-
ters without the additional mulch. Roses should not be uncovered too soon
in the spring. Warm weather in February will induce the buds to swell, but
each year these spells are followed by a freeze. Winter mulches are removed
when the roses are pruned in late March or early April.

Spring Pruning.—All roses require some pruning each year. Polyantha
roses should have the weak wood and some of the older canes removed. The
remaining stems are cut back to about a foot.

Hybrid tea roses receive the most pruning. In severe winters much of
the wood is frozen as far back as the mulch, but varieties differ in their hard-
iness. When grown for garden display they should be moderately pruned.
Three to six canes are left to each plant and these are pruned to twelve to
twenty-four inches, the cut being made above an outside bud. Frozen wood
is shriveled and brown but sound wood is green and the buds are plump.

Most of the new canes of the hybrid perpetuals grow from the base of
the plants after the blooming period. Some of these canes grow six feet
tall. At whatever height they are pruned in the spring, the flower-bearing
laterals will develop near the top. The number of flowers of the hybrid
perpetuals can be increased by tying the long canes horizontally. Most of
the old flowering canes are removed during the summer.

When pruning rugosa roses examine them closely, as they frequently are
infested with scale. Single rugosa roses are pruned to a height of three or
four feet and the hybrid rugosas to four to five feet. Shrub roses should
always have the wood removed at the base.

Rose varieties—In answer to the many requests the Garden receives for
names of suitable roses for this locality the following partial list, with ratings
of hybrid teas and floribundas, has been compiled from the Guide for Buying
Roses which is issued by the American Rose Society:

HYBRID TEA ROSES
Pink—

ink:
Comisony Gling) oe ee 9.5 PE eee OG 8.4
arlotte Armstrong 0... 9.0 MTR ck a 8.2
Etoile: de Hollande 2 8.9 sec Mee ti toc ci 8.2
Christopher Sténe 22 2 8 ys Fig SLBA 8 tee GSE eS 8.0
Grand Duchesse Charlotte 8.3 Tt Date a 7.9
Yellow— W hite—
adh Sopet ere ems te ania 8, 8.5 stterhe yaaa EneE on na el aa 8.0
Golden Dawn pasta ts cnsconcrWsenedventcneeataes 8.1 PEOY A BVO 78
OP INIE aie’ a 7.9 we Wee 7.7
McGredy'’s ‘Yellow 2.500000 7.2 ehowbird (0 ve 4
Sous: There 7.9 Mme. Jules Bouche... 73
Blends—
PORE Ce ee 9.4
Mme, Fienrs Guillot 2 8.9
a News: 8 ee 8.4
Ficlen Traybel 0 8.4

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 17

FLORIBUNDAS
Red— Pink—

Red Pindécebigs io o oe se uF Fashion 9.5
nald Prior 8.6 The Fairy 5.3
Flora 8.2 Betty Prior 8.8
orld’s Fair $9 Else Poulsen 8.7
Permanent Wave 8.1 POC CHIG Oo od hes stad eens 7.6

Yellow— W hit
Goldilocks 7.9 Summer Snow 8.4
Marionette Fd Dagmar Spith 8.2
Yellow Pinocchio 6.4 Irene of Denmark 73

RUGOSA ROSES AND HYBRIDS

Agnes Pink Grootendorst

Conrad Ferdinand Meyer Rosa rugosa alba and R. rugosa alba-plena
F. J. Groctendorst Sarah Van Fleet

Hon. Lady Lindsay uard

Nova Zembla
SHRUB AND SPECIES ROSES
Blanche Moreau Rosa Hugonis
S oss elope
Harison’s Yellow Rosa setigera
TRAILING ROSES
Max Graf Rosa Wichuraiana

CLIMBING ROSES

American Pillar Mary Wallace
laze Mrs. Arthur Curtiss James
Chevy Chase iawatha
Doubloons Paul’s Scarlet Climber
Dr. Silver Moon
Evangeline artburg
Excelsa White Dorothy
r. W. Van Fleet New Dawn
Ghislaine de Feligonde Wichmoss

Gruss an Freundorf

Two years ago next spring two plants of Rosa alba were moved from a
private garden to the administration building at 2315 Tower Grove Avenue.
In spite of two blistering summers they have survived and increased in a
place which few modern roses would tolerate. They are on either side of
what was once the front door of Mr. Shaw’s old city home. ey face east
and get full sun all the morning, with a brick and granite wall behind them
which reflects the heat.

18 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

PLANTS FOR A ST. LOUIS GARDEN
EDGAR ANDERSON

Only those who have struggled with the problem can understand the
difficulties of gardening in St. Louis, and by St. Louis we mean just that,
and not the area around about. The small yards, the general lack of sun-
shine, the high proportion of the area which is right next to a wall of some
sort or other (house wall, garage wall, or a high board fence) combine to
make gardening much more difficult than it is in Kirkwood or Webster, or
even Richmond Heights. Added to all these general difficulties are the
special ones to be found in many parts of the city, the pavement ants which
will girdle Calendulas and Zinnias, the heavy red clay subsoil exposed by
grading in many parts of the town and whose only proper use is for tennis
courts, or the equally difficult places which were filled in with ashes and
rubble with only a thin veneering of soil on top.

If you have the kind of garden in which Johnny-jump-ups will seed
themselves and Korean Chrysanthemums will flower year after year with no
resetting, this article is not designed for you. Some of the strong-growing
plants recommended here would run wild and become a pest in such a gar-

en. It is written rather for the real city gardener, who never digs deeply
without finding a bit of brick or an old piece of crockery, and who has to
learn by sad experience just which plants can be made to grow on those
parts of the garden which are shaded by buildings and have no sunshine at
all in the late fall and winter.

The following twenty-five plants will all thrive in the really urban parts
of St. Louis. Several of them, as noted in the discussion, require sunshine,
but some of them will stand a great deal of shade. As a group they will
provide continuous bloom from late March to the end of October. Few of
them need to be sprayed or dusted for particular pests. Most of the peren-
nials can go ten or fifteen years without resetting, and the annuals can be
counted upon to reseed themselves in at least a portion of the garden. All
will benefit by fertilizer, but most of them are hardy enough to bloom with-
out it. None of them, however, are fond of grass in the flower bed and they
will require weedings, particularly in the spring before they are large enough
to resist competition. They are listed roughly in the order of bloom, with
shrubs and ground-covers in a special section at the end.

Narcissus FeBruary Goip.—This rich yellow trumpet daffodil is a
comparatively new variety and is not known to many St. Louis gardeners,
but it is most vigorous and can be depended upon to give a good show of
bloom before the Forsythias come into flower.
rapidly and will need to be separated and reset in
or replaced by newly purchased ones.

The bulbs increase fairly
about four or five years,

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 19

Dwarf Iris (Iris pumila var. atrocaerulea).—This little early Iris, which
comes into flower a few days after the Forsythias, should be much more
widely planted here, since it is very much at home in Missouri. It wants
sunlight and good drainage and it is very intolerant of grass, but is other-
wise a most obliging plant. It is apparently very fond of cement and will
grow well right up next to a sidewalk, or along the south side of a stone
wall. It has run wild in southern Missouri and one can buy it by the bushel
from old German gardens just outside the suburban area. In addition to the
genuine early Iris pumila, whose flowers are stemless, there is another variety
just a little later, with somewhat larger flowers and a very short stem, which
is probably a hybrid between Iris pumila and Iris chaemaeiris. By inter-
planting the two varieties one can have a longer season of Iris bloom

Narcissus Sm WatTkin.—By far the sturdiest and most floriferous of all
the daffodils under our conditions. It will bloom in spite of rain or sleet or
snow, and the bulbs will not have to be reset for ten or fifteen years.

Iris Kochii MionicHt or BLack Prince.—This intermediate Iris is ex-
tremely floriferous even for an Iris, and has flowers of an intense dark purple.
They are of excellent quality, and although this is one of the oldest varieties
of Iris in St. Louis gardens it is still one of the best.

Iris germanica.—The modern tall bearded irises are one of the glories of
middle-western gardens, but most of the varieties in current catalogues are
too overbred for city conditions. One can do better by looking about in
other city gardens and picking up old-fashioned varieties which will be much
more dependable, if not so breath-taking. The “German Flag” irises, with
their two tones of blue, will grow and blossom, almost without attention,
in spots where fancier varieties will gradually die out. They don’t really
like shade, but they will continue to blossom in places which have a good
deal of it and they are really a splendid flower, even if they are old and cheap.

Iris pallida ALBERT VicToR.—Few of the newer hybrids will do so much
for so little as this old-fashioned variety. It is no longer listed by Iris
specialists but there are plenty of gardens in south St. Louis where it makes
masses of soft-gray-blue every spring. If your Iris-collector friends tend to
sneer at this old-timer, you may compare it with some of their more ex-
pensive new hybrids. It may not have blossoms which are as large, or
spectacularly colored, but it has a ages of form equalled by only a few
of the modern varieties.

Hemerocallis (HyrER1ion, CaLypso, and fulva).—The last of these is
the old-fashioned orange day-lily, which can stand more neglect and grow
in more kinds of places than any other flower which has ever been tried in
eastern North America. You may not particularly care for it; after all, the

20 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

plant is a bit weedy, but you can put it at the back of the garden and get a
mass of foliage, and a bright streak of color which will improve the garden
picture as a whole. There are many beautiful new varieties of Hemerocallis,
some of which do very well in the city, HypeRIon and CaLypso being out-
standing under such conditions.

Annual Larkspur, Calliopsis, Bachelor’s Buttons.—All three of these
common annuals can be planted more or less together and all can be counted
upon to seed themselves in your garden, provided it is sunny enough. Lark-
spurs will take the most shade and Calliopsis the least. If they don’t do
well in one part of your garden try them in another. They are apparently
rather sensitive to soil reactions and to the presence of certain other plants.
All three have a distressing habit of seeding themselves heavily in the parts
of the garden where you may not particularly want them, and then failing
altogether to come up in the places you had planned for. Once well estab-
lished, however, they should seed themselves year after year.

Elder Daisy.—This is just a selected form of the common white daisy
of meadows and pastures, but it is very free-flowering and has shortish stems
which are not so apt to break and bend as those of the commoner sort. It is
very responsive to sun and will crowd into the sunniest places in the garden,
and yet not flourish at all in shadier spots just a few feet away.

Hollyhock.—If you grow these from seed it will take two years from
seed to flower. Once the plants are well established in the garden, however,
they will seed themselves, and these self-sown seedlings nearly always seem
to be hardier than the original plants.

Blackberry Lily (Belamcanda chinensis ).—This old-fashioned flower looks
much like an Iris until it blooms. The little cinnamon and orange-red
flowers are borne freely all over the top of the plant and they blossom through
the very middle of the summer. There is a good deal of difference in color

grown near each other adds variety and interest.
to go to seed, the dark shiny seeds,
will be attractive in the fall garden.

Showy Live-forever (Sedum spectabile)—No matter how hot and dry
early September may be, Sedum spectabile can be counted upon to give a
good display of its misty pink flowers. The 8ray-green leaves make an at-
tractive note in the flower border during
does its best in full

garden perennials, Sedum spectabile will grow and flower in partial shade

If one allows the flowers
which give the plant its common name,

rampant
ecomes a

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 21

virtue. It can easily be controlled by pulling it up from those parts of the
garden where it is not wanted. It does well in the sun but can stand quite
a lot of shade, and if the first flowers are cut when they begin to fade it can
be kept attractive for a long period in the late summer and early fall.

Aster turbinellus.—This beautiful Ozark Aster is not yet in the trade
but it transplants easily and increases rapidly enough so that once a plant
has been acquired it can be increased by division. Many of our wild asters
become weedier in the rich soil of a garden but not Aster turbinellus. It
merely produces larger and larger sprays of its attractive clear blue flowers
and seems even more at home in a city backyard than it did on a rocky
hillside in the Ozarks.

New England Aster (Aster novae-angliae).—This species is available in
the trade in various shades of rose or purple. If one allows it to go to seed,
volunteer seedlings will appear here and there in the garden, many of which
will be worth keeping.

Ozark Allium (Allium stellatum).—This beautiful bulbous plant with
rosy-pink umbels of flowers from August to October is one of the choicest
things for a city garden and a most dependable bloomer. It suffers from
the fact that technically it is a wild onion, albeit a most beautiful one. It
is not yet in the trade and if one wants it for his garden he must keep his
eye open for one of those dry Missouri hillsides where it grows in great pro-
fusion. However, it transplants readily at all seasons of the year, even when
it is in full bloom

Chrysanthemums.—The last two decades have seen a great development
of hardy chrysanthemums in this country. Most of these fancy new varieties
can be grown successfully in the city, but nearly all of them require resetting
every two or three years if they are to give a satisfactory display. If you
haven’t the time and energy for this keep your eyes open for old-fashioned
varieties in dooryard gardens in the market-garden district. There is a very
handsome variety, deep-pink fading to white, which abounds in such places
around St. Louis. It will flower dependably for five to ten years without
resetting, and while it doesn’t like shade it can stand a good deal of it and
still flower acceptably.

SHRUBS

One shrub leads all others in its adaptability to the city area, the old-
fashioned snowball. It will take full sun or a good deal of shade. It grows
well in poor soil and requires no special pruning. The flowers are attractive
in May and its leaves hang on late and then color a beautiful red bronze

before they fall.

22 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Mock-oranges or Syringas are nearly as adaptable, though most people
prune them too severely. Since they come in a variety of sizes it is better
to select a low-growing kind and let it have full development than to attempt
to dehorn one of the large ones every year.

Forsythias also do well in the city area but are too large for most city
gardens. They do not flower well when cut back severely year after year.

GROUND COVERS

The shadier portions of a city garden will look better with a good ground
cover than in grass, and they will take much less time and effort. Even the
most difficult of city backyards can be made reasonably attractive by paving
the central portion with brick and then growing a good ground cover along
the sides and at either end.

For the shadiest places wild ginger is excellent. Though this can be
obtained in the trade, the local Missouri species and varieties are stronger-
growing and will make a more effective ground cover. All the wild gingers
like rich soil and the earth should be heavily mulched before one attempts
to grow them.

Hardy Ivy is dependable both in shade and sun, particularly if one uses
the new Balkan varieties introduced recently by the Garden, MBG “Bulgaria”
and MBG “Rumania.” These will take a year or so to establish but once
this is accomplished they require almost no attention from year to year.

Periwinkle (Vinca minor), commonly called myrtle in the United States,
is also dependable, though it will not do so well in the city as it does in the
suburbs. Bowles’ variety, with its large blue flowers, is no harder to grow
than the ordinary variety and is much more effective when it blossoms in the
early spring.

according to a design worked
Various perennial and annual herbs have been set

round the city. Part of this
d entrance gate and the cast-
herb garden, shutting it off

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 23

TREE FEEDING
AUGUST P. BEILMANN

In 1929 the first article on tree “feeding” or fertilization appeared in the
Garden BuLtetin. The information and suggestions given in this and
later articles on tree feeding have had wide acceptance, but resulted in com-
plete exhaustion of the bulletins reporting the work.* Since interest in the
subject appears just as keen and even more necessary today than it was some
years ago, it seems desirable to reprint the latest article and to review any
facts which might have come to light since.

We must feed a tree to prevent the slow starvation which results if a

tree uses all of the available food within range of its roots. In the forest a
layer of decomposing leaves adds plant food to the soil through a devious
biological chain. On a lawn or along the curb a tree must exist on what
ood becomes available each year through the slow decomposition of the
mineral soil. As such a tree grows its requirements increase and at the same
time the root area is restricted by streets and walks. The soil. being unable
to supply the tree with more than the minimum requirements, the growth
rate is much reduced; insects and diseases do more than the usual amount of
harm; and eventually the tree dies—a victim of starvation.

The terms “tree feeding” and “tree fertilization”’ need some clarification.
In the field of tree care they mean the same thing: replenishment of soil
elements. All plants manufacture food from nitrogen, phosphorus, potash,
lime, iron, and many other elements which occur in minor quantities in the
soil, including boron, zinc, and manganese. These are carried to the leaves,
through the roots and trunk, where, in the presence of sunlight and carbon
dioxide, they are synthesized into living tissue. Feeding a tree, then, consists
of adding those deficient elements in ways acceptable to the roots. This is
commonly done by using commercial grades of nitrogen, phosphorus, potash,
calcium, iron, and some of the lesser elements, to overcome the shortages
indicated by either soil tests or field work or both.

Most of the experimental work on tree feeding at the Garden has centered
on the large trees, many of which had reached maturity in the sixty or more
years since they were set out. Some trees 150 years old were included, since
they had successfully bridged the gap between the old prairie and encroaching
civilization. To verify the effectiveness of the feeding formulas many
smaller trees were used, but none of the work was done in nursery rows or

Ch) 5 Che soos of shade and ornamental — shone Bot. Gard. Bull. Vol. pp.
130. 1929; (2) How to feed a shade tree. Vol. p. 113-126. 1934; (3) ‘Feding the
shade trees. Vol. 24, pp. 95-113. 1936; (4) Set Se Vol. 37, pp. 115-122. 19

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

ws

— feeding

trolled.

pounds being poured int

PRESSURE GUN FEEDING

8 gun in position to drill hole. 2. Half way. tage ~ feeding can
3. Hole drilled, — to charge cylinder with fertiliz zer. 4. Second char

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 25

pot cultures in the greenhouses. All efforts were directed toward stimulating
trees in such a way that there could be no doubt about the effectiveness of
the feeding program. For this reason very few check trees were used. It
was also found more satisfactory to compare the growth during the five
years preceding feeding with that after feeding than it was to locate identical
trees which would serve as checks.

The soil within the Garden is of aeolian (wind-blown) origin, called
loess, and classed as Muscatine Silt Loam. It has great depth, good water-
holding capacity, and uniform texture to a depth of 30 inches where a
“hard pan” is encountered. Although this soil is usually considered to be
lacking in available phosphorus, additional phosphorus had no effect on tree
growth. Only increased amounts of nitrogen stimulated the trees, and above
a certain point that did not result in increased growth unless both phosphorus
and potash were included in the fertilizer. Eventually the formula was
established at 41 per cent nitrogen, and this was the only one in ten years
of testing which gave predictable results. In time it became standardized
as a 10-8-6 commercial fertilizer, containing 10 per cent of available nitro-
gen, 8 per cent phosphorus, and 6 per cent potash. Considerable work was
done with the “minor” elements—zinc, boron, manganese, magnesium, etc.,
—but no measurable evidence indicated that they were needed in tree feed-
ing, although their need in fertilizing field and truck crops is very well
established.

There is some objection to the use of a “complete” food (one containing
nitrogen, phosphorus, and potash) in every case. It is not unlikely that a
soil containing adequate amounts of one of the important elements will be
encountered. However, until satisfactory testing equipment is readily avail-
able it will be better to continue the “shotgun” method of using the complete
food, in the hope of supplying the deficiencies. There is also less danger in
using this type of tree food since the combination of the three elements will
be less likely to “burn” than will a single salt. In addition, the use of just
one or two elements may and often does accentuate the need for the missing
portion of the formula.

The chemical fertilizers used in this work were those which were con-
sidered as immediately available to plants. No evidence appeared to indicate
that fertilizers requiring a year or longer to become soluble were of special
benefit. Objections have been raised to the use of these quick-acting
materials; they have been likened to a “shot in the arm” which would leave
a tree worse off after they leached away. That this is not the case is shown
by a group of seven pin oaks (Quercus palustris) which after fourteen years
were still growing eleven inches taller each year. Before feeding they had
grown two inches taller and added one-tenth inch to their trunk diameter

annually.

26 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

It has been stated that we should never “‘over-feed” a tree. This is a
presumptious remark. Since we all arrived on the scene some 200 years after
the destruction of the virgin forest, we can only guess at what should be a
“normal” growth rate. If a shade tree grows 6-8 inches in height annually
it is in no immediate danger of starving; but it would not be hard to find
specimens of the same tree growing four times as fast under certain condi-
tions. If the growth of the branch tips indicates an increase of less than 6
inches a year, the tree is considered in need of additional food. This does not
apply to dwarf trees or some horticultural varieties known to grow very
slowly. It does include nearly all of the trees ordinarily used on streets or
lawns as shade trees.

GALVANIZED

QUIK ACTING py
“even valve *

=—*\ Ye
STOR COCK

PRESSURE FEEQING GUN
as developed
4

Y
August 2 Belmann
40-/4~32

S0lL AOD
i" GMVANIZED PIPE
Win or less in Lengh

Diagram of pressure feeding gun

There are two major ways of adding fertilizers to the soil. One is to

tips and driven from 12-30 inches deep
If a single row of holes will not hold
made inside or outside of the first.

Sometimes it is necessary to perforate the whole area sheltered by the branches

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Placing trowel of food in punch-bar hole

28 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

SOFT.

THE

PRODER DOSE
FOR THIS TREE
IS 265 lbs.
OF 10-8-6.

How fertilizer dosage is calculated: to the height in feet (80), add the branch
spread in feet (60) and the trunk circumference in inches (125). The sum is the
amount of 10-8-6 fertilizer needed.

to obtain adequate space. Usually the holes are about 30 inches apart and
the rows spaced about 36 inches. If mechanical means are used to drill the
holes, the same power is generally used to force the diffusion of the fertilizer
through the soil. The home-owner can use the crowbar successfully, while

soil. Usually the late summers are dry,
the most effective use.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 29

Dense forest type Open-forest, street Specimen type
or lawn type
Use % calculated dose. Use 34 calculated dose. Use full amount.

cation has been decided, it becomes necessary to inquire about the dose per
tree. The following three figures have been used to calculate the amount of
food to apply to the soil about any particular tree. We have added the height
of a tree in feet to the branch spread in feet, and to this added the circum-
ference of the lower part of the trunk in inches. The total has been in-
terpreted as the number of pounds of 10-8-6 fertilizer needed for that tree.
This is admittedly a large amount of fertilizer, but it must be remembered
that with a starving tree having a branch spread of 60 feet or over we are
working with 14, of an acre. If we hope to restore the fertility to a depth
of 30 inches (often the depth of root penetration) we are dealing with the
equivalent of the top soil of two acres. Field crops often accept 500 pounds
of fertilizer per acre and produce prize-winning harvests.

SUMMARY

The need to feed trees is generally accepted since it is not possible to
grow either trees or a bumper field crop on the same soil without an attempt
to maintain fertility.

Of the many formulas tried during ten years, the 10-8-6 (containing
10 per cent nitrogen, 8 per cent phosphorus, 6 per cent potash) has given
the most dependable results.

Fertilizers must be placed within the root area—usually considered to be

beneath the branches.

30 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Tree feeding should be done in spring while the soil contains ample water.

Either the crowbar or a mechanical means of placing the food under-
ground may be used. The crowbar pockets permit maximum concentrations
but perhaps favor “burning” in very dry seasons.

Follow the dosage suggested for starving trees and reduce the amount if
the growth rate is only a little below normal.

Recently, “foliar feeding” solutions, which have quite commonly been
used on house plants, have become available for shade and lawn trees.
This method consists of placing small quantities of soluble nutrients directly
on the leaves where they are quickly absorbed. Fertilizers added to the soil
usually require some weeks before there is evidence of assimilation, but feed-
ing through the foliage gives very quick results. The improvement can
generally be observed as a deepening of color—a change from a yellow-green
to a darker blue-green. Foliar feeding has been used experimentally at the
Arboretum on rooted cuttings, ornamental materials, and forest trees. The
results have been excellent in all cases, especially with smaller plants. How-
ever, shade and forest trees require such quantity that a large hydraulic
sprayer must be used in order to give a thorough drenching.

Book REvIEw:—

Handbook of Plants of the Colorado Front Range. By William A. Weber.
232 pages. University of Colorado Press, Boulder, Colo., 1953. $5.00.

The Colorado Front Range is that part of the Rocky Mountains nearest
to St. Louis and, while still nearly a thousand miles away, is accordingly of
special interest to residents of the St. Louis area. The Front Range extends
roughly from Pikes Peak northward to Rocky Mountain National Park. It

-of-the-way spots, but none
the less attractive and charming. As the author of “Handbook of Plants of

“vegetation means more to
us... when we can call some of the plants by name.”

The nature of Professor Weber’s book is much better indicated by its
subtitle than by its title, for it is essentially only a volume of “keys for the
identification of ferns, conifers, and flowering plants.” As such it should
be a useful field book. The keys, which have been field-tested for years and
should accordingly be pretty well error-free, cover the whole vascular flora
of the Front Range. Despite its over 200 pages the book would still add
little weight to a knapsack, a real consideration in the Rockies. There is an

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 31

excellent glossary well illustrated with over three score clearly drawn figures.
The main portion of the book is prefaced by helpful paragraphs on the plant
zones of the area, the use of keys, the structure of plants, directions for
collecting plant specimens, etc

But it is only fair to remark that the author has written his book for
those who are “willing to make a serious effort.” He has not shunned the
use of technical terms, and anyone unfamiliar with them who would use his
book must make the not inconsiderable effort of learning a fairly large new
vocabulary. Again, as any botanist will affirm, one cannot always be sure
of the determination of a plant from a key; there are too many possible slips.
The proof of the key is the description, or better, the comparison with an
illustration or an authentically named plant specimen. In this book there
are no descriptions and no illustrations of any of the plants. However much
the book may help one to find a name for his plant, he will want other means
of confirmation, as well as other information such as can only be found in
the more pretentious floras.

Comparison with F. Schuyler Mathews’ very successful ‘Fieldbook of
American Wildflowers’ is inevitable. Mathews was able to include about
900 species, each with an adequate description and a very adequate illustra-
tion. True, he included only keys to the families, but he supplied a great
deal of habitat information and plant lore, and still his book bulked much
less than Professor Weber’s. Had Mathews cut corners by paring his descrip-
tions and especially the paragraphs of additional information he could have
included half again as many species and at least generic keys. Would not
something of this nature solve the problem of a pocket flora of an area no
larger than the Front Range?—G. B. Van Schaack

NOTES

Mr. Louis G. Brenner, of the Arboretum staff, has just been made one of
‘the Board of Directors of the Missouri Quail Hunters’ Association.

Recent visitors to the Garden library and herbarium include: Dr. P. K.
Koh, of Kyongjuk University, Taegu, Korea; Dr. S. C. Choi, of Chunam
University, Kwangju, Korea; Mr. Ralph Emons, of the Antibiotic Division,
Chas. Pfizer & Co., Brooklyn, N. Y.; Dr. Tien-ding Chang, of the Taiwan
Research Institute, Taipei, Formosa; Prof. Taizo Inokuma, of Institute of
Forest Botany, University of Tokyo, Japan.

Last year one of the Garden’s guest investigators was a young man from
Honduras, Sr. Antonio Molina R. Since his return to the Escuela Agricola
Panamericana at Tegucigalpa in Honduras he has published part of the
work he did up here on a Guggenheim Fellowship. It is a technical mono-
graph of a group of plants from the New World tropics and appeared in the

32 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

last number of Ceiba under the title: ‘Revision de las Especies de Cephalodes
de Mexico, Centro America y las Antilles,”

Up until mid-January Mr. Shaw’s Old Residence “Tower Grove” has
been open to visitors every afternoon from one to four, with ladies from
the Federated Women’s Clubs serving as guides. It was then closed for one
week for cleaning and minor repairs. The hardwood floor of the front parlor
has been refinished and Mr. Shaw’s old office at the rear of the building is
being replastered and repainted. Since the building was re-opened to the
public in November more than 2000 visitors have registered in the guest-
book. They came from thirty-five states and from twelve foreign countries.
Week-day crowds dwindled when the chrysanthemum show was closed, but
the Sunday afternoon crowds have given the guides all the visitors they
could handle efficiently. Several hundred dollars have come in as voluntary
contributions to the restoration fund, and pieces of furniture of the same
period as the house have been contributed by three families

One of the nice things about having young people trained in Botany at
the Missouri Botanical Garden is that after they have gone out and made
names for themselves in the world they frequently come back and pay us
extended visits, using our library and conferring with us about various
problems. We learn from them and they learn from us, and the general at-
mosphere is rather like having the grown-up children in the family come home
for Christmas. These remarks were brought to mind by Dr. Charles Heiser,
now of the University of Indiana, who has been working in the herbarium
and library for the Past several weeks. Dr. Heiser is a St. Louis boy who

is cooperating with the Mexican
member of the Mexican-American
though still a graduate student.

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

OHN S. LEHMANN, President
DanieEL K. CaTLin, Vice-President

EUGENE Pettus, Second Vice-President

DuDLEY FRENCH
Henry HircHcock

RicHarp J. Lockwoop
GeorcE T.

ErHan A. H. SHEPLEY
RoBERT BROOKINGS SMITH

EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS

ARTHUR H. Com

Chancellor of Washington University

ARTHUR C. HTENBERGER,
Bish of He pisces of Missouri

RayMoNnD R. Tuc
jeer pr the City oe st Louis

Secretary
GERALD ULRICI,

sCAR EHRHARDT,
President of the Board of Education
of St. Louis

STRATFORD L. TON,
girs eet ae recon of Science

THE HORTICULTURAL COUNCIL
Clarence Barbre, A. C. Chandler, E. G. Cherbonnier, Paul Hale, Mrs. Hazel

Knapp, Martin Lammert III, Emmet Layton, Elinor
. J. Garneau Weld, Harold E. Wolfe, John S.

Govern, W. F. Sc

ott, Jr., Mrs

McClure, Clarence Mc-

Lehmann, Edgar Anderson, John Nies, Chairman

George T. Moore

STAFF

Emeritus Director

Acting Director

John S. Lehmann
Edgar Anderson

Assistant Director

Executive Assistant

Leicester B. Faust...
Carroll W. Dodge

Mycologist
é o

Robert E. Woodson Jr.

Curator of Herbarium

Paleobotanist

Assistant Curator of Herbarium

Curator Museum of Economic Plants

Research Horticulturist

Robert J. ae ceca
John D. Dwyer___-

esearch Associate

R
Honorary Curator of Grasses

George B. Van eRe y
Julian A. Steyermark_______
Nell C. Horner

Honorary Research Associate

Librarian and Editor

Assistant Librarian

Assistant Librarian

Business Manager
¢ ” |

P
Floriculturist

.Ladislaus Cutak
Frederick G. Meyer

in charge of Conservatories
Dendrologist

Kenneth A. Smith

Engineer
g

August P. Beilmann____
Louis G. Brenner

___Manager of the Arboretum, Gray Summit
Assistant Manager of the Arboretum

G. R. Lowry

In charge of Orchids

SOME FACTS ABOUT THE GARDEN

The Missouri Botanical Garden carries on the garden estab-
lished by Henry Shaw over a century ago at “Tower Grove,” his
country home. It is a private institution with no public support
from city or state. The old stone walls and cast-iron fences, the
Linnean House, the Museum, the Mausoleum and the “Old
Residence” all date from Mr. Shaw’s time. Since his death, as
directed in his will, the Garden has been in the hands of a Board
of Trustees who appoint the Director.

The Garden is open every day in the year (except New
Year’s Day and Christmas) from 9:00 a.m. until 7:00 p. m.,
April to November, and until 6:00 p.m., November to April,
though the greenhouses close at 5:00 p.m. Tower Grove, itself,
Mr. Shaw’s old residence, is open from 1 until 4. The Garden is
nearly a mile long and has several entrances. The Main Entrance,
the one used by the general public, is at Tower Grove and Flora
Place on the Sarah bus line. The Southampton buses (No. 80),
direct from downtown, pass within three blocks of this entrance
and stop directly across the street from the Administration
Building at 2315 Tower Grove. The latter is the best entrance
for students, visiting scientists, etc. It is open to such vis-
itors after 8:30 a.m, but is closed on Saturdays, Sundays, and
holidays. There is a service entrance on Alfred Avenue, one
block south of Shaw Avenue.

Since Mr. Shaw’s time an Arboretum has been developed at
Gray Summit, Mo., opposite the junction of routes 50 and 66.
It is open every day in the year and has two miles of auto roads
as well as foot trails through the wild-flower reservation. There
is a pinetum and an extensive display of daffodils and other
narcissi from March to early May.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL
_ GARDEN BULLETIN

SPECIAL HITCHCOCK NUMBER
CONTENTS

The Missouri Botanical Garden
What It Is and What It Does

Volume XLII February, 1954 Number 2

Cover: Mr. Henry cae on - balcony of his town house. At the time this picture
was

taken the house stood on the c orner of Seventh and Locust streets which
is now estan St; spar After his death the howe was taken down and
re-erected at 2315 Tower Grove Seg where it now forms the north wing
of the present Administration Buildin

Office of ORB 306 E. Simmons Street, Galesburg, Illinois.
Editorial Office: issouri Botanical Garden, 2315 Tower Grove Avenue,
St. sig Tk Missouri.
— ered except ag and August by the Board of “arbtes of the
cal Garden. Subscription Price: $2.50 a
BS ais as hearer Matter January 26, ities > the post- ae at Gales-
urg, Illinois, under the Act of March 3;

$e

Please: Do not discard a copy of the Bulletin. If you have no further use for yours
pass it along to a friend or return it to the Garden. Return postage will
es guaranteed.

THE HITCHCOCK LEGACY

It is appropriate that a number of the BULLETIN devoted
to the history and functions of the Garden should bear the
Hitchcock name. There has always been a Hitchcock on the
Board of Trustees since it first began operations in accordance
with Mr. Shaw’s will. Henry Hitchcock (the grandfather of
the present member of the board) was a friend of Henry
Shaw’s and was on that first board. He was succeeded by his
son, George Collier Hitchcock, affectionately known to many
St. Louisans as “the Judge” and for many years the president
of the Board of Trustees of the Missouri Botanical Garden.
In his kindly way he left a bequest to the Garden to be used
wherever it might be needed the most. This fund has provided
for the color plates and additional illustrations for this num-
ber of the BULLETIN.

Henry Shaw at the age of thirty-five

his portrait shows him at about

the time that he first conceived the
idea of building up his country

estate into a garden for the public to enjoy.

Muissour1 Botanical
Garden Bulletin

Vol. XLII FEBRUARY, 1954 No. 2

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN
WHAT IT IS AND WHAT IT DOES

What is a botanical garden? It looks more or less like a park; why not
call it a park and be done with it? Well, primarily a botanical garden is a
center of understanding of plants; its business is to interpret plants to the
community. Notice that word, UNDERSTANDING; it is the key-word.
Understanding springs not from the head alone, like knowledge, nor from
the heart alone, like love. It is something more than both of these put to-
gether. An understanding of plants is an appreciation of them, a knowledge
of their kinds, their likes and dislikes, their role in the history of mankind.
It is a liking for them, a joy in their infinite variety, a realization of their
effect on the human spirit. It is the primary job of the botanical garden to
increase this understanding, to promote a love of plants, an interest in the
local flora, to serve as a center where like-minded people in the community
can meet each other and work together with plants, to find out things about
plants which were previously unknown, to function as an organized distribu-
tion center for those facts already known, to display plants so that their
wonder and their beauty and their usefulness will be brought to the attention
of young and old, to be, in other words, a go-between for plants and people.
All of this sounds pretty high-flown but it is true just the same and it
needs to be understood. Perhaps it might be a good idea to show by examples
the way an understanding of plants produces tangible results at a botanical
garden. Take Mr. Pring’s creation of the yellow water-lily, “St. Louis.”
Since boyhood, Mr. Pring has been associated with two botanical gardens,
the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, and the Missouri Botanical Garden in
St. Louis. At both of them he has grown and studied water-lilies. He is
familiar with their classification, with all the literature about them, with
their growing and propagating, and with their use as cut flowers and as
tubers and seeds. In other words, he understands them. He knew enough
about them in the first place to realize that there were opportunities for
interbreeding the tropical day-bloomers already on the market and producing
superlative new varieties. This he did, and this he might have done had he
(33)

34 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

been at a park instead of a botanical garden. But because he was at a
botanical garden, it was natural for him to go on with the next step. Know-
ing the scientific as well as the horticultural literature, familiar with the
dried specimens of water-lilies in the herbarium (which are meaningless
things to the ordinary gardener), he knew there were other species in Africa
which had never been introduced to gardens. By every possible route he
sought to get hold of these wild water-lilies, particularly the yellow-flowered
ones. Thanks to his persistence, thanks to his connections with other botan-
ical gardens, he eventually got two species of these wild yellow African
lilies and by using them he has produced a whole group of beautiful new
varieties. This is the kind of thing which happens naturally at any well-run
botanical garden; it can occur elsewhere, but it is much less likely to.

Let us drive the point home with one more example. Dr. Anderson, too,
has worked since boyhood in a succession of botanical gardens, Beal Botanic
Garden, Arnold Arboretum, John Innes Horticultural Institution, Missouri
Botanical Garden. When he set out to find broad-leaved evergreen plants
which would bring winter beauty to our midwestern gardens he had acquired
enough understanding to know where to look. With his botanical-garden
background he knew that to find more adaptable strains of tender plants one
goes to that part of their range having a climate most like our own. With his
botanical-garden background he knew that if boxwood and ivy are to succeed
in the Middle West we must get strains of them, not as we previously did
from England and Germany, but from those parts of Europe with a “‘middle-
western” climate—in other words, from southern Russia and the northern
Balkans. With his botanical-garden connections he not only got to those
regions but got in touch with local botanists, gardeners, and foresters, who
aided him in bringing back Balkan strains of various broad-leaved evergreens.
One of the results of his trip is the Bulgarian Ivy which is transforming the
winter aspect of the Missouri Botanical Garden and will play an important
role in middle-western gardens as it becomes better known. This again is
something which might just possibly have been done in a park or a nursery
or a department of botany, but it is the sort of accomplishment one expects
from a botanical garden.

It is a good idea to begin this story of the Missouri Botanical Garden with
a discussion of botanical gardens and their place in the community, because
it was out of just such discussions that the Garden came into being a century
ago. Mr. Henry Shaw, an able young Englishman with good business con-
nections and $10,000 to invest, settled down in St. Louis in the early
nineteenth century and made a small fortune. A trip back to England had
given him the idea of developing his estate just outside St. Louis for the
benefit of the community as well as for his own delight. His friend of many

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 35

years, Dr. George Engelmann, a distinguished surgeon, had spent his form-
ative years in German universities and was one of the ablest botanists of his
day. Germany, then as now, had more and better botanical gardens than any
other part of the world, and Dr. Engelmann knew from experience what a
botanical garden could do for a community. Year after year he urged Mr.
Shaw to create and leave for St. Louis not merely a park, but a park and a
botanical garden. Eventually Sir Joseph Hooker, the Director of the Royal
Gardens at Kew, came to the United States on an extended tour and Dr.
Engelmann saw his chance. In letters which can still be read he planned
his campaign. Sir Joseph came to St. Louis by way of Boston and Harvard
where he was the guest of Asa Gray. Dr. Engelmann wrote Gray, who ex-
plained the whole situation to Sir Joseph, and when the latter came to St.
Louis and was entertained by Mr. Shaw, he emphasized what a superlative
role a good botanical garden could play in the developing Middle West. Mr.
Shaw was swung over by Sir Joseph’s opinion, and from then until the day
of his death his first interest was the botanical garden he would leave behind
him.

Modestly Mr. Shaw decided that the new garden should not bear his own
name but should be designated as the “Missouri Botanical Garden.” While
this was very nice of him there are times when those of us who live and work
in his botanical garden wish that he had not done so. The place was called
“Shaw’s Garden” in his lifetime, and Shaw’s Garden it remains to this day
in popular speech, legal name to the contrary notwithstanding. It is not
always convenient having two names, the legal one and the popular one.
There has to be a double listing in the telephone book, and eventually we
may have to use it on our letter-head for the sake of visitors from out of
town. Several of us on the staff had our first encounter with the double
name when we came to take up positions at the Garden. We landed at the
Union Station or the airport and asked to be directed to the Missouri Botanical
Garden. Invariably, the reply came that there was no such place in St.
Louis, or at least not one generally known, and it was only after persistent
questioning that the identity of “Shaw’s Garden” and the “Missouri Botanical
Garden” was cleared up.

It is kind of nice that St. Louis remembers Mr. Shaw in this personal way
in spite of his own efforts to be politely anonymous. One of the amusing
results is when the occasional citizen who sees Mr. Shaw’s original in-
scription over the front gate writes an irate letter to the newspaper com-
plaining of our disrespect to Mr. Shaw’s memory.

(Continued on page 36)

Two views in the central part of the Garden in the Nineties.
It required about as many gardeners to take care of the carpet
bedding shown in these two views as are now available for the
entire Garden.

=e
The Main Gate in the Nineties

The Garden was then at the edge of the city. As the con-
dition of the street suggests there were then some problems
we do not have to face today.

The cactus collection was moved out of doors for the
summer. Gardeners were cheap in those days and good ones
were easy to find.

The Main Gate seen from the inside

Orchids arrive by truck Spring bulbs are whisked into the show in a trailer
THE NEw AND THE OLD IN FLOWER SHOWS

Motorized equipment saves man hours in setting up the
big flower shows. Orchids come in from the greenhouses at
Gray Summit in specially designed boxes and trays which fit
in the big panel truck. A little trailer moves spring bulbs and
other small flowers in quantity directly into the floral display

ouse.

Styles in hats come and go, but every year when the big
“mum” show is taken down the ladies of the Book-Flower
Guild meet at the Garden to prepare bouquets for distribution
to the hospitals.

The Book-Flower Guild in 1907

glk i
ROE
ome

RE 6 Ra

Interior of the Auditorium in the Museum

This was the building erected under Henry Shaw’s personal
supervision in 1859 when he definitely set out to found a
botanical garden. It served as library, herbarium, and ad-
ministrative center for the Garden as well as a Museum for
the education of the general public. The year 1954 finds it
quite as actively in use and for a variety of purposes. It is a
regular meeting place for several of the horticultural groups
in the city such as the Herb Society, the Orchid Society, and
the Henry Shaw Cactus Society. A series of semi-permanent
exhibits are being installed as time and funds are available.
It is now officially a Museum of Economic Plants and is the
center for the research activities of Dr. Cutler and Dr. Ander-
son and their students and associates.

36 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

In carrying out Mr. Shaw’s plans the Garden does many things. In the

course of the last twelve months, for instance, the Garden has:

1. Brought in bulbs of new snowdrops from Turkey by airmail.

2. X-rayed seeds of tobacco.

Reduced useless weed trees and brush to productive mulch with the use

of power machinery.

Named and introduced several new hybrid orchids.

Installed new boilers in the power house.

Sold over 23,000 colored postcards.

Made several thousand ivy cuttings.

Filled in scores of small gullies at the Arboretum with river soil,

Organized and conducted a class in plant breeding for amateurs.

Brought back new cacti from the Southwest.
The list could go on indefinitely. Obviously, if we are going to get
anything like a quick bird’s-eye view of what goes on at the Garden we had
better group these various activities under a few main headings. Most of
them will fall under one or another of the following five: Publication,
Research, Instruction, Collection, and Exhibition, which are easy to keep in
mind by the initials P R I C E

we

SY PNAWS

—

PUBLICATION :—

The Garden has several publications. This BuLLETIN which you are
reading is one of them, and it is published ten times a year. It serves several
purposes, telling the public about what is going on at the Garden, passing on
useful information to gardeners, reporting botanical facts of general interest.
The material in it is not copyrighted, and permission to reprint in St. Louis
or elsewhere is always freely granted. At the moment of writing, for instance,
the magazine called Wild Flower is devoting some of its pages for several
numbers to reprinting the articles on “Missouri Wildflowers” which came
out in the BuLLETIN last year. In this way some of the BULLETIN articles
have reached tens of thousands of readers, a few of them hundreds of
thousands.

The other periodical produced at the Garden is of quite a different nature.
It is called the ANNALS OF THE MissourI Botanical GARDEN, or just
“THE ANNALS” for short, and it comes out in conservative dark paper
covers four times a year. It is written by the scientists at the Garden, or by
students under their direction, and it reports the scientific discoveries being
made here. Through a world-wide circulation it js known to professional
botanists everywhere. An occasional St. Louisan straying into the library at
Kew, or visiting the Linlithgow Library in New Delhi, or stopping off in
Java, has been so surprised to find the current numbers of the ANNALS
prominently displayed in such a far-off place that he has sent us a postcard

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 37

about it or called us up on the telephone on his return. Those who do
scientific work at the Garden get so used to having world-wide reputations
that they are rather surprised that their non-scientific friends and neighbors
make so much of it. Perhaps therefore we had better stress the fact that this
is indeed so; that Dr. Dodge’s work on Lichens and Fungi is known all over
the world; that Lad Cutak is in touch with Cacti and Succulent specialists
in Mexico, South Africa, and Germany; that Dr. Woodson gets as much mail
from outside the United States as from within its borders.

The BULLETIN and the ANNALS come out regularly. At irregular inter-
vals the Garden also publishes books and pamphlets to meet particular
demands—guides to the Garden, water-lily catalogues, Dr. Steyermark’s
illustrated flora of the state, a brochure on the history and development of
the quinine industry, etc. Our most ambitious undertaking is the “Flora of
Panama”, an illustrated technical guide to the plants of that important area.
It was begun in 1938 under the editorship of Dr. Woodson. Approximately
one-third of the “Flora” has now been published, a volume or a portion of a
volume at a time. Although dealing specifically with the flora of Panama, it
is useful over a much wider area. Throughout Central America those por-
tions which have appeared are now in daily use in various laboratories from
Honduras to Colombia.

RESEARCH:—

Research, the finding out of new truths, the adding to the sum of human
knowledge, is one of the responsibilities of any first-rate botanical garden,
and Mr. Shaw stipulated in his will that it was to be carried on.

There are a number of indirect benefits to a research program. It keeps
the staff on their toes intellectually. It keeps their minds awake and flexible
and interested in new developments. It puts them in touch with fellow-
scholars all over the world, a very helpful thing for a botanical garden in
more than one way. Somewhat over a year ago, for example, it became ap-
parent that the snowdrop collection, started twenty-five years ago by Mr.
Kohl, was continuing to give a fine display with very little encouragement
and that it might be a good thing for the Garden to build up as complete a
collection as possible. We immediately got in touch with Col. Stern of the
Royal Horticultural Society, since several of our staff knew that he was en-
gaged in monographing the snowdrops of the world. By similar contacts
we enlisted the aid of a young Turkish botanist, a Scotch collector of rock-
garden bulbs, Mr. Edgar Denison of Kirkwood, and Mrs. J. Norman Henry
of Gladwyne, Pennsylvania (whose garden just outside of Philadelphia is a
botanical and horticultural treasure-house). With their help, promptly and
freely given, we have quickly assembled the finest collection of snowdrops in
the New World. This was possible because we were dealing with fellow

(Continued on page 38)

Mrs. Lowry weighs the formula for the nutrient solution

THE STORY OF THE QUEEN’s BouQUET

Every year the Garden
presents an orchid bou-
quet of fantastic beauty
to the new Queen at the
Veiled Prophet’s ball.
The flowers are all
grown in the Garden’s
orchid greenhouses and
many of them have been
bred in the Garden’s
laboratories. The tiny
a like a fine gray

are planted on sci-
eniicaly prepared gel-
are carried

hess gh their early
stages as little “babies”

few inches high they are
transplanted to flower
pots and after several
years they are of flower-
ing siz

Me peigren ie es seedlings to a fresh
flask of m practice adds con

siderably to sae us and development.

Getting the blooms ready for the bouquet. The bouquet itself is shown
on page 45.

When the flowers are harvested a glass tube of fresh water
is sealed over the cut ends of each stem and the tubes packed
in shredded tissue paper. Delivery trucks (note the truck in
the background) drive right into the potting shed of the

orchid house.

Dr. Woodson and Mr. Freytag turn to one of the old folios in the
to answer a question about Magnolias.

—

ibrary

As a training center for young botanists the Garden has
had a national and international reputation for over half a
century. In a survey of those who received their training
here, conducted a few years ago, it was found that our gradu-
ates were now scattered over thirty-five states, mostly as
professors of botany or microbiology. Some of them are in
foreign countries. At the moment there is one in Finland,

one in Mexico, two in Honduras, one in Costa Rica, one in
Colombia, two in India, one in Formosa, one in Burma, and
one in New Zealand. Some of these are Americans who have
gone abroad; others are foreigners who came here for their
scientific training and then returned home.

Almost as important has been the Garden’s role as a center
for botanists from other institutions. The good library, the
agreeable working conditions, the convenience of St. Louis as
a railroad and highway center have all contributed to this
development. Some come for a few hours; some spend a day
or two; an occasional visitor stays and works for a month or
more. They are one of the pleasant features of scientific life
at the Garden, and scarcely a week goes by without having at
least one of these informal “‘scholars-in-residence.”

Dr. Duggar (fourth from the left) and a group of his students

38 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

scholars to whom cooperation in scholarship was taken for granted. We
supplied the young Turk with railroad and bus fare to do the collecting and
sent him useful literature in return; we collected American bulbs and for-
warded them to the Scotchman; but it was the camaraderie of scholarship
which made the whole enterprise go forward promptly and smoothly.

The direction which research work at the Garden has taken has varied
with the times. Dr. Engelmann had been a leader in exploring and naming
the flora of the developing West, and work in this field continued at the
Garden long after his death. For twenty years, under the leadership of Dr.
Moore! and Dr. Duggar?, the laboratories at the Garden were a center for
studying the physiology of fungi. Thirty years ago it was frequently difficult
to justify to inquiring St. Louisians the nature of this research work. Fungi
were being grown and studied; papers which made no sense to the ordinary
intelligent gardener were being produced. Visitors always took for granted
that this work was an attempt to learn how to control plant disease and
were sometimes horrified to learn that the scientists were not particularly
helpful at recommending sprays or, worse than that, did not always recognize
a fairly well-known plant disease. Twenty years later it is easier to explain
what these scientists were up to. The world has changed, and Dr. Moore’s
and Dr. Duggar’s laboratory is one of the things which changed it. These
men and their students were studying the physiology of fungi not just to
save the nation’s potato crop or to help keep the rust off carnations; they
were working on the very frontiers of knowledge. What they were getting
at was what we might call the home life of the fungi; how they live, what
kinds of chemicals they need for life and what they do with these substances
when they get them into their systems. These pioneers had to learn the
hard way, by trial and error, how to cultivate these finicky plants; today it
is done on a factory scale. It was pioneering work—the kind of pioneering
which led to our modern understanding of antibiotics, to the various technical
uses of fungi in chemical engineering. It is significant that today, long after
his formal retirement, Dr. Duggar is on the staff of Lederle Laboratories and
that he took the lead in the commercial development of aureomycin.

No work on antibiotics is being done at the Garden today. Government
laboratories and private industry now push such studies forward at an ever-
increasing scale. It is the function of such small independent laboratories as
ours to pioneer, to develop unknown (or for that matter forgotten) fields
until there are enough significant facts brought together to be of some pur-
pose, either in understanding the world we live in, or for using its various
features for man’s benefit. The Garden is still pioneering in research. It

1 Director Emeritus of the Missouri Botanical Garden.
* Consulting Mycologist, Lederle Laboratories, Pearl River, New York.

Typical Day-blooming Water-lilies

(ST. LOUIS, WILD ROSE AND SHELL-PINK

ae oa
“e”.. ‘
¢>

Annual Chrysanthemum Show in the F

loral Display House

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 39

would be as hard to explain today the value of Dr. Anderson’s current
analyses of hybridization as it would have been twenty years ago to make
Dr. Duggar’s efforts generally intelligible. Just as the visitor of those days
was so certain that Dr. Duggar must be learning how to control plant diseases
that he could seldom get into his head any notion of the far larger program
under way, so today those who learn a little something about Dr. Anderson’s
work are equally certain that he must be trying to breed a better kind of
corn or a more handsome sunflower. Dr. Duggar, it is true, was a very
knowledgeable man and frequently of direct help in a disease-control pro-
gram. Dr. Anderson, likewise, is closely associated with various commercial
corn-breeders but this is just incidental to a far wider research program.

The research carried on by the Garden is by no means limited to the
laboratories and herbarium in the city garden. As it has developed, the
Garden’s Arboretum at Gray Summit has become more and more completely
a research institution. The land was acquired when the smoke nuisance was
so bad in St. Louis that it had become virtually impossible to operate a decent
botanical garden here. Land was purchased well outside the metropolitan
area and a new range of orchid greenhouses was soon constructed outside the
smoke zone. It then seemed likely that before long it might be necessary
to move most, if not all, of the Garden outside the polluted area. Fortunately,
thanks to the efforts of a few determined citizens, smoke control in St. Louis
became a reality and gardening is now no more difficult in St. Louis than in
the midst of any other large metropolitan area. The Arboretum therefore
has been devoted largely to those features which are difficult or impossible
to develop in the middle of a large city. There are wild-flower reservations,
meadows, and woodlands. There is a pinetum; the air of St. Louis is not
even yet clear enough for evergreens to do their best. Increasingly, how-
ever, under the leadership of Mr. August P. Beilmann, the Superintendent,
the Arboretum has become an outdoor laboratory for studying the various
problems of landscape. The Arboretum has been cooperating in an intensive
study of quail foods, not merely what quail might eat if driven to it but
what foods they prefer if given a wide choice. Mr. Beilmann and his as-
sistant, Mr. Brenner, have made a study of native and introduced honey
plants. Jointly they have studied the ancient balance between woodland and
prairie in this immediate area and produced convincing evidence that the
Missouri forests as we know them are a development of the last century. The
work of the Arboretum has received wide attention not only among sports-
men and conservationists but among ecologists and geographers who are
concerned with the general problems of the land surface and its proper
management.

(Continued on page 40)

Fox trail
eets
squirrel trail

winter woods

The deer have been with us for nearly two decades at the
Arboretum. Does and fawns are frequently seen by visitors
in midsummer, and during the autumn it is not unusual to
come upon larger groups as in the view below.

Beaver work along the Meramec River

The Arboretum at the junction of Routes 50 and 66 at
Gray Summit, Missouri, is a haven for wild life. Deer, fox,
beaver, coon, and possum are all at home here.

A woodcock’s nest

Logs being hauled to the Arboretum’s own sawmill

A “chipper” reducing weed brush (from a field clearing operation) into
small ee which are used for mulching and for cattle bedding.

THe EFFICIENT MANAGEMENT OF THE LANDSCAPE

Large-scale operations are carried out in the Arboretum
at a low cost in man hours.

Enlarging the pool
at the East Bridge
with power machin-
ery. The dirt is used
to fill gullies, low-
ering maintenance
costs in meadows and
hillsides. The pool
serves as emergency
water supply for fire-
ghting or in periods
of drought.

40 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

INSTRUCTION :—

As provided in Mr. Shaw’s will, much of the Garden’s teaching is closely
tied up with Washington University. Mr. Shaw endowed the Botanical
Garden: he also left a separate endowment to the Henry Shaw School of
Botany which had been previously established by the Corporation of Wash-
ington University. Most of the members of the Garden’s scientific staff
therefore have dual appointments; it is a kind of interlocking directorate.
Dr. Henry N. Andrews, Jr., the Dean of the School of Botany, is a member
of the scientific staff at the Garden, although most of his work is carried on
at the University. Dr. Anderson, the Assistant Director of the Garden, is
Engelmann Professor of Botany at Washington University, and while he
teaches some courses at the University most of his work is at the Botanical
Garden.

One phase of the teaching program is centered as much at the Garden
as at the University, the training of graduate students. Technically, they
have no connection with the Garden and are merely there as guests in the
library and laboratories. Practically, they serve a very useful function.
They help to keep the professors human. Left completely to themselves,
research professors can be a sorry lot. Their scientific precision, their finicky
accuracy, which they need in the laboratory, tend to overflow out of their
professional and into their private lives. They get too critical of themselves
and of each other. A research laboratory without any young students coming
and going usually becomes a dreary place. A few good graduate students
keep it alive. They do unexpected things. They respect the professors up to
a point but are sometimes engagingly frank beyond that point. Ina graduate
laboratory with a good reputation such as that of the Henry Shaw School of
Botany, more students apply than can be accepted, and the graduate stu-
dents are a group of able, interesting young people. The group working at
the Missouri Botanical Garden are particularly cosmopolitan. For historical
and administrative reasons few large herbaria are connected with large uni-
versities, yet in these days, if one is to go very far in herbarium work, he
needs a graduate degree. The only large herbaria closely connected with
graduate schools are at California, Harvard, and the Missouri Botanical Gar-
den. For forty years the Garden has become increasingly important as a
center for training of herbarium administrators and today our students come
from all over the world. Last year we had one from Honduras and one from
Costa Rica (both on Guggenheim Fellowships) , one from New Zealand, one
from Formosa, and one from India. This year some of these have received
their doctorates and returned home, but another has arrived from France and
a second student from New Zealand is making arrangements to be with us
next year.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 41

In addition to the courses offered in the Henry Shaw School of Botany,
the Garden offers courses to the general public whenever the need arises.
Nearly every spring finds a group of amateurs in the Garden’s experimental
greenhouse, taking a course in plant propagation. Last fall we tried out for
the first time a practical demonstration course in the forcing of bulbs, for
which over 200 amateurs registered. For the last five years a short course in
practical plant breeding has been organized for amateur and_ professional
greenhouse men.

The number and nature of such courses vary from year to year with the
needs of the times. During its early days the Garden offered one of the first
courses in Bacteriology taught in this part of the country. The young
science was then having a revolutionary effect upon medical practice, and
the first Director of the Garden, Dr. Trelease, organized and taught a
Bacteriology course for doctors and other professional men in St. Louis.
Similarly, when club women were just beginning to take a really professional
interest in flower-show judging and flower arrangement, the Garden organ-
ized a three-day course in these subjects, the first one of any size in this area.
In all these efforts the Garden has done the pioneering; as soon as enough
interest has been aroused for the subject to be carried forward in a larger
way by some other agency, the Garden has transferred its efforts to newer
ventures,

CoLLECTIONs:

e Garden has notable collections of three sorts: collections of plants,
collections of books, collections of herbarium specimens. Let’s begin with
the plants.

Collection of Plants.—There is a nice fable current in parts of St. Louis
that the Garden has every possible kind of tree, shrub, or vine which can be
grown in this climate either in or out of a greenhouse. It is a nice fable but
it is fantastically impossible. There are over a million species of plants in
the world; for some of the cultivated species there are thousands of varieties
of each. At the moment there are being offered for sale, one place or another,
several thousand named kinds of bearded irises, several thousand of narcissi,
several hundred of peonies, thousands of gladiolus, hundreds of African
Violets. A really comprehensive collection which includes these and all
other plants readily grown here would be impossible outside of Never-Never
Land our seventy-five acres there would not even be room for the
labels, let alone the plants or people to care for them. No botanical garden
can hope to grow everything, not even everything of interest and importance
for that area. Every garden has to specialize.

The Missouri Botanical Garden’s specialties are its collections of orchids,
tropical water-lilies, daffodils, bromeliads, Missouri wildflowers, snowdrops,
hardy ivy, and cacti and other succulents.

(Continued on page 42)

I

haw’s Garden from the air: The Main Conservatories and the Service Entrance

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It requires athletic ability to work on the roof of the Palm House

A Bic Botanica GarDEN Has Its OWN PECULIAR PROBLEMS

One of the big greenhouses after a
windstorm.

Cleaning algae and other plants out of the lily pools is a never-ending task.

Paving the Palm House to reduce maintenance costs.

Woop Cuts FROM OLp VOLUMES IN THE GARDEN’S LIBRARY

One of the Garden’s most outstanding assets is its collec-
tion of old books about plants. Some of them are illustrated
with charmingly effective woodcuts which depict the life of
the time. These cuts were lent and copied so much that we
do not always know for which book they were originally

prepared.

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MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 42

Collection of Books—The Garden’s library has grown until it has become
one of the world’s large botanical libraries. Yet it is outstanding for more
than mere size; it is effective. It is not the number of shots fired which win
a battle but the number which hit the mark. With a library the important
thing is not how many books there are but how quickly you can locate the
information you are after. The Garden’s library is so effective that every
year finds many scholars coming to us from other institutions, to spend the
time between trains, or all day, or sometimes a whole spring or Christmas
vacation, running down the information they need for a book, or a paper, or
some other scholarly purpose. This is partly due to the richness of our
collection of books but equally important is the attitude of our librarians.
There may be somewhere in the world a botanical library with more helpful
librarians but none of us here have ever heard of one. It is a scholar’s para-
dise; you arrive with a list of, shall we say, fifteen references to rare books
which you haven’t been able to locate in other libraries. The chances are we
will have five to ten of them and furthermore the librarians will be able to
get all of these within half an hour. Before the morning is over they are
likely to come around with one or two others bearing on the subject that you
didn’t have on your list. How they do it is a mystery to us, since technically
they are librarians and not botanists. Part of it is a phenomenal memory;
part is complete devotion to their work. Just imagine a library in which
you can go to one of the librarians and say, “I’m looking for a big thin book
I saw several years ago. I don’t know the name of the author or even
whether it was one of a set or just a single volume. I don’t even know what
language it was written in, though I have a vague memory it was not English.
All I remember is that it was big and thinnish and that it had a frontispiece
showing a palm tree with some Indians sitting under it in a grass hut.”
Imagine a library in which you can give a request of this sort and know that
you'll probably have the book in your hands in half an hour!

The Missouri Botanical Garden Library is that kind of a place. Is it any
wonder it gets used? It is open to any one who needs to consult botanical
or horticultural books, and many kinds of people use it every year. If you
visit us for a few days you would probably see something like the following:
staff and students using it at all hours of the day in connection with their
general work; a club woman putting together the material for a paper; a
manufacturer who is getting the background information concerning a plant
wax long in use by primitive people and just now of promise for some
specialized manufacturing process; various kinds of people with plants which,
for one reason or another, they want to know more about; a pair of nuns
who are taking advanced work in Biology somewhere in the city; a young
couple who are planning a garden which is to have a collection of particularly
choice shrubs.

The Linnean Garden in late spring

The Linnean Garden takes its name from the Linnean
House, a picturesque old greenhouse built in Mr. Shaw’s time
and surmounted by busts of Linnaeus (‘‘the father of Botany”’)
and other scientists.

It is a garden of perennials with a few choice shrubs and
some bulbous plants. The large shrub in this picture is a
“Sweet Bay”, a charming small-leaved Magnolia which blos-
soms in early summer, its fragrant flowers being mostly hidden
among the leaves.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 43

The library is worth much more than the money we have spent on it.
For this, too, we have Dr. Engelmann to thank. He not only persuaded Mr.
Shaw to found a botanical garden; he convinced him that any first-class
botanical garden must have a good library. Just as soon as Mr. Shaw had
formally committed himself to founding a botanical garden, Engelmann was
off to Europe at Shaw’s request to gather the beginnings of a first-class
library. Never was money more wisely spent. There was then little compe-
tition for the useful (and frequently beautiful) old books which are the
core of such a library. It was before the days of big agricultural and horti-
cultural colleges with specialized libraries; it was before the time when these
rare old books were widely appreciated for the beauty of their engravings.
Many of the books which Dr. Engelmann bought for a few dollars are today
worth hundreds (and sometimes thousands) of dollars and are hard to get
even at such prices.

These early purchases by Dr. Engelmann were supplemented a few years
later when Dr. E. S. Sturtevant, the able director of the country’s first
agricultural experiment station, left us his magnificent personal collection
of rare old botanical books from the very beginnings of botany—herbals,
natural histories, medical botanies, books of travel, etc. Most of them are
illustrated with quaint but effective woodcuts on thick, hand-made paper.
Four of them were printed before 1500 and many date back to the sixteenth
century. There are a few larger collections of such books in the New World,
but there are none where a scholar who wishes to consult them will be able to
see so many in such a short time and with so little red tape.

Collection of Dried Specimens, The Herbarium.—Like the library, the
herbarium actually goes back to Mr. Shaw’s day. The core of it was forme
by Dr. Engelmann’s own collections and by the “Bernhardi Herbarium”
which he bought in Europe nearly a century ago. In 1858 Dr. Engelmann
was in Europe purchasing books at Mr. Shaw’s request. Sir Joseph Hooker
tipped him off that the Bernhardi collection was for sale at a bargain. Dr.
Engelmann got the money from Henry Shaw and bought this key herbarium
for a mere five hundred dollars.

To the ordinary visitor, the Herbarium of the Missouri Botanical Garden
is impressive only by its size. It occupies the whole third floor in the big
red brick administration building and a good part of the second floor. It
consists of row after row of tall steel cases built like modern office furniture.
The whole front of each case is a steel door which locks air-tight with a
levered steel handle. Open up such a case; within it are shelves of specimens,
all virtually the same size, all of them in neat manila folders. Each herbarium
specimen is mounted on a sheet of heavy paper a little smaller than the
folded half of a newspaper as you see it on the newsstand. The specimens

(Continued on page 44)

One of the Garden’s recent introductions, the hardiest of all the true ivies.

“MBG Bulgaria” is a large-leaved, rapid-growing variety
introduced by the Garden in 1945, after ten years of careful
tests. It was deliberately sought for in those parts of Europe
with a climate like our own and was collected in the grounds
of the Rila Monastery in Bulgaria in 1934.

“MBG Bulgaria” is so at home in St. Louis that in those
parts of the Garden where it was first planted it grows up
into the trees and transforms the winter landscaps, just as it

has in Europe for thousands of years.

BROMELIADS, ONE OF THE GARDEN’sS IMPORTANT
COLLECTIONS

Shaw’s Garden has one of the finest collections of these
strange plants of any place outside the tropics and subtropics.
Bromeliads grow for the most part in tropical tree tops, but
they take kindly to the dry air of modern apartments and are

becoming increasingly popular as house plants.

Cryptanthus zonatus

Many Bromeliads are “tank plants”
and keep their water supply in the
central well made by the leaves.

Vriesia splendens

Bromeliad flowers are frequently
of very odd colors, brown, green,
blue, flaming red. Some are very
brilliant.

Neoregelia marmorata

Flaming Torch Bromeliad in bloom

A view inside the “tank.” As this
picture suggests, many Bromeliads
resemble the best-known member of
the family, the pineapple.

View of the Rose Garden

The Rose Garden was very cleverly designed by Mr. John
Noyes so that as one looks down the paths which radiate from
the center of the garden each one has an interesting view. For
most of them the view is attractively framed by the arches
of the rose arbor which forms a semi-circular border around
the collection. A corner of the Linnean House and Mr. Shaw’s
old brick garden wall are seen in the distance.

Se

Close-up of hanging baske

Some of the features of the annual Chrysanthemum Show
have received general horticultural acclaim: the development
of hanging baskets of chrysanthemums suspended high over-
head or at the summit of bamboo poles; the displays of cas-
cade chrysanthemums to mimic the effect of falling water;
the use of Japanese accessories made of cat-tails; and an ex-
tensive use of bamboo.

Setting up the Mum Show

a

Miss Julia Terry, Queen of the Veiled Prophet

On the Saturday afternoon after the Veiled Prophet’s ball
(October 10, 1953) his Queen, Miss Julia Terry, and her
court visited Mr. Shaw’s home to receive the greetings of more
than 4,000 school children. To date over 6,000 adults have
visited the home since it was opened to the public in November.

Repairing walls in Henry Shaw’s old office

Under the supervision of a
committee of historians and

P 1. Whenever possible,
ven ion restoration work is
pe ssivtits the house is kept

& open Paka its regular hours,
52s daily from 1 to i P. m. More
— =. than 8,000 le went
through the nee this fall.

le
oe Ae

7 4
Le ea ae
OO aa Se on
:
a
oe Oe

a,
tne

ll jinn
“

so aeameennenesannn Vaal

a

esses from St. Louis women’s
clubs

View of Henry Shaw’s home through Mausoleum gates

44 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

are glued (or sometimes sewed) to the heavy white sheets and bear neat
labels telling where and when and by whom they were collected. Some of
those in the big steel cases were pressed and dried just a few years ago; many
of them are fifty or a hundred years old; the very oldest were collected about
the time of the American revolutionary war. To a casual glance they look
pretty much like an old faded bit of hay carefully glued to a sheet of paper,
but take one to the laboratory table and put it under a binocular microscope.
Most of the little niceties of the leaf and flower (though powder-dry) are
just as perfect as they were when they were pressed. The iris plants which
Dr. Engelmann made into herbarium specimens before the time of the Civil
War still show the same bearded zones on each sepal; each little hair is still
there in perfect detail.

These specimens are precious because they are documents in the truest
sense. A book about the flora of the United States will be full of botanists’
statements about plants. It can be no better than the understanding of the
man who wrote it and the men he studied with; inevitably it will be incom-
plete and in part erroneous. But an herbarium of plants from that same
area is a set of documents; the actual plants are there and as we learn to
work with these specimens we can draw many kinds of information from
them.

Herbaria are old-fashioned, and in the United States the old-fashioned
way of doing things is frequently neglected. Thanks to Dr. Engelmann and
Mr. Shaw, the Missouri Botanical Garden got off to a good start with a good
herbarium. It is still one of the best in the New World. For the last quarter
of a century the Garden has become known to other scientists not only for
its herbarium, but for various new ways of getting useful information out of
such a collection. If one waits long enough the old-fashioned frequently
becomes something newly recognized as interesting or exciting or valuable.
This is just now beginning to happen with our herbarium, and scholars from
various parts of the world are taking an interest in the new uses to which
our old herbarium is being put.

EXHIBITION :—

And so at the very end of this recital of the Garden’s activities, we come to
the phase best known to the public. It is the “Mum” Show, a tradition carried
on every fall for over fifty years, and it is the Orchid Show in mid-winter,
when thousands of orchid flowers are tastefully displayed, that the general
public knows the most about. Many of the features of these shows developed
here have been very generally copied elsewhere. The Garden pioneered in
adapting the gracefully drooping “Cascade Mums” to American conditions,
in developing the use of chrysanthemums in hanging baskets, in using cat-
tail rushes as effective background material. Traditionally the “Mum”

(Continued on page 45)

ITALIAN GARDEN

GUIDE TO DAFFODIL PLANTINGS |
~ MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN/
ARBORETUM

GRAY SUMMIT MISSOURI _

4\| DAFFODILS
A ps, || ARE PLANTED AT
[A ‘BCD EFGHJ

y

¢ House (Fest rooms) & West Valley Trail
2. Pinetum (Evergreens) 9 Oriental Crabapples
3 Box Garden 10 Flowering Dogwoods <=
4 Manor House (Private) Sf Li
5 Parking Areas 1 Gren ( piers
6 Trail House & Office is Azaleas,
7. Crescent Glade Trail /4, Water Maia

April is Daffodil month at the Arboretum

Daffodils and other Narcissi have been extensively natural-
ized in the meadows at Gray Summit as well as in the City
Garden. Those shown in these views are largely the old

variety “Sir Watkin.”

A Blue Vanda orchid from the Garden’s col

ections

There is a folk superstition that flowers which have con-
spicuous color should not have a conspicuous odor. Many of
the orchids prove the falsity of this principle, being as fragrant
as they are colorful. The Vandas in particular have a heady
tropical scent, something like ripe grapes but rather sweeter.
This Blue Vanda has sometimes been included in the Queen’s
Bouquet.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 45

Show is open for the month of November; the Orchid Show for the month
of February. Poinsettias and other seasonal plants fill the Floral Display
House during the weeks between these two big shows, and the Orchid Show

is followed by successive exhibits of bulbs and other spring flowers.

Bouquet of orchids presented by the Garden to the Veiled Prophet’s Queen

A winter view of the Gate House at the Arboretum

A Note CONCERNING THE PICTURES IN THIS SPECIAL
NUMBER OF THE BULLETIN

We are indebted to many friends of the Garden, amateurs
and professionals, members of the staff, and outsiders, living
and dead, for the illustrations. Mr. Charles Trefts contributed
the original prints from which the two color plates were pre-
pared, as well as some of the finest of the black and white
close-ups. Several of the older pictures are by the late William
Trelease, the first director of the Garden. Others to whom
we are indebted are: Henry N. Andrews, Jr., Alfred G, Etter,
August P. Beilmann, Louis G. Brenner, Paul A. Kohl, Lad
Cutak, Clifford Paulsen, Robert W. Schery, Hugh C. Cutler,
and Edgar Anderson.

CONTRIBUTIONS AND BEQUESTS

Contributions and bequests to the Missouri Botanical Gar-
den may be made in securities, money, or books. ey may,
if desired, take the form of a memorial to a person, to be
named by the giver. For those desirous of making bequests
to the Missouri Botanical Garden the following form is
suggested:

FORM OF BEQUEST

I do hereby give and bequeath to the Missouri Botanical
Garden of the City of St. Louis, State of Missouri:

The total of contributions in money or property not in
excess of 20 per cent of the individual’s adjusted gross income
for the year are allowable as deductions in computing net in-
come for federal income tax and not in excess of 15 per cent
thereof in computing the Missouri state income tax. Illinois
has no income tax. The limit for corporations is 5 per cent

of net income.

Bequests to the Garden by will are deductible without
limit, in determining the federal estate tax and are exempt in
any amount from Missouri and Illinois state inheritance taxes.

Bee i
A) eh
one Say

eek,
Ser ie

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Joun S. LEHMANN, President RicHarD J. Lockwoop
DanieL K. CatLin, Vice-President GEorRGE T. Moore
EUGENE Pettus, Second Vice-President A. WeEssEL SHAPLEIGH
DupLEY FRENCH ErHan A. H. SHEPLEY
Henry HitcHcock RosertT BRooKINGS SMITH

EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS

ETH . H. SH re HARDT,

ean of Se ibse "University reac ot the Board of Education
ArtTHuR C. LICHTENBERGE tO Aes

be Pg the Diocese of Missouri STRATFORD L. Morton,
Raymonp R. Tuc baal ote of the peek of Science

Mayor of the City o ry Louis of St. Lo ouis

Secretary
GERALD ULRICI,

THE HORTICULTURAL COUNCIL
Clarence Barbre, A. C. Chandler, E. G. Cherbonnier, Paul Hale, Mrs. Hazel
Knapp, Martin Lammert Ill, Emmet ng ware Eleanor McClure, Clarence
McGovern, W. F. Scott, Jr., Mrs. J. Garneau Weld, Harold E. Wolfe, John
S. Lehmann, Edgar Anderson, Toha Nies, Chairman.

STAFF

George T. Moore...-.----------——- ated a oe easerees Director
John S. fb tideh en ae ee ent erty ere Acting Director
Edgar Anderson —- eae Director
1 ties The Vadt oe Executive Assistant
Gol ¥. bade _ Mycologist
Robert E. Woodnn, jr. oCerator af Herbarium
Henry N. Andrews------———-—-—---——--— feels ___._... Paleobotanist
Rolla M. Tryoa__$___—__—_— hedean Caras a Herbarium
Hugh C. Cutler__.____-_—_-_--_— = Cera Museum of Economic Plants
Robert J. hes ae eae er eee Research Horticulturist
(aD Owe Research Associate
George B. ie aback ee ee in Pe Sera Honorary Curator of Grasses
Julian A. Steyermark—_____—_-_----— Honorary Research Associate

l PEP ORTET ented ig etree nro area ibrarian and Editor
Mins Menai Assistant Librarian
ORT Sg i ORR enC er gnmlnrecRanNe ee Lec oct ance Assistant Librarian
Gerald Vl oe i Senet Manager
George H. Pring aa ee
Danl A Kop ee _____.Floriculturist
Ladideos Sa Se ce Suen se dcanaie in ee of Conservatories
Frederick G. Sees Sa a ie ameeinsipeneiomeenner ee Dendrologist
et ee Engineer
August P. Beilmann_____--.-—------—-- Manager of the Arboretum, Gray Summit

Assistant Manager of the Arboretum
In charge of Orchids

Louis G. Brenner - —_

SOME FACTS ABOUT THE GARDEN

The Missouri Botanical Garden carries on the garden estab-
lished by Henry Shaw over a century ago at “Tower Grove,” his
country home. It is a private institution with no public support
frem city or state. The old stone walls and cast-iron fences, the
Linnean House, the Museum, the Mausoleum and the “Old
Residence” all date from Mr. Shaw’s time. Since his death, as
directed in his will, the Garden has been in the hands of a Board
of Trustees who appoint the Director.

The Garden is open every day in the year (except New
Year’s Day and Christmas) from 9:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m.,
April to November, and until 6:00 p.m., November to April,
though the greenhouses close at 5:00 p.m. Tower Grove, itself,
Mr. Shaw’s old residence, is open from 1 until 4. The Garden is
nearly a mile long and has several entrances. The Main Entrance,
the one used by the general public, is at Tower Grove and Flora
Place on the Sarah bus line (No. 42). The Park Southampton
buses (No. 80), direct from downtown, pass within three blocks
of this entrance and stop directly across the street from the
Administration Building at 2315 Tower Grove Avenue. The
latter is the best entrance for students, visiting scientists, etc.
It is open to such visitors after 8:30 a.m., but is closed on Sat-
urdays, Sundays, and holidays. There is a service entrance on
Alfred Avenue, one block south of Shaw Avenue.

Since Mr. Shaw’s time an Arboretum has been developed at
Gray Summit, Mo., opposite the junction of routes 50 and 66.
It is open every day in the year and has two miles of auto roads
as well as foot trails through the wild-flower reservation. There
is a pinetum and an extensive display of daffodils and other
narcissi from March to early May.

Growing Exhibition Chrysanthemums at Home

A SYMPOSIUM ARRANGED BY A
COMMITTEE OF THE GREATER ST. Louis
DAHLIA AND CHRYSANTHEMUM SOCIETY

Dan O'Gorman, Chairman
William N. Avis

L. C. Bennett

Harold R. Hartman

John Ollinger

Ralph H. Rabenau
Hubert G. Sandefur
George A. Schaefer

Office of publication: 306 E. Simmons Street, Galesburg, Illinois.
Editorial Office: sean Botanical Garden, 2315 Tower Grove Avenue,
St. Louis, 10, Misso
Published monthly except cn and August by the Board of — of the
Missouri Botanical Garden. Subscription price: $2.50 a year.
Entered as second-class matter January 26, 1942, at the Seca at Gales-
burg, Illinois, under the Act of March 3, 1879.

Please: Do not discard a copy of the Bulletin. If you have no further use for yours
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Missour1 Botanical
Garden Bulletin

Vol. XLII MARCH, 1954 No. 3

THE BACKYARD GARDENER CAN GROW GREENHOUSE MUMS
HAROLD R. HARTMAN

Many articles have been written with detailed instructions on “how” to
grow greenhouse chrysanthemums. Recently published is an entire book
devoted to mums, written by two well-known non-professional growers and
covering every phase of both hardy and greenhouse types. Since minute
cultural instructions can be found in these writings, perhaps a brief outline
of how the ordinary backyard gardener can grow luxurious greenhouse-type
mums will be of interest, the writer being an ordinary backyard gardener.

First of all, it should be emphasized that there is no mystery involved in
growing good mums. They are easy to grow and success is well within the
reach of the beginner. The writer is purposely avoiding mention of a list of
recommended named varieties; there is an endless number of good named
varieties, and such a list would merely be a reflection of the grower’s personal
choice and not because many other varieties weren’t just as good. The classi-
fication of bloom form, for instance, embraces the singles, semi-singles,
anemones, pompons, incurves, decoratives, regular and irregular reflexes,
spoons, quills, threads, and spiders, with small, intermediate, and large blooms
in many of the classes. Too, there are early, intermediate, and late bloomers
in some classes, and each class has a range of colors found in few other flowers.

Types, colors, and period of bloom therefore become a matter of personal
taste, and it behooves the beginner to visit both amateur and_ professional
growers, particularly during the blooming season, to discuss his problem of
selection. In this way he will not only receive information from an actual
grower who finds it necessary to soil his hands occasionally in pursuit of his
hobby, but he will also see in the various stages of growth and bloom those
varieties that always grow well in spite of weather conditions and those which
require extra care to secure top-rate blooms.

Rooted cuttings or plants established in 22-inch pots should be obtained
in the spring from a reputable grower. The plant you will grow, no matter
how well you care for it, can only be as good as the parent stock from which
it came; therefore, it is extremely important to know that your plants came
from clean, healthy stock, free from disease. Some growers transplant from

(47)

48 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

21-inch pots to 4’s, then to 6’s, and finally to 8’s. My experience indicates
there is no difference in the final plant, and to avoid a lot of unnecessary
work and possible injury to the roots during the shifting process, I shift the
214-inch-pot plant immediately to the 6- or 8-inch pot. Plants do well in
6-inch pots; 8-inch are somewhat clumsy to handle, a bit more expensive,
and require more room in the mum shelter. However, the larger pot does
allow for more root growth and, under normal conditions, should make a
somewhat stronger plant. I use beth 6’s and 8’s, the 8’s being well adapted
to the tall, strong-growing and large-blooming standard varieties. If pots
are not new, they should be thoroughly scrubbed inside and out with a stiff
brush while submerged in a container into which fresh water is freely flowing.

Potting soil should contain humus, be capable of retaining plant food,
and sufficiently porous to allow for good drainage. The formula for potting
soil which I have found to give good results is: 3 parts of good garden loam,
2 parts of well-rotted leaf mold, 1 part of pulverized cow manure, and 12 to
1 part of sand. When potting, allow about 1 inch from the top level of the
soil to the top of the pot. This will provide space for water during the hot
summer months. A layer of broken pots should be placed in the bottom of
the pot to assure good drainage. The pots are then plunged in the garden, in
rows two abreast with a path between the rows of sufficient width to allow
for free movement to water, spray, tie, and disbud the plants. The beds
should receive sunlight at least half of the day and be sufficiently open for
free movement of air between the plants.

Pinching the plant after it is some 6 inches high is indicated to throw off
side-shoots and provide more than one stem to the plant. The frequency of
pinching depends on the type of mum; the tall standard incurves and reflexes
are allowed two to three stems per pot; you will want the bush varieties to
have a multitude of stems for mass blooms. In setting out your plants for
summer growth, you will want to know the final form the plant will take.
The tall, column-growing standard incurves and reflexes may be plunged
within a few inches of each other in the row and the rows a foot apart; those
which have a habit of spreading must have plenty of room to grow.

After the plant is about a foot high, it is well to provide stakes for sup-
port. For the tall-growing standard mums, I have found a 4-foot steel stake
of No. 8 galvanized steel to be excellent. Though the initial cost is a bit
higher than bamboo or wooden stakes, the steel stake retains its straightness
and rigidity, is neater in appearance, and practically lasts a lifetime. The
4-foot stakes are ample for the tall-growing types and may be cut to size for
the lower-growing types. For tying the plants to the stakes either use twine
or tiny metal gadgets which are pinched onto the stem and stake. They are
quite simple, inexpensive, readily applied and can be home-made or purchased

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 49

from a florists’ supply house. There is no formula for tying; you merely tie
whenever a stem seems to need support.

Your mums need little attention during the summer growing season. The
condition of the soil in the pots will vary with the weather, and watering
must be adjusted thereto. Spraying with insecticides and fungicides is
indicated upon the first sign of trouble. Aphis seem to be particularly fond
of mums, but they are easily controlled by a spray of nicotine solution. Red
spider gives occasional trouble and can be controlled with several spray solu-
tions sold commercially. Since some of the new insecticides are deadly to
the grower as well as the insect, caution should be exercised in their use.

yr
oe
EN eee,

~~,
_.

. + Pe |

Mr. Harold Hartman entering his 8 X 12 foot backyard greenhouse which is heated by
a small kerosene stove.

With the approach of fall and shorter days and longer nights, buds will
begin to form rapidly, and here again disbudding requirements are predicated
by the types of mums you are growing. You must know each type of mum
to know how much to disbud. Only one bud per stem is allowed for the
large standard incurves and reflexes as contrasted to those types which grow
in bush form and are not disbudded at all, since disbudding would not per-
ceptibly increase the size of remaining blooms and would only rob you of a
wealth of small blooms, normal to the plant.

e plants may be given a feeding at intervals during the growing season
and up to the time color begins to show in the buds. I have found that liquid
fertilizers are not only easier and cleaner to apply, but the amount of nourish-
ment can be better controlled by their use. Extreme care must be exercised
in feeding the plants, however, for over-feeding results in “soft” plants,
weak stems, and distorted blooms. Over-feeding is far worse than no feed-

50 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

ing at all, so, if in doubt, tend to go easy on the feeding program until you
are experienced in this phase of mum culture.

Before danger of the first frost, the pots should be removed from the
open ground where they were plunged at the beginning of the season and
scrubbed to remove dirt from the outside. The dried and discolored leaves
are then removed and the plants placed in the mum shelter according to size
and shape and so arranged to give a pleasing color effect. A shelter of some
sort is necessary for these somewhat tender greenhouse-types to prevent
damage from rain, wind, frost, and freezing weather if late-blooming varie-
ties are grown. The shelter may be simple or elaborate, depending on indi-
vidual taste and pocketbook, but should provide ventilation and movement
of air, a roof which is sufficiently tight to prevent water from dripping down
on the plants and blooms during the cold fall rains, and controlled heat to
cope with cold spells.

The writer’s mum shelter is of very simple and inexpensive construction
and can be duplicated by anyone who can use a hammer and a saw. It is 8
feet wide and 12 feet long, providing ample space for 75 to 80 pots; the
height of 8 feet in the rear and 7 in the front allows good roof drainage and
sufficient air space above the heads of the plants. The uprights are 4 x 4
posts, placed at 3-foot intervals, and support a roof made up of ordinary

6’ hotbed sash, caulked together. The sash are placed from the front
of the house; the remaining some 2 foot to the back is a hinged ventilator, in
two sections of 7% feet each, running the length of the house. The back of
the house which faces the west, and one side facing the north are completely
built up of 4” tongue and grooved 1 X 4” fir boards; the east (front) and
south sides are built up to 4 feet of this same material, with hotbed sash used
to cover the remaining space up to the roof on the front. However, on the
south side I have experimented with a piece of corrugated synthetic fibre
glass material, 8 314’, placed horizontally. Not only is this material
practically unbreakable and requires no upkeep as compared to glass sash,
but its translucent texture allows plenty of light to enter the house minus
the glare of direct sunlight. The present cost of this material, however, does
not encourage more extensive use. n ordinary screen door covered with
“glass cloth” for light and insulation fills the door requirement.

For heating this size shelter, ample protection is afforded by a gallon-size
cylindrical-shaped kerosene heater. Regulating the heater to provide night
temperatures of not over 40° F. will hold the blooms in better condition than
a higher temperature. This type of heating is inexpensive and the fumes
seem to have no ill effect on the plants or blooms, but it is well to keep the
wick clean at all times to assure perfect combustion. The ventilators must
be kept open during the warm, sunny fall days, for otherwise the temperature
in the house will soar and cause the plants and blooms to wilt. An accurate

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 51

Fahrenheit thermometer, hung near the center of the house and about half
way between the tops of the plants and the roof, will be an invaluable aid to
temperature control. Leaving the door open when the days are warm will
provide a circulation of air through the house and out of the ventilators.
Incidentally, the interior of the shelter should be painted a bright white to
provide a maximum of light reflection, essential in this case since two of the
sides have no glass.

Care should be exercised in watering now that the pots are indoors, so to
speak. Water the pots only, and not the leaves or blooms, since water under
these conditions has a tendency to rot the blooms, especially the large incurves
and reflexes, and wet leaves invite fungus diseases. You will find that insects
are now easier to control than when the plants were growing in the open.
Shading the roof with a whitewash solution or using lath frames will distort
the direct sunlight during bright periods, holding the plants in better condi-
tion and preventing fading of the blooms.

Compared to many other flowers, mums are not nearly as demanding in
their needs, and if the simple rudiments of culture are followed, success
should follow. As enthusiasm and interest mount, so will the extra frills of
care and culture and superior flowers of all types will result. You are certain
to meet other growers, exchange ideas and theories, swap plants and pool
orders, and become an enthusiastic exponent of this king of flowers. There
is a lot of fun in having a wealth of bloom when everything else in the gar-
den is gone, and accomplishing this with your own hands should be a source
of personal pride and satisfaction.

GROWING MUMS IN A PLASTIC GREENHOUSE
JOHN OLLINGER

My first year of growing the large chrysanthemums outdoors was any-
thing but the elaborate setup we have today, and looking back over the last
eight years, I note that most of those now enjoying the great pleasures and
satisfaction of outdoor mum-growing started in a small way and increased
and improved their mums each succeeding year.

My first experience was on a plot of garden space 18’ X 4’, in which I
planted thirty mum plants. I staked and tied them, and when buds showed
color I drove a larger stake at each corner of the patch to support the frame
covered with waxed muslin. This kept the water off the blooms and is one of
the simplest ways to grow big, beautiful “football” mums outdoors. The fol-
lowing year I fitted a water-pipe frame around the mum patch, and instead
of waxed muslin I covered the frames with Plexiglas, as this is more service-
able. When threatened with a killing frost, I simply throw an extra cover,
such as a blanket, sheeting, etc. over the top, and the blooms will be pro-

52 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Mr. John Ollinger of Afton grows both hardy and greenhouse mums.

tected from damage even to as low as 28 degrees. The sides need no covering.
At the present time I am growing a good many of the early-blooming
varieties exactly that way.

1 of the writers of the articles in this bulletin are members of the
Greater St. Louis Dahlia and Chrysanthemum Society. We meet in the
Cabanne Library the second Friday in every month. We exchange plants
with each other or purchase new varieties from commercial growers, but our
basic planting is from plants grown the previous year. These were cut down
to about an inch from the ground, the clumps lifted into a cold-frame, and
dirt filled around the sides of the clumps to prevent air pockets. They were
then watered thoroughly once, sprayed with Vapatone to destroy aphids
and red spider, and covered with sash to protect them from snow oF
rain. Remember that cold and freeze do not kill the plants; it is usually
drowning which does the damage. I have already wintered some by placing
the clumps tightly together on top of the ground, covering the plants with
rough straw (without the chaff), and all of them came through nicely the
following spring. Simply keep them from getting “wet feet.”

ropagating.—In March and April you will note quite a few new shoots
growing from these clumps. Prepare a rooting box, making it any con-
venient length and width, but, more important, about five inches deep. Fill
with Vermiculite, soak thoroughly, and tamp firmly with a wide piece of
wood. When these new shoots are 3 or 4 inches tall, cut them off below the
leaf node, trim off the lower leaves, dip cut ends in Rootone, and sink them

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 53

half their length into this wet Vermiculite, tamping well around them to
eliminate air pockets. Space about an inch apart, allowing about 3 inches
between rows, and wet down thoroughly. I have an open porch on the north
side of my house, with an hour of morning sunshine. The rooting box is
placed on the floor on one-inch sticks laid flat to allow for air circulation
underneath the box. Then I have a frame about 6’ X 3’ covered with a
heavy cheese-cloth which I set on end and lean against the wall, thereby
protecting the cuttings from sun and wind. Water about every three days
in normal weather, and in three or four weeks the cuttings should be well
rooted. They are perfectly safe in a temperature as low as 32 degrees, and
should there be a threat of colder temperature simply take the box into the
basement for the night and bring it back on the porch in the morning. The
box of Vermiculite is very easily handled, which is the advantage over rooting
in sand.

Potting Soil—Some growers use great care in preparing their potting
soil and some even weigh each portion of the humus, sand, peat moss, fertil-
izer and what not. I use a good garden soil, with about 25 per cent well-
rotted compost, and that’s it. When the cuttings are well rooted, pot them
in this soil in 4-inch pots and place them either in a cold-frame or out in the
open, but be sure to shade them for at least a week or ten days to harden off.
Let them grow in these 4-inch pots for another couple of weeks or so, and
they are then ready to be planted. Since the plants have not been pampered,
they will not be set back when the roots start reaching out in the open soil.
In other words, don’t make the potting soil any different from the soil in
which the plants will have to grow 95 per cent of their lives.

Planting Time.—I have spaded the soil deeply in the fall, adding a liberal
quantity of well-rotted compost and barnyard manures. In the spring you
can spade the ground again when it is in good workable condition, but I
don’t. Isimply apply a light application of Vigoro and rake it in thoroughly.
My plantings start about May 15 and continue through May 30. You can
plant as late as June 20, but until you have more experience do your planting
in May.

Permanent Setup.—tIn order to grow some of the later bloomers, I selected
a spot in my garden 12’ X 12’ and built a frame-work of 2 X 4’s 7 feet
high with a center slope of 1 foot. The top and upper sides of the frame-
work is sectioned off in 6’ 3’ openings, while the lower part of the sides
is 6’ X 4’. About May 15 I mark off the spots for the plants, three rows on
the two sides, two rows at the far end, and leave walking space through the
center. Plant 18 inches apart each way, and that will give you room for 54
plants. Dig the holes about 12 inches deep, and mix thoroughly with the
soil a little wood ashes, if available. Plant the mums about an inch deeper
than they were in the pots, water well, and level the hole with the remaining
soil. After four weeks, give the entire bed a small amount of Vigoro, raking

54 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

it lightly into the soil, and water heavily. When the plants are about 8
inches tall, top them and apply a well-rotted cow-manure mulch 3 inches
thick over the bed. As the laterals begin to grow, select about four or five
of the healthiest and pull off all the rest. Be sure you clean out these laterals
as side growth appears, in order to preserve all of the plant’s strength for the
bloom which eventually will develop at the tip of each stem.

Selecting Buds.—Here again is where some of us differ. Let’s review
this pinching process. When the plant is 8 inches or so tall, you top it; that
is, you pinch out the center growth and tie the plant securely to a 4-foot
stake. In a couple of weeks laterals will form. These when left to bloom
will be the “first crown” buds. All side growth is removed as quickly as
possible. As the canes continue to grow keep them well tied to the stake
to insure straight upright stems. To the beginner, I suggest using this first
crown bud for his bloom. A lot of varieties do best in this section of the
country on the first crown bud, difference of opinions notwithstanding. After
more experience you will find out which do better on second crown buds and
which are best on terminal buds. For a variety preferring the second crown
bud simply give it another pinching on the date deemed proper for the
scheduled blooming time and follow the same procedure of cleaning out all
side growth. If you choose the terminal bud merely pinch the plant a third
time, although frequently you can get the terminal bud by simply passing
up the second crown bud when it appears and waiting a couple of weeks till
the tip of the plant grows into a cluster of buds. When these are large
enough to disbud clean out all but two. Pinch out any buds appearing before
August 10. In selecting a bud it is best to allow two buds to form on each
of the five canes you have been growing. Let these get to about the size of
a pea, then remove one and leave the healthier on each cane. This procedure
allows for any damage that could happen to some of the buds.

Watering and Spraying —When the plants are about 15 inches tall, apply
a well-rotted cow-manure mulch about 3 inches thick over the entire bed.
Some growers use peat moss, compost, etc. Water heavily about every seven
days, although the frequency of watering depends on the weather. Don’t let
the plants suffer for moisture. When watering during the earlier part of the
day, wash the leaves too, as they can breathe better with clean open pores;
but evening watering should be confined to the soil only, otherwise you take
a chance of getting the plants mildewed. I don’t find it necessary to spray
oftener than about four times during a season. A mixture of Vapatone and
DDT keeps my plants free of any pests. To those of us who crowd the plants
or don’t have sufficient air circulation, dust the underside of the leaves once,
about October 1, with sulphur.

Give a light application of Vigoro again about July 25 and August 20,

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 55

then no more during the balance of the season. As soon as the buds show
color, I go to work with the covering for my framed house. As I mentioned
earlier, the whole framework is sectioned off in 6’ 3’ openings, top and
sides, so during the winter months, I made Plexiglas frames 6’ & 3’. These
are fitted with hooks to match the eyelets en the house frame, and now I
simply hook the Plexiglas frames into place, including the door of the same
material, and I’m all set. When there is danger of a temperature drop to
below 28 degrees or so, I light a small coal-oil burner, set it in the center of
the “room.” This will protect the plants down to about 10 degrees, giving
me beautiful blooms up to December 10. Mums should be grown in full
sunlight.
The following are some of those I would recommend for good results:

Early-blooming: Buttercup—yellow, Major Edward E. Bowes—pink, Morgan’s White—
“= Rar she ie “ sree a rahe knee Bis eine Ranch

e-bloo ze Nerissa—bro —pink, Fern Edwards —pink, Garnet King
SS gorse 5 seal ink, Aa ox Whice—whie, “Melo dy—yellow, Mrs. David F.
Roy—red, Tranquility—white, Yellow Frill—yellow

FIVE RULES I USE IN GROWING EXHIBITION MUMS
HUBERT G. SANDEFUR

No. 1. Potting Soil and Care of My Plants.—

I use leaf mold and manure that is well decayed for my fertilizer; 1 part
manure, | part leaf mold and 2 parts soil. I turn and mix this about four
times. I believe that by making my cuttings after the fifteenth of April the
plants will not get so tall. A flower is not pretty if you can’t look it in the
face. I always try a few new plants each year, but always have plenty of old
varieties that I know will grow for me. This way your planting will always

good.

I place my cuttings, which measure about 3 inches, in a box of sand
about 5 inches deep. These I keep out of full sun and wind for at least a
week, then I harden them off with sun and air. It takes three weeks for
them to root. Then I pot them off into 21-inch pots for three weeks, 4-
inch pots for four weeks, and last in 8-inch pots. These are sunk up to their
necks with a 2'4-inch pot under them. I do this so that the roots can go
through the hole into the small pot; then in taking them up I can cut off
all roots that have come through. This will not hurt the plants in any way.
I take them up when they show color. I disbud all large varieties to three
or four blooms.

Recently I built my new home with garage attached. All windows in
this garage are on the north and east side with an overhanging door on the
south side so that when displaying my mums they will get plenty of air.

56 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Living with mums as I do is a pleasure, for I take three steps from my bed-
room and I am surrounded by 500 blooms. Some of these are up to any
greenhouse standard.
2. Spraying.—
I spray my plants with DDT and Vapatone once a week, starting when
they are rooting in the bench.
o. 3. Watering.—

Unless there is a hard rain, I water my plants every morning before the

ft ek Po SSP aS
hee mie ee Pete
ss Ett ss ee agp %

Mr. Sandefur of St. Louis utilizes his garage for the display of his mums.

sun comes up; this tends to keep the plants fresh all day. Plants are dependent
upon you for their water if they are grown in pots.

No. 4. Feeding.—

Mums like their meals the same as you and I, but they can also be over-
fed. I discovered this point this year to my sorrow on the TURNER varieties.
This variety, of course, is your largest mum, and I decided to make my
twelve plants even larger. I gave them two shots of Vigoro and two of 20
per cent nitrogen. Result: deformed buds! They blew their tops. Under
each bud the stems looked as if they had been cut half in two with a knife.
In a growing season I use 4 teaspoonsful of Vigoro, but nothing after the
buds show color.

No. 5. Displaying Mums.—

I can display 125 plants to their best advantage in my garage which is
12’ X 21’. All tall mums go to the back, next to the walls and windows,

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 57

and the shorter ones in front. All bush varieties are placed down the middle
forming a horseshoe so that spectators can walk in a half circle without
brushing against the blooms. I do not place each color alone. Instead, I
like to distribute them so that they blend in a more satisfying color array,

I have listed below some varieties which in my ten years experience in
growing large mums have proven to be of excellent quality to me:

Large Globe Shape Pompons Spider Mums Cascade Varieties
Bronze Nerissa Brilliance Bunbu Jane Harte
Country Maiden Gold Coast Emerald Isle Anna

ard ypsy Georgina Hedinger
Indianapolis Little Dot Lorraine

and Bronze uggets rsha
Major Edward E. Bowes Pink Iz Masumi
Mrs. David F. Roy Queen of the Pinks Melody
Mrs. H. E. Kidder Soroku rs. V. Mood
Stephanie Thyra Tranquility
Watanabe

CHRYSANTHEMUMS, ONE OF OUR OLDEST FLOWERS
DAN R. O’GORMAN

Chrysanthemums should have a prominent place in our fall garden, as no
other plant will give as much color and bloom, beginning in September and
braving early frost until only a hard freeze cuts them down.

The history of the Chrysanthemum dates back over 2000 years. The
Chinese philosopher, Confucius, wrote of this flower about 600 B. C. in his
book Li-Ki (Ninth Moon). History tells us that in the year 386 A. D. seeds
of the Chrysanthemum were brought unto Japan. From then on the Japanese
played a leading role in its development, and it was later adopted as the
national flower of Japan. The original Chrysanthemum was yellow, and for
this reason Linnaeus in 1753 gave it its name, taken from two Greek words,
chrysos, meaning gold, and anthos, meaning flower.

All this took place centuries ago, but it is only in the last generation that
the mum has developed into the beautiful garden flower we have today. Much
of this development has been due to the work of such men as Elmer D. Smith,
Alex Cumming, Charles Totty, Eugene Michel, and others.

The aim in breeding Chrysanthemums is to produce a good flower that
is winter-hardy and early-blooming. The term “hardy mum” must be taken
with reservations; the term “garden mum” would be better suited. There are
only a very few of the so-called “hardy mums” that will live through our
winters without protection.

Soil.—Chrysanthemums prefer a sunny location in good average soil with
plenty of humus. There must be perfect drainage, as mums will not succeed
in a poorly drained location. They like plenty of water, but it must be

58 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

moving. Prepare the bed to a depth of 12-18 inches. Dig in plenty of well-
rotted manure, peat-moss or leaf mold, and some superphosphate. Be sure
that any leaf meld or organic matter is thoroughly decayed, or nitrogen
deficiency will result.

Planting.—Plant in spring and do not crowd; 18 inches apart is about
right for most hardy types. The large exhibition types which are grown one or
two stems to the plant may be planted as close as 10 inches apart both ways.
Mums must have plenty of air circulation, as crowding is one of the surest
ways to encourage foliage diseases, aphids, red spider, and other pests.

Plants that have survived the winter will grow numerous young shoots
in the spring. When these shoots are about 4-6 inches tall the entire clump
can be dug, and each shoot, with its root system, can be separated from the
old plant and planted separately. This is the easiest way to increase the
plantings.

Many growers prefer not to disturb the clumps but to allow the shoots
to grow about 6 or 8 inches high and use them for cuttings. This is
done by cutting, with a sharp knife, about 3 or 4 inches off the shoots just
below a leaf node. Treat the cuttings with Rootone and insert them in sand
or Ter-a-lite and place in the shade out of any draft. In about ten days to
three weeks new roots will have formed and the plants can be potted and
later put out in the garden.

The main reason for taking cuttings is that some disease may remain over
winter in the roots of old plant. These diseases then follow growth up the

Mr. Dan O’Gorman waters plants in his simple mum shelter built at a minimum cost.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 59

stems of the new plants, but not as fast as the stem grows. If we can take
cuttings of the new fast-growing shoot we can get growth before the disease
gets up that high. Then, too, many think that a plant from a cutting makes
a better bush than one from a division.

Fertilizers —Mums need plenty of nourishment but must not be over-fed.
If fertilizer or plenty of manure was incorporated in the soil at the time of
planting, regular feedings of liquid manure every ten days during July and
August should suffice until the latter part of August or the first part of
September. At this time an application of a good complete fertilizer will act
as a stimulant.

Where liquid manure is not used, an app/ication of about 3 pounds of com-
plete fertilizer for each 100 square feet of garden can be given once each
month during July and August. Do not feed after the buds show color, as
this will result in poor-quality soft flowers. As long as the plants have a
healthy soft vigorous growth they have enough nutriment. When the leaves
turn a dark color and are so thick and brittle that they break when folded
they are being over-fed and all feeding should stop.

Pinching.—Pinching of mums controls the form and branching of the
bush. When the plant is about 6-8 inches high, pinch the top inch out.
This will cause new shoots to grow from the side. Select the three strongest
of these, and when they are about 4 inches long pinch off their tips. Allow
two side shoots to grow from each of these and then pinch again to
allow two shoots to grow from them. This should give a well-branched
compact bush. Pinch out any buds that form before the first of August
(except in very early-flowering varieties). Do not pinch any more after the
first of August. When pinching, be careful to leave enough soft growth
for the new side, or lateral, to form. Laterals that form in hard wood should
be removed.

Cushion-type mums which naturally grow in a low mound need no
pinching. Tall-growing types must be staked. This must be done early
and the plants kept tied, or a strong wind may snap the whole plant off.

The method of pinching the large exhibition mums is different from that
used for the garden or hardy mums. The plants are allowed to grow to
about 8-10 inches before the tip is pinched. This is called the break-bud
pinch. Then one to four laterals are allowed to grow (all others are re-
moved). These laterals will form what is known as the first-crown buds.
Most first-crown buds do not form good flowers, so when these laterals are
about 6 inches long they are pinched. One lateral is allowed to grow from
below this pinch. The bud formed on this second lateral is known as the
second crown bud. Some growers save this bud as on some varieties it pro-
duces the best bloom. However, this second lateral can be pinched and the

60 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

growth from below this pinch will produce the bud known as the terminal
bud. This terminal bud must be allowed to produce the flower. When you
purchase this type of mum ask the dealer which bud to save. If you cannot
find out the best bud to save, grow two stems to the plant; take the second
crown bud on one stem and the terminal bud on the other. Then you can
decide which is the better flower.

Most of the exhibition-type mums bloom later in the fall and need protec-
tion from early freezing. They also need some sort of cover to protect the
blooms from rain. When the flower forms it has a cupped shape center, and
water will rot the bloom if allowed to settle in this cup.

Spraying.—Spraying should start early, as soon as the plants are set out.
They should be sprayed for green and black aphids, leaf hopper, leaf miner,
red spider, cucumber beetle, grasshoppers, and other insects. There are new
sprays to control aphid and red spider—Vapatone, Malathion, etc. Chlordane
will control grasshoppers. If red spiders are present, spray every four days
with Vapatone, Spider Rid, Dimite or Malathion, four times.

Fermate will control many fungous diseases such as leaf spot. A good
all-purpose spray is a mixture of Vapatone, Chlordane, and Fermate, used
every ten days.

Chrysanthemums love a good mulch of well-rotted manure or compost,
put on about the first of July.

Varieties.—Some hardy or garden varieties that have proven satisfactory
in this locality are:

ee Ermine, Irene, September Queen, White Dot.

Yellow—Mrs. H. E. Kidder is the leading yellow. It can be grow a bush or as an
exhibition type. hee good yellows are: Charles Nye, cue Coast, go Powell, Midas
s ES Cuitine Betty, Cecil Reed, Early Wonder, Lavender Lady,
Olive “Longland, _ eer

Red armine Queen, Courageous, Cydonia, General MacArthur, General
Omar ae a Red Vidleet, subs Pompon, Serenade.

Some of the best of the large exhibition type are the following:

hite—Ambassador — incurved), Indianapolis White (large incurved), Marketier
(large eet Sn blooms late; good for potting and if taken indoors blooms for Thanks-
giving), Silver Sheen (hinge | incurved).
Yellow eee all (large incurved), Friendly Rival (large incurved), Gold Lode (large
inte Indianapolis Yellow, Mrs. H. E. Kidder (large incurved), Watanabe (large in-
curved).
Red and pie ne Tatos = ighton (red incurved), Garnet King (large s sakeg Gold
Bronze (large), Tegan raneureak mahogany), Indianapolis Bronze (erge ssoreed),
Mrs. David F. Roy (ocurred, reddish bronze), Sunnyslope Bronze (golden bronze
Pin leo nndiianagielia Pink (large incurved), Major Edward E. Bowes pert -incurved),
xchid Queen (large incurved).

There are many fine Spider types. Here are a few that have been grown
successfully here:

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 61

White—Anne (pure white), Morgan’s White, Sunnyslope Splendor, Tranquility (a
beautiful white).

Yellow—Albert Witt, Yellow Frill, Yellow Rayonante.

Pink and Lavender—Bunbu (orchid pink), Georgina Hedinger, Rayonante (light rose,
quilled petals).

Red and Bronze—Bess Witt (apricot-bronze), Chopstick (henna-red), Mauve (wine-red).

GROWING THE LARGE CHRYSANTHEMUMS OUTDOORS
ah

The start of the mum-grower’s year should be about the latter part of
March, if he intends to propagate his own plants. If there are only two or
three sprouts coming up out of the stock plants it would be a good idea to
pinch the tops out of each of them about the middle of February, so as to
start them branching and thereby have more sprouts suitable for cuttings.

Box for Cuttings——This box should be made about 4 inches deep with
enough small holes or cracks in the bottom to admit some air, and also for
drainage. Put 34 inch of gravel in the bottom and then fill the box with
fairly coarse sand. Give a good sprinkling, and then you are ready to put in
your cuttings.

Making Cuttings—The first most important thing to have in making
cuttings is a very sharp knife or a razor blade, then some tags on which to
write the name of the variety, and a pencil, preferably a black wax or water-
proof one.

Selection of cuttings should be made when they are 4-5 inches long.
Trim off the bottom four leaves, and with a roll over the edge of your tool
cut off excess stem, just below where the bottom pair of leaves were cut off.
With the top or non-sharpened end of your pencil push a hole about 1/2
inches deep into the sand and then carefully drop the cutting into it. Using
your pencil again, punch several holes in the sand about half an inch from
the newly planted cuttings. This will firm the sand to the cutting without
scratching or breaking the very tender outer surface of the stem. Attach
your tag with the name of the variety written on it and give the cuttings a
good watering, preferably with a florist’s syringe.

Do not crowd your cuttings in the box. Have them about 1/2 inches
apart in rows about 3!4—4 inches apart. Place this box in some sheltered
place outdoors with some air space under it, where the wind and sun will not
blow or shine directly on it for a week or ten days. By that time the cuttings
should be pretty well hardened off and can be gradually exposed to full sun.
During this rooting time care should be taken against over-watering. More
cuttings have been lost from too much water than by not having had enough.
It doesn’t hurt them to wilt a little sometimes.

In about three to four weeks there should be a good root system on these
cuttings, and they should then be potted into 3-inch clay pots. The potting

62 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

mixture should be preferably just good garden soil with, if available, about
25 per cent well-rotted leaf mold added. A little hardwood ashes and a light
sprinkling of dehydrated lime will prove to be helpful. Keeping these newly
potted plants in a partial shade for a few days will also help. You can
note when they have started to grow, and gradually give them full sun.

When they have established themselves in the 3-inch pots and have formed
three or four pairs of true leaves, the tip of the plant should be pinched out.
This will cause the plant to start branching. At about this stage the plants
are ready to put into larger pots or to plant out into the bed where they are
to be grown.

If planted outdoors (May 10 is a safe date but they can be set out up to
June 1) 14 to 16 inches apart will give them good growing room. A 5-foot
stake should be at each plant to which the four, five, or six laterals per plant
should be tied as they grow taller.

Preparation of Bed.—As early in the spring as the soil is in proper working

oe ca

r
ee &

oa
acai He

Mr. Pat Bennett built a garage lean-to for his mums and heats it with
two hot plates with bricks on top of them.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 63

condition put on a liberal amount of well-rotted manure, about a pound of
bone meal, and a pound coffee can twice full of wood ashes to each square
yard of bed. Turn this all under and mix thoroughly. Try and turn the
bed over again at a later date before planting, again mixing well. The plants
should not need any further fertilizer until about the latter part of July; at
this time apply Vigoro at the rate of 3 pounds per 100 square feet, and the
same amount again about the first week of September. When applying this
fertilizer keep it well away from the plant, rake it in lightly, and water well.
It would also help if the bed was mulched about the middle of July.

Second Pinching—Having pinched out the plants in early June there
should now be four to six laterals per plant that should each have a second
pinching. This is done about the middle of July.

Disbudding.—After the second pinching each lateral will put out laterals
of its own. All of these, except four to five or six per plant, depending on
the individual vitality of each plant, should be removed. Those laterals that
have been left will start showing buds about the middle of August. This
bud is generally known as a second crown bud and will first be seen as a pair
of “rabbit ears” surrounded by a vegetative growth or other laterals that will
in turn form the terminal buds if not removed. Do not let this growth go
too long before removing or it will by-pass the second crown bud and blast
it. “This second crown bud has proven to be the best to save in this locality.”
After having selected the buds to have bloom, all other growths, at the leaf
joints and sprouts out of the ground, should be removed as soon as they are
large enough to handle.

Insects and Sprays.—Aphis is the most likely insect that will have to be
kept in check, but a spraying every week or ten days should not only take
care of aphis but other pests—worms, tarnish plant bugs, etc., that might
have ideas. WVapatone, D-X, Red Arrow, Black Leaf 40, and some others
are all good as sprays.

Watering.—During the very hot and dry weather of July and August
the plants should be well watered so as to keep them in a good growing con-
dition. A sprinkling of the foliage real early in the morning or late in the
afternoon is also good. When the buds start to show color it is well to pay
close attention to watering. The plants should not be permitted to dry out
but, on the other hand, do not drown them.

The Pay-off—By following this program and not going to extremes, there
should be no reason why at blooming time you won't have some blooms that
you will be real proud of and have your visiting friends admire.

Proven Varieties—The varieties listed below have proved that they can
grow in this locality. There are others that will bloom at about the same
time and perhaps will also prove to be satisfactory.

64 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Early varieties that can be planted in the ground and will bloom where

planted with but little protection and no heat are the following:
curved: si) imei ar Major Edward E. Bowes—pink, Mrs. H. E. Kidder—yellow,
sai gerbes nabe—yellow.

Spider: RE ss oe aE Aniinssvehied,

Later varieties that will bloom October 20-30 are the following. These
can be grown in the ground or in pots and can be either moved or some
temporary protection erected around them so that heat may be used in case
of a below-freezing drop in temperature.

rved: Bronze Nerissa—bronze, Dame Enid Lyons—white, Fern Edwards—lavender-
cake hitawapals hehe e, Pink, Argseaens cog Yellow, Lilian Foltz—yellow, Mrs. David F. Roy
—tred, Orchid Queen—pink a
Spider: Bertha pfleeeinier: ge aA aad pink, Marsha—white, Melody—yellow.

GROWING GREENHOUSE MUMS IN THE GARDEN
WILLIAM N. AVIS

Growing of some greenhouse varieties of mums in the garden was suc-
cessfully accomplished this year by using black-cloth covering to reduce the
daylight and thus induce early budding and early bloom. A bed 4 feet wide
and 30 feet long containing 45 plants produced an average of six good blooms
per plant or approximately 270 blooms. Varieties used were all from the
early-flowering group, including Wurre CuHrer, INDIANAPOLIS YELLOW,
GOLDEN ScepTRE, BLaziING Gotp, Mrs. H. E. Kipper, and Mayor EpwArD
E. Bowes, all I.C. Decorative. Some of the Spider varieties were: PEGGY
ANNE Hoover, SUNNYSLOPE SPLENDOR, ALBERT Witt, WHITE, YELLOW
and Pink RAYONANTE, Mamoru, MAry GARDEN, Arctic, Miss GINA
Harwoop, YELLow Lack, etc.

Plants were propagated by rooting cuttings taken from stock plants
carried over in a cold-frame. Cuttings were rooted in March in a home-
made box equipped with fluorescent lights and potted in bands. They were
moved to a cold-frame for planting in the bed about May 15.

The bed was prepared in advance by working in a 2-inch layer of manure
and 5 pounds each of calcium phosphate and 80 per cent commercial muriate
of potash per 100 square feet. Fertilizer was worked in to a depth of 4-6
inches. Plants were set out 18 24 inches apart and hard-pinched to about
7 or 8 inches high. After two weeks a high nitrogen liquid fertilizer was
applied. Regular disbudding was practiced.

e bed was equipped with two strong pipe posts 6 feet high at each end
and cross-bars for fastening wires to which the stems were supported by

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 65

strings. Above these wires two strong wires were placed for supporting the
black shade cloth. The cloth is water-repellent and the type used by com-
mercial growers. It must completely cover the plants, sides and ends, so
that when drawn over the wires, all light is kept away.

The treatment was begun August 14, and by covering the bed at 6 P. M.
and removing the cloth at 7 A.M. the daylight was cut to eleven hours.
This schedule was maintained until September 2, when all plants had budded.
Color was showing the third week of September and the prime bloom period
was from October 5 to 20. The plants will not increase in height very much
after budding. Many of the varieties were also grown in large pots and not
treated for light curtailment but grown otherwise the same. These potted
plants did not bloom until three or four weeks later than the cloth-treated
plants, which was a good check on the value of the cloth treatment. The
cloth was also used several times at night when there were light frosts.

The above method is the best the writer has devised after several years’
trials, to grow this type of bloom in his garden, as it overcomes the obstacle
of cold weather, which generally may start any time after October 20.

Several pots of cascade mums were grown. These were trained on a 4-
foot piece of solid aluminum wire (12 gauge) by tying the stem every four
or five inches. The wire was pointed at a 45° angle to north and was grad-
ually bent north so that by September 15 it was parallel with the ground.
Side shoots were pinched to induce branching. When buds were well formed
the pot was taken from the ground and placed on a shelf with the wire facing
south and bent further or completely removed. The buds will then face up
for blooming. We have found cascade mums excellent to bring in the house
and several lasted to December 1 on a shelf in our dining-room.

Mr. W. N. Avis of Webster Groves uses shading cloth for his mums.

66 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

A PIT HOUSE
GEORGE A. SCHAEFER

In my estimation the Chrysanthemum is one of the most beautiful and
long-lasting flowers that can be grown by amateurs in their backyards. Many
articles and books have been written about Chrysanthemums but the satis-
faction you get from raising the delicate graceful Spider mums cannot be
put into words. The exhibition varieties of mums require more care than
the common hardy ones, as the blooms have to be protected from the wind
and rain. At first the only protection that I used was a plastic cover; now
my pit house, which is no more than a simplified greenhouse, is much better.
The pit is 4 feet deep, 8 feet wide, and 10 feet long. The walls are of con-
crete blocks to just above the ground level, and the glass windows are set at
a 45-degree angle to a crown board. The trap door on the east end protects
the open steps and windows that swing open. The pit is easily ventilated;
but the real advantage is that no elaborate heating system is needed and that
the blooms can be kept in good condition until late November or early
December.

Although I have made cuttings in the basement of my house with some
degree of success, the ones made in the pit house last spring were healthier
and made much sturdier plants. The plants were potted in 6- or 8-inch
clay pots or 1-gallon tin cans and sunk into the ground in full sun. The

Mr. George Schaefer of St. Louis grows mums in a small pit house in his backyard.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 67

mums must be disbudded, sprayed, and fertilized throughout the growing
season for best results. When the blooms began to cup and show color they
were moved into the pit house. By the middle of October most of the
varieties were in full bloom, making a beautiful array of colors.

GROWING CHRYSANTHEMUMS FROM CUTTINGS
H H. RABENAU

In growing mums I like to raise my own plants. I begin about April 1, by
taking cuttings from stock plants wintered over in a cold-frame. I save part
of the frame, about two feet square, for the propagating bed, laying two
pieces of lumber about two feet long and 4 inches high in the front corner
to hold the sand in the bed. The cuttings used are about 4 inches long with
all but the top leaves removed. They are planted 2 inches deep in the sand
and watered regularly. Fertilizer in liquid form, mixed according to the
manufacturer’s directions, will make the cuttings healthier and stronger. It
will be necessary to provide shade to protect them from the direct sunlight.
This is done by placing a muslin-covered frame over the propagating bed on
top of the cold-frame sash, raising it about 6 inches at the rear for ventila-
tion. A rooting preparation is used, as cuttings kept cool do not root as fast
as those kept warm indoors; but they are much healthier and stronger, with
enormous clumps of roots, and they can be potted with little or no shock as
they are accustomed to the outdoor weather and a good deal of light. Cuttings
rooted in this manner may be potted in the evening and left in partial sun-
light for several days, and from then on in full sunlight with no damage
other than a slight wilting.

All the cuttings are treated the same, whether of hardy types, early-
blooming outdoor mums to be grown in beds, or the late-blooming
varieties grown in pots sunk in the ground during the summer and taken to
the porch when frost threatens. All cuttings are potted in 4-inch pots the
first time, but from then on the treatment of each type varies. Some of the
hardy types and the cushion mums are planted in their permanent places in
the garden. I grow about 100 hills of Dahlias 4 feet apart, which gives
space between the plants to grow mums in larger pots, to be moved into the
border beds later in the season when the early-blooming flowers have
finished. Tulips and daffodils may be replaced by hardy mums after
their foliage has matured, as the mums are very shallow-rooting plants and
do not interfere with the deep planted bulbs. These plants, for later use,
are transferred from the 4-inch pots to 6-inch pots, and sunk to the rims
between the Dahlias. They should be pinched two or three times to keep the
plants low and bushy, and when moved to their places in the garden in July
or August they will be compact and easy to shade for a few days until estab-

68 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

lished in their new locations. Some of the smaller plants can be kept in the
pots and brought indoors when they are in bloom.

The early-blooming large-flowered greenhouse types, such as Mrs. H. E.
KippER, SILVER SHEEN, Major Epwarp E. Bowes, MoRGAN’s WHITE, BuT-
TERBALL, CELESTRA, etc., are grown in a bed which can be covered to protect
the flowers from the rain after the buds shew color, and from early frost. A
convenient planting is a bed with the mums in three rows, 12 inches apart,
with plants 12 inches apart in the rows. This requires a bed about four feet
deep which can be worked from either side, and as long as you care to make it.

Mr. Ralph Rabenau of Lemay grows mums in a glass-enclosed front porch.

About June 1 to 15, 4-foot tomato sticks are driven at 12-inch intervals, and
a plant placed beside each stick and tied securely to it about 6 inches above
the ground. When the plant is 8 to 10 inches tall the tip should be pinched
out to form laterals which will produce the flowers. Allow about six to eight
laterals on each plant growing in the soil. Pot-plants cannot support as many
flowers and produce acceptable size. Each lateral, as it develops, should be
tied to the stake, as it is easily broken when it becomes long and has a large
bud to support. All side growth should be removed from the laterals, and
when the buds form, only one should be allowed to develop on each lateral.
The first bud to form is called the crown bud, which will have four laterals
developing rapidly just under it. These laterals must be removed very soon,
as they develop rapidly and within a short time grow beyond the bud. When
this happens remove the bud and all but one of the secondary laterals, in

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 69

order to keep the plant to six or eight flowers. The next bud to form will
have four smaller buds around it where the laterals grew around the crown

I like to use the large center bud, called a terminal bud, and remove
the four smaller ones and all the extra growth and buds which will form at
each leaf on the stem. Try removing the center bud and allowing one of the
side buds to mature on several of the laterals, as it will ripen a little later
and may produce a better flower. Some varieties produce better flowers from
crown buds, some from center terminal buds, and some from side terminal
buds. Experience will tell you which buds to keep.

The late-flowering mums, grown in pots to bloom on the porch in late
October and November, are transplanted from the 4-inch pots to 6- and 8-
inch pots. Those in 6-inch pots are grown to one bloom for each plant, and
those in 8-inch pots are grown to three or four blooms for each plant. The
care of these potted plants is about the same as for the plants grown in beds
except that the number of laterals allowed to grow is restricted more, and
a cane or reed is used for support instead of the heavier tomato sticks.

The potting soil is made up of good garden soil, loose enough to drain so
that water will not stand in the pots too long but not so sandy and porous
that water runs through it like a sieve. The pots are sunk in the ground
during the summer and are brought indoors on the porch as soon as frost
threatens. A small pot placed in the ground under the drainage hole in the
large pot will keep the plant from sending roots into the soil through the air
space thus provided. This will lessen the shock when the plant is taken
indoors. Even though roots have formed under the pot in the soil, the plant
can still be moved indoors, but it will wilt considerably for some time after
being taken in, if placed in the sunlight.

The soil for the beds of mums outdoors should be loose, fertile, and well-
drained, and, if possible, raised slightly above the normal ground level. Water
the plants regularly and fertilize lightly about three times—July 1, August 1,
and September 1. Those plants grown in pots will need water oftener and
should be fertilized on the 15th of each month, as well as the first, as soil
nutrients will be leached out by the extra water needed for the plants. A
mulch of rotted manure, 3—4 inches deep around the plants in beds, is very
helpful and will cause the mums to produce much better plants and flowers.
Spray as needed to control aphis during the spring and summer and at weekly
intervals after the buds have formed to prevent them from getting a start
in the opening blooms, as they are hard to control in the open flowers.

After the plants are brought indoors it will be necessary to water them
every day, as a great amount of the moisture will evaporate through the
Porous pots allowing the soil to dry out rapidly.

This last season (1953) I was unable to care for the large-flowering mums

70 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

in the outdoor bed as much as is necessary, so they were allowed to flower in
clusters with five smaller blooms on each cane instead of the usual one. Warm
weather stayed long enough this past season so that even the later-blooming
mums flowered outdoors as clusters, providing more cut flowers than it was
possible to use. We grew tired of carrying them around before the season
ended.

Some of the cluster-flowering varieties are grown for their color in the
garden and as cut flowers. LmtiaN Dory is a beautiful lavender that does
exceptionally well and is reasonably hardy. A golden yariety called Gotp
Coast produced more good clusters of perfectly round pompons than any
variety I have ever seen grown around St. Louis. When planted early and
pinched three times each bush will produce 20 to 25 clusters of blooms on
long canes. This variety is able to stand heavy frost without damage to the

oom.

After a killing freeze, the bushes are cut down and enough plants potted
and stored in the cold-frame to provide stock for next season. Two pots of
each variety are sunk to the rim in the soil of the cold-frames. The glass is
put in place but is kept raised about 6 inches in the back to provide fresh
air at all times except in extremely cold weather (zero degrees or less), when
the sash is closed for the duration of the cold wave. It is excessive moisture
rather than cold weather that kills most mums. One good plant will provide
enough cuttings for the ordinary garden and some extras to pass around to
friends, so the extra plant saved is for insurance just in case of an accident
that may kill one of them. Those plants growing in the garden among the
iris and over the spring-flowering bulbs are dug up in the fall and given away
or destroyed as they multiply rapidly and will form a heavy mat of growth
early in the spring that will interfere with the tulips and daffodils if the
winter is not severe enough to kill them. Most of the mums will live out-
doors over the winter if planted in well-drained soil and if the weather is no
worse than it was last season (1952-53), but it is safest to use a cold-frame
to save stock in case we do have severe cold weather with lots of rain and
ice. The stock plants must be sprayed while in the cold-frame as aphis can
damage the new growth severely. They must also be watered enough to
prevent them from drying out through the winter, increasing the amount as
spring approaches to encourage new growth. Cuttings can be made very
early, but the plants will not bloom any sooner; therefore it is better to wait
until later as the bushes will not get too tall if planted later and will be easier
to control with less pinching.

For displaying Chrysanthemums in the home there is nothing quite as
satisfactory as a cool entry porch or a sun-room. If the temperature can be
kept ten to twenty degrees below that of the average living-room the plants
will stay in flower much longer and the blooms will develop to maximum size.

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Joun S. LEHMANN, President RicHarD J. Lockwoop
Danret K. CatLin, Vice-President GEorGE T. Moore
EuGENE Pettus, Second Vice-President A. WeEssEL SHAPLEIGH
DupLEY FRENCH ErHan A. H. SHEPLEY
Henry HitcHcock Rosert Brookincs SMITH

EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS

Ernan A. H. Oscar EHRHARDT,

‘inelere of Stet Unieendis President of the Board of Education
ARTHUR C. LICHTENBERGER, nt St. Louis

Bishop of the Diocese of Missouri STRATFORD L. N,
RayMonp R. Tuck R, President of = ppb of Science

Mayor of the City = = Louis of St. Lou

Secretary
GERALD ULRICI,

THE HORTICULTURAL COUNCIL
Clarence Barbre, A. C. Chandler, E. G. C Cherbonnier, Paul Hale, Mrs. Hazel
Knapp, Martin Lammert IU, Hesiack Layton, Eleanor McClure, Clarence
McGovern, W. F. Scott, Jr., Mrs. J. Garneau ‘shoo Harold E. Wolfe, John

STAFF
George T. Moore _..- Emeritus Director
John 5. Lehane Acting Director
Edgar Anderson Assistant Director
Leicester B. Fant Assistant
Carroll W. Dodge —__$_$__-_$_-______—___— Mycologist
Robert E. Woodson, Jr.----------------—-——------- Carstor af Herbarium
Henry N. Andrews__—-—.-——-——--——--—--—--——— __.._.. Paleobotanist
Rolla M. ee = uci cst of Herbarium
Hush C. Catlett Gin: Museum of Economic Plants
Robert J. nee Sai a le amc otcealeste Research Horticulturist
John D. Dwyer ae eek Statin esac mana Research Associate
George B. Van Gdeeee ico eaten Oe ea eee - Heaoracy Curator of Grasses —
Julian A. Aegean Honorary Research Associate
Nel a CA cynical nnpeetereesincmerene ibrarian and Editor
Edna cidae TS ONS ee ct Sa eh RDN NONE TEN oe Assistant Librarian
Ida M. Kohl _____. LA ee ene an ee a Librarian
Ba yt Manager
George H. Pring a geen rae
Vent A Koni ee ies se Blosiculeyrist
Cadiak Citak oe Piseelieatenieiet3 in lake ak Conservatories
feck G. Mee. Dendrologist
ge A Gu ___—_-------_ Engineer
August P. Beilmann ____-..-----..-------- ex ot he a ia, Gray Summit
Poe te Assistant Manager of the Arboretum

ities In charge of Orchids

SOME FACTS ABOUT THE GARDEN

The Missouri Botanical Garden carries on the garden estab-
lished by Henry Shaw over a century ago at “Tower Grove,” his
country home. It is a private institution with no public support
from city or state. The old stone walls and cast-iron fences, the
Linnean House, the Museum, the Mausoleum and the “Old
Residence” all date from Mr. Shaw’s time. Since his death, as
directed in his will, the Garden has been in the hands of a Board
of Trustees who appoint the Director.

The Garden is open every day in the year (except New
Year’s Day and Christmas) from 9:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m.,
April to November, and until 6:00 p-m., November to April,
though the greenhouses close at 5:00 p.m. Tower Grove, itself,
Mr. Shaw’s old residence, is open from 1 until 4. The Garden is
nearly a mile long and has several entrances. The Main Entrance,
the one used by the general public, is at Tower Grove and Flora
Place on the Sarah bus line (No. 42). The Park Southampton
buses (No. 80), direct from downtown, pass within three blocks
of this entrance and stop directly across the street from the
Administration Building at 2315 Tower Grove Avenue. The
latter is the best entrance for students, visiting scientists, etc.
It is open to such visitors after 8:30 a.m., but is closed on Sat-
urdays, Sundays, and holidays. There is a service entrance on
Alfred Avenue, one block south of Shaw Avenue.

Since Mr. Shaw’s time an Arboretum has been developed at
Gray Summit, Mo., opposite the junction of routes 50 and 66.
It is open every day in the year and has two miles of auto roads
as well as foot trails through the wild-flower reservation. There
is a pinetum and an extensive display of daffodils and other
narcissi from March to early May.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL
GARDEN BULLETIN

CONTENTS

Volunteer Help at the Garden A Device for Sweeping Leaves
Sewage Sludge as a Fertilizer from Trails

rof. Spencer’s Treatment for The pega “Vegetable

hloem necrosis in Elms Piate” for D

Control of Deer Damage at the Book Reviews: ‘Dony’ s “Flora of

Arboretum Bedfordshire’

Notes

Volume XLII April, 1954 Number 4

oni
pare notes as 22 iu assistants fill, stamp, seal, 000 Savdoos
i riends of the Ga man

one da ‘
of the secretarial committee of the Friends of the Garden volunteer wo Mrs
Fisher, president of the Fenton Garden Club, has been one of pease taht cies
in recruiting efficient workers—Photograph by Edward H. Goldber

Office of publication: 306 E. Simmons Street, Galesburg, Illinois.
oe Office: Panne Botanical Garden, 2315 Tower Grove Avenue,
ouis, 10, Ouri
Pb a except July and ae. = the Board of i of the
tanical Garden. Subsc ce: $2.50 a
cae as pe class matter baer 26, 142, = the post- es at Gales-
burg, Illinois, under the Act of March 3,

Please: he not discard a copy of the Bulletin. If you have no further use for yours
s it along toa friend or return it to the Garden. Return postage guaranteed.

Missouri Botanical
Garden Bulletin

Vol. XLII APRIL, 1954 No. 4

VOLUNTEER HELP AT THE GARDEN

Due largely to the efforts of our Horticultural Council an increasingly
large number of St. Louisans are helping in various ways with the Garden’s
activities. Under the leadership of Mr. Dudley French of the Board of
Trustees an active campaign to increase the “Friends of the Garden” is now
in full swing. For some months groups of women from the Federated Garden
Clubs have compiled mailing lists, checked addresses, and addressed thousands
of envelopes. Finally, during the first week in April, 22 of them, working
with Dr. Cutler and Mr. French under the direction of Mrs. Bellville (see
cover picture), got all the thousands of envelopes filled, stamped, and sealed.
Other groups have assisted in preparing thousands of cuttings of the Garden’s
Bulgarian Ivy, in cleaning the books in the library, in showing visiting dele-
gations through the Garden, and in various other ways.

The Federated Women’s Clubs have served as guides to Mr. Shaw’s
country home “Tower Grove,” every day from 1 to 4 p. m., including Sun-
days and holidays. They made such an impression on one visitor that he has
returned at regular intervals to shelve Mr. Shaw’s personal library and to aid
in restoring some of the old furniture. The Weeders and Seeders Garden
Club has taken over the care of the grounds around Mr. Shaw’s mausoleum,
watching all the little details which will make the area look as if it were
really part of a gentleman’s garden. The St. Louis Garden Club has started
to restyle and replant the area immediately behind the Old Residence. The
charming little herb garden, paved and planted by the St. Louis Herb Society,
grows lovelier every day, as the plantings and the background are extended
and improved. The Men’s Garden Clubs of this area are helping with better
direction signs and a map to the grounds. Dr. Van Schaack’s recataloguing
of our excellent grass herbarium is now virtually complete. Leicester Faust
has assisted with various executive problems. Other volunteers have begun
a study of the weed flora of St. Louis and a general survey of the problems
involved in maintaining and improving our marvelous collection of old
botanical books.

(71)

72 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

One of our most helpful volunteer workers, Mr. Harry Collins, died sud-
denly in March. There will be a short notice of him and of the gifts to the
Garden in his memory in an early number of the BULLETIN.

With the help of the Council it has been possible not only to find en-
thusiastic and able volunteers but to integrate their efforts into the Garden’s
operations. The use of these volunteer helpers has solved several problems.
First, it has carried forward various projects which would have been impos-
sible without extra help. Even more important, however, has been the way
in which it has put the Garden in more direct touch with the community.
We have learned about them and they have learned about us. We have
enjoyed having these friends help us, and they give every indication of having
had a good time while they were here.

PROFESSOR SPENCER’S TREATMENT FOR PHLOEM NECROSIS

For several years Professor E. R. Spencer, of Lebanon, Illinois, has been
using common salt in the treatment of sick elm trees. Newspaper accounts
of his experiments have stimulated interest in the possibility but, so far as
we know, no conclusive tests of this treatment have yet been made. For
those who may be interested in knowing about the salt treatment, or who
may wish to try it out, Dr. Spencer has prepared the following short account
of his method:

SALT AS A CURE FOR PHLOEM NECROSIS OF ELM

(“We probably do not have a information to make the statement at the
heading of this, but several trees we feel sure ha wi hloem necrosis have récovéréd
their health when Smal with parts as stated below

TREATMENT
ordinary coarse salt, beans sae For a large tree, use from 25 to 50
iat Pith small trees, from
Either make a trench a foot 4 ep ied shia’ width of a spade around the tree out
Bed the reach of the tree’s branches; or punch holes a foot deep in the area béyond
i ou, S

the reach of the branches, and if the area permits make h holes to use the 25
unds of salt stn about a handful dropped in a bottom of i tie ey cat the
area is as much as 100 feet wider than the spread of the tree, put th at inter-

vals of 3 or 4 a et all the way out to the reach of i rea. If re ‘al is porte ed a
foot below the surface it will have no ba on the grass — eck
1

“Several trees have been treated i e€ two ways capo ta
dying of the pe branches had rent and ae trou ohise of ere ght end
these trees had the phloem necrosis disease. lenis ees all recovered.

“If y 1: ese a sick tree, that is a sick elm, try this out. If i the phloe

necrosis cae I feel sure it will get well. If it is Ai Dutch elm phat I feel sure
it will not be cured.”

Consulting cae
Lebanon, Illinois

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 73

SEWAGE SYSTEM SLUDGE AS A FERTILIZER
AUGUST P. BEILMANN

At a time when all St. Louis County is involved in a proposal to install
an adequate sewer system, it might be apropos to report on a little-known
product of sewage disposal. Nationally we are intrigued by and proud of
the excellence of our plumbing. But our interest does not extend beyond
our own homes—we don’t know what happens at the end of the sewer line!
And perhaps that is much more important health-wise than the design of
the chromium fixtures. No matter what kind of tile lines may be installed
in the immediate future, eventually it will become necessary to treat all
sewage to avoid converting even the larger rivers into common sewers.

Even now our major rivers are but little better than open sewers. They
flow past our towns and cities and carry along all manner of industrial and
domestic wastes. In 1888 Otto Widmann reported on the Winter Crow
roost near St. Louis and described how the crows searched among the ice-
floes for packing-house offal, which made up a major portion of their diet.
So the practice of using the river as a sewer is not new! It is also a universal
practice for a city through its water department to build an intake tower
upstream; then treat the water so it is usable, and for the sewer department
to discharge all sewers below the town. Fortunately, there is some dilution
of wastes and some natural purification or the problems of the next town
downstream would be insurmountable. But that town follows the same pro-
cedure—only stepping up the chemical treatment. Thus a particular gallon
of water flowing down the Mississippi might conceivably have been drinking
water and then sewage effluent several times on the way to the sea. Even-
tually, the water becomes so heavily charged with purifiers of one sort or
another that a person unaccustomed to it finds it unpalatable or even causing
intestinal disturbances. In the future we shall be forced to give serious
thought to what can be done to treat sewage, so that a city, jealously guard-
ing the health of the citizens within the corporate limits, does not create
a state-wide health problem by using the nearest stream as a sewer.

Raw sewage has been successfully treated for some time. Perhaps the
most notable example is that of Milwaukee, where all sewage, after being
processed and reduced to solids, is marketed as a bland fertilizer called “‘Mil-
organite.” Many other cities and towns follow a similar procedure, but few
have been as successful in disposing of the dried solids after treatment.
Sewage-treatment plants can be very simple—just an enlarged septic tank—
or they may be very elaborate and costly and include drying and processing
equipment. Sewer systems are laid to drain to a low point; here a sump is
constructed and the disposal plant built nearby. The first step in the process

74 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Sewage sludge being emptied directly into a spruce planting at the Arboretum

is the screening and grinding of all wastes and pumping them to the first
digesting tank. Here bacterial action quickly reduces all solids which slowly
settle and allow the excess water to be drained off and pumped through an
aeration system where it trickles through a deep bed of graded gravel. The
relatively clear effluent is then returned to some creek or river. This is the
most simple procedure but many more stages and certain refinements can be
added if necessary.

It is the decomposed solids, which settle and become the “sludge,” with
which we as gardeners and farmers are concerned, Actually, plant operators
are no less concerned since very few “disposal plants” have any means of dis-
posing of the sludge. In a city of 10,000 people this may amount to a consid-
erable tonnage during a year. The author has experimented with “sludge” as a
fertilizer for over fifteen years, beginning with the dried material from the
Kirkwood, Mo. plant and finally devising a way of hauling and distributing
the liquid sludge. At the Arboretum, only the liquid form has been used,
and this has been taken directly from the “digester” at the Pacific, Mo. plant.
In all, about 154,800 gallons have been used as fertilizer.

Disposal plants are generally provided with drying basins. The digested
sludge is discharged into a basin filled with a deep layer of graded sand and
gravel. The water drains away and the dried mud-like sludge can then be

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 75

picked up with a shovel and hauled to the field. We have found this to be
the most costly way of hauling and distributing the material. For some
years we have used a tank truck. This requires the use of a diaphragm pump
(mounted on the truck) which is connected to a pipe line from the digester
and transfers through a 3-inch hose directly to the tank truck. Both loading
and unloading are quickly accomplished without direct contact with the
material. When filled, the truck is driven directly to the field or to a tree
plantation. The valves are then opened and the sludge is allowed to cover
the ground to a depth of several inches. If the slope is not too steep or if a
heavy mulch is present, it is possible to build a very fertile top-soil almost as
soon as the excess water drains away. During the drying period some odor
is noticeable, but it is not objectionable and lasts but a short time.

In a rather widespread and general use of sludge we have encountered no
difficulties. The material has been applied directly to field corn, to grass,
winter wheat, and rye. It has been used in plantations of pine, spruce, hem-
lock and holly; to crabapples, strawberries, and to flowers grown commer-
cially for cutting. Without exception, it has proven a superior fertilizer
when used in sufficient quantity. While a detailed analysis might be obtained,
experience indicates that pound for pound it is worth about half as much as
most commercial fertilizers. Because of our experience we feel that we might
offer a few suggestions to builders and designers of such plants. First of all,
more attention should be given to the method and manner of removing the
liquid sludge. Second, major sanitary sewer lines should be tight pipe; not
open-joint clay tile. During rainy periods the additional water entering the
tile from the saturated soil imposes an unanticipated load, and it may carry
along enough clay to complicate sludge removal. Debris and trash should
be screened out at the intake. Even 3-inch pipe and valves become clogged,
and a uniform distribution of the liquid sludge is impossible. The tanks
should be covered with screening and the plant fenced so that debris cannot
be thrown into the system.

“Sludge” from a sewage-disposal plant is a modernization of the night-
soil of much older civilizations than ours. It has demonstrated its value
through the maintenance of sufficient fertility to feed dense populations.
Organic wastes have always been returned to agricultural lands, but in
“sludge” we have an innocuous material, quite free of diseases, almost with-
out odor and easily handled. It should be gathered and processed then re-
turned to our gardens and farms. The raw sewage should not be emptied
into the nearest river to create an endless problem. Clear, potable water can
become our most precious resource—the past dry summers have driven that
home in many parts of the Middle West.

76 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

CONTROL OF DEER DAMAGE TO WOODY PLANTS
AT THE ARBORETUM
LOUIS G. BRENNER

The browsing habit of deer is not considered to cause a great amount of
damage. Such herbaceous plants as the Purple Coneflower (Echinacea pallida)
and the Rosin-weeds (Silphium spp.) are eaten, and some ornamental shrubs
as Rhododendrons and the Mountain Laurel (Kalmia latifolia) are often so
completely defoliated and new growth so reduced that the plants are several
years in recovering. Sometimes in the nursery seedlings are seriously cut back
and growth retarded by browsing. The greatest damage at the Arboretum,
however, is to woody plants during the fall and early winter when the buck
deer rub the “velvet” from their antlers and polish and sharpen the “points”
in preparation for the mating season. For this strange “toilet” a small tree,
usually about 1-114 inches in diameter, is selected on which they rub their
antlers with a vigorous up-and-down motion, peeling the bark from the stem
and breaking off limbs as well. Plants with an aromatic inner bark, as the
conifers, Gingko, Sassafras, are especially favored and suggest a peculiar
masculine vanity among deer. Coarse, scaly-barked trees as the oaks and
western pines are seldom bothered, since deer seemingly prefer the thin,
tender-barked trees.

It has been found that nursery-grown stock have much in themselves to
do with inciting deer damage. Such plantings are for the most part made at
regular intervals and usually on open sites to permit maximum light and
room for growth. Maintenance customarily includes clean mowing about
the trees to control invasion by seedling forest trees and brush. Such condi-
tions seem particularly inviting to buck deer which seem reluctant to move
into areas where immediate retreat in any direction is not possible and from
which danger may not be readily sensed. Removal of brushy growth sur-
rounding wild flowering shrubs and trees to permit more rapid growth of
the plant tends to create the same possible dangers of deer rubbing.

Experience has shown that almost any small conifer may be rubbed on
until it reaches the height of 5—6 feet. After that the stiff branches of cer-
tain species such as the Tiger-tail Spruce (Picea polita), White Spruce (Picea
glauca), and the Colorado Spruce (Picea pungens), discourage this practice.
Pines, as the White Pine (Pinus strobus), spruces, especially Norway Spruce
(Picea abies), and the firs may be rubbed against until the tree trunks are as
great as 3—4 inches in diameter, since their lower branches are not stout enough
to prevent the animals from pushing their way in toward the trunk. Rubbing
then has the effect of girdiing the tree causing serious damage if not death.

Extensive ravages by deer at the Arboretum, where there is an unusually
high population of these animals, has warranted several methods of protecting

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Saucer Magnolia (Magnolia soulangeana) wired to prevent “rubbing” by buck deer.

78 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

woody plants where applications of repellent sprays have proven ineffectual.
Because the buck deer are reluctant to engage their antlers into anything
that may entangle them the simplest form of protection has been through
the use of barbed-wire fencing. A most effective means of safeguarding small
evergreens is fashioned by winding a single strand of the wire in a spiral
manner about the tree, beginning at the base and laying the wire loosely on
the outer branches. Three or four turns about a tree 3-414 feet is sufficient,
and usually requires a strand of wire 12-15 feet long. The wire is wound
from the base to the uppermost limbs of the tree. This method is also used
for shrubs, as the shrubby types of Magnolia (Magnolia soulangeana and M.
stellata), on which deer are especially fond of rubbing (see illustration). It
has been found necessary to protect even the larger Magnolias at the Arbo-
retum and in these only the lower 4—5 feet of branches need have the strands
of wire laid onto them.

Since deer have a pronounced roving habit and are prone to assume a
direction of travel having least obstruction, effective protection against them
is sometimes gained by stringing a single strand of barbed-wire on posts
around an entire group of plantings. The strand of wire in this case should
be about 31% feet above the ground. This means of protection, however, is
suited only for the smaller more compact groups, 3—5 trees, since the deer
may jump over or slip under the wire where larger groups are fenced.

Clean unbranched trunks of trees as the Cucumber Tree (Magnolia
acuminata), Beech (Fagus spp.), Maidenhair (Ginkgo biloba), and Bald
Cypress (Taxodium distichum), etc. may be rubbed by deer even though
the trees may be as great as 4-5 inches in diameter, and need protection up to
at least 4 feet above the ground. For these, the trunk may be wrapped with
2-3 inch mesh poultry netting, wound spirally with barbed-wire with the
wrappings about 6 inches apart; or several stout stakes may be driven in the
ground around the tree, and the barbed-wire wound about them to form a
small enclosure. Though somewhat unsightly, the latter is the more preferred
form of protection since the trunk is permitted to expand freely in growth
and annual readjustment of the protecting wire is eliminated.

Evergreen shrubs, as Rhododendrons (especially Rhododendron maximum
and R. mucronulatum), Mountain Laurel (Kalmia latifolia), and trees, as
Hemlock (Tsuga canadensis and T. caroliniana) and the Arborvitaes (Thuja
occidentalis and T. orientalis) which may be both browsed on and rubbed
against should be protected until they are at least 5-6 feet high with 4-foot
poultry netting fences. Rhododendrons and Mountain Laurel need permanent
fencing in areas where deer resort in extremely cold or icy weather.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 79

A DEVICE FOR SWEEPING LEAVES FROM TRAILS
LOUIS G. BRENNER

The six and a half miles of service trails through the woodland areas of
the Arboretum have long presented a problem—that of raking off the leaves.
Unless the leaves are removed the trails may not function effectively as fire-
breaks, and furthermore a thick mat of leaves left on the trails may become
so wet during rainy reasons that deep ruts result. Formerly, the leaves were
raked off by hand, a time-consuming and, needless to say, expensive opera-
tion. Despite the day and a half or two days spent by a crew of two to
three men, only those parts of the trails where leaves laid heaviest were able
to be raked clean. The development of the device illustrated below has made
annual sweeping a practical and economical operation and has made it pos-
sible to sweep the entire trail system in a day and a half, rendering the trails
effective as firebreaks as well as improving the appearance of the whole
wooded area.

Saas ee using high-pressure fog to blow leaves from a stretch of trail at

The
the Arboret

80 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

A trailer-type tree-spraying tank equipped with a high-pressure pump
operating at 600 pounds per square inch pressure was used. To the rear of
this was attached the fog-type spray-guns, also used for tree-spraying, in such
a manner that the spray-guns blew toward opposite sides of the trail. To be
effective, it is necessary that the guns be arranged so as not to blow directly
into each other. With the nozzles adjusted to a medium fog stream it was
found possible to sweep away even those leaves matted down by vehicle
wheels, as well as twigs and smaller branches. The equipment was found to
be most efficient when the leaves are only slightly dampened. If the leaves
are extremely dry they tend to drift back on the trail especially if there are
light breezes during the sweeping operation. Very wet leaves are too heavy
to be blown aside. When operated under proper conditions the blast of air
and water spreads the leaves evenly on either side of the trail, leaving the
woods with a natural appearance and without the unsightly piles of leaves
that result from raking by han

Flora of Bedfordshire. By John D. Dony. 532 pp., 25 pls., 22 figs. Luton
Museum, Wardown Park, Luton, England, 1953. £2 2s. ($5.88).

This recent British County flora is of special interest to botanists of this
country as an outstanding example of a detailed local flora. Bedfordshire is
a county of some 470 square miles (slightly smaller than St. Louis County)
and it displays a considerable diversity of soils and habitats. In addition to
the list of flowering plants and ferns with detailed locality records and habitat
notes there is a section on mosses and one on fungi, groups not often included
in a floristic work.

Close attention is paid to the status of the species, whether native or
adventive. This is of particular importance because of the long history of
extensive land use in the county and the present very high percentage (75
per cent) of land devoted to farming and urban use. An additional 22 per
cent is in pasture. Special problems of the adventive flora are wool-waste
weeds, railroad colonists and the rock-wall flora. The last particularly is of
interest as primarily composed of species native to Britain but occurring in
the county only on this man-made habitat. A separate list is hangs of
species that are not admitted to permanent membership in the

€ most unusual feature of the book is the ecological vais ‘ef selected
habitats. Eighty-six of these studies present a good sampling of the vegeta-
tion types and they will be valuable in future studies of changes in the flora.
The history of botanical activity, begun in 1597, shows the interest in the
local flora of more than 250 persons. This long and active study has enabled
Dr. Dony to prepare a work of detailed scope that will be a useful reference,
and something of a model, for botanists in this country.—R.M.T.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 81

THE ARBORETUM—A “VEGETABLE PLATE” FOR DEER
LOUIS G. BRENNER

Visitors have always expressed much interest in the rather large herd of
White-tailed Deer that have taken residence in the 1600 wild and semi-wild
acres of the Arboretum. The White-tailed Deer, so called because of the
conspicuous white under part of the tail which is shown as the animal “high-
tails-it for the brush,” usually withdraw to one of the many brushy areas or
deep wooded valleys to loaf as the sun rises high in the sky, and the best
chances to see them are early or late in the day, or on clouded days. As a
rule, the question ‘““What do they eat?” comes forth whenever conversation
turns to the deer. The following is an account of the feeding habits of the
White-tailed Deer at the Arboretum and is based on observations in the field
and on study of browsed plants.

On-the-spot observations of the deer’s food preferences were made with
the use of binoculars, after which the plants were checked for specific identi-
fication. Extensive notations were also made in the field of plants browsed
over by deer, thus giving a fairly accurate summary of the food plants of
the animals. Chiefly they snip tender shoots and buds of plants as they rove
about, seldom lingering more than a few minutes in any area. Such a feeding
habit is very unlike that of cattle which methodically progress through a
pasture, grazing entirely upon herbaceous plants. Unlike cattle, too, which
may resort to feeding on tender shoots of weody plants only when there is
insufficient plant material, deer include large quantities of tender woody
shoots in their diet. It is easily seen, then, that deer’s diet will include a
large assortment of the plant species listed in the table below. It is also to
be expected that deer create serious problems in an area devoted to growing
a multitude of plants for botanical purposes. Fortunately, the deer snip
only the tender new shoots on woody plants, resulting merely in retarding
growth and sometimes in reducing flowering or fruiting wood. More serious
problems arise with herbaceous plants, especiaily annuals, where loss of the
new growth and also the flower-heads may seriously affect reproduction.

There are two very desirable wild flowers which are threatened with ex-
tinction because of deer. The flower-heads, and especially the ripening seed-
heads, of the Purple Coneflower (Echinacea pallida) and the Rosinweeds
(Silphium spp.), both showy plants of the glades, are snipped from the
plants annually and in great quantity. Examination has shown that the
seed-heads contain a great amount of pungent oils which present a juicy
morsel to the deer. To insure perpetuation of these plants, it is necessary to
collect an abundance of the seed-heads before they are completely stripped
by the deer and then sow them on the glades.

Deer also present serious obstacles in introducing new herbaceous plants

$2 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

in the Wildflower Preserve of the Arboretum. For instance, repeated efforts
to introduce the Large White Trillium (Trillium flexipes) have met with
equally persistent snipping of the broad succulent leaves by the deer. The
tuber of the plants finally become so depleted of food that the plants seldom
persist past the third year. Perhaps the new plants added to the otherwise
stable flora present a dainty “‘salad”’ to the deer.

Although the deer have caused considerable damage to valuable wild
flowers, let us look at another and possible balancing factor. The Sow-
thistles (Sonchus spp.), formerly noxious weeds which rapidly invaded any
tilled or disturbed soil area about the Arboretum grounds, have been so
greatly reduced by the deer continually feeding on the new growth and seed-
heads that the plants are no longer a pest. The presence of a rather high
deer population has proven a distinct advantage, too, in the forest areas
where such weed trees as the elms (Ulmus fulva and U. americana) and

he Sow-thistle (Sonchus sp.), a good example of the effect of deer browsing. Note
repeated ee have caused a much-branched habit and though many more flower -
a ced as a result these seldom have epportunity & to mature to seed. The plant is
no! pees praale like with a few flower-heads at tip of s

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 83

Honey Locust (Gleditsia triacanthos) are often cut to permit more rapid
growth of desirable trees. Deer are fond of the tender shoots of the elms and
Honey Locust and regularly visit the newly sprouted stumps to browse,
making the use of herbicides for stump sprouts unnecessary in these areas.
The decided preference by deer for certain plants may account for peculiar
growth habits. Repeated browsing often results in interesting “sheared”
forms, particularly of stump sprouts growing vigorously on more open sites.

Deer are extremely fond of acorns, particularly those of the White, Red,
and Black Oaks (Quercus alba, Q. borealis, Q. velutina), and during good
mast years they form the greater part of their diet. The acorns are taken
whole, often with the cup attached, without mastication. Deer are also very
fond of the fruits of Wild Cherry, Wild Plum, Pawpaw, and Persimmon.

It is of particular interest that at no time have the deer browsed to any
appreciable extent on the many Boxwoods (Buxus sempervirens, B. micro-
phylia) planted about the grounds. The Narcissus, containing a strong toxic
factor, remain untouched. However, early attempts to establish the showy
Regal Garden Lily (Lilium regale) on the grounds were met with failure.
Their succulent shoots, much like an Asparagus tip, have proven too tempt-
ing a morsel for deer in spring. Repeated browsing on the evergreen
Rhododendrons (especially Rhododendron maximum) and the Mountain
Laurel (Kalmia latifolia) has made the growing of these shrubs impractical
without protection of woven-wire fencing. No serious damage has been
caused to crops grown for test or feed at the Arboretum where there is other
abundant food available. However, attempts at vegetable gardening by the
resident Arboretum personnel have been particularly frustrating, for the
deer have proven extremely fond of garden peas and beans, with little regard
for variety. Carrots and beets have first the tops nipped off and then the
roots pawed from the ground, but tomatoes are seldom touched. Fences
prove useless against these agile raiders which may easily clear a 7-foot fence,
and only the vigilance of a watchful dog has been found effective.

The deer in the Arboretum grounds seem to delight in the numerous
“openings” made in the woods and brush to permit planting of native and
exotic trees, shrubs, and wild flowers. Such openings have increased the
number of herbaceous plants important in the diet of deer. Thinnings in
the forest areas have favored increased mast production. Widespread use of
fertilizers and mulches, an effective erosion control, and water conservation
program, all necessary in the develpoment of the Arboretum, have also pre-
pared a natural habitat with a rich flora capable of sustaining an abundance
of wildlife even through climatic extremes.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

SOME OF THE MORE IMPORTANT DEER FOODS AT THE ARBORETUM

NATIVE HERBACEOUS PLANTS

mpa
Cassia fascic ~ulata

re ctsine pallida
Elymus spp.
Erythrianie Seat
Galactea volubilis

j us Ss

Liliu

Parthenocsus pete folia

Phlox

Po midlets um canaliculatum

Silphium spp
Trillium sp

Sonchus spp.
Strophostyles spp.

Common Name

Partridge Pea

pring Beauty
Prairie oe
Beggar Tic
Purple Couples
Wild Rye
Trout Lily
Milk i
Sunflow:
Spotted “Touche gat
Pale To snail
espedez
Kansas Cevbeatio
Turks-cap Lily
Virgini reepe

Sow-thistles

Trailing Wild Beans

NATIVE

WOODY PLANTS

Cam bsis radicans

Diospyros virginiana
Euonymus at:opurpurea
Fraxinus s

Gleditsia triacanthos
Hydrang-a paniculata
Ilex d.cidua

Salix

Seeding: ‘icin

Sym aa Saga a oe
Ulm

Vitis ie

Zanthoxylon americanum

Trumpet Creeper
Hackberry
Redbud

ogwoods
Persimmon
Burning Bush
Honey Locust

drangea

Deciduous Holly
Red Cedar

Cottonwood
Oo

Sassafras
Buckbrush
Elm

Grape
Prickly Ash

Part of plant eaten

New growth
New growth
New growth
New growth
All
New growth
New growth
Flower bud, seed-head
All
Il
New growth
Flower bud, seed-head
All
All
All
Flower spike in bud
A
New bt leaves
New gro
All
eg ‘ind, seed-head
All

New growth, seed-head
New growth, seed-pod

New growth, flowers

New growth

New pane green pods
wth

New growth

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 85

NATIVE FRUITS

Name Common Name Part of plant eaten

Asimina triloba paw
Ah she virginiana Persimmon

Ilex decidua Deciduous Holly Fruits
iiss: serotina Wild Cherry

Prunus am rican Wild Plum Fruits
gota alba, Q. "baeelis: Oaks (White, Red, Black, Fruits
Q. velutina, Q. macrocarpa and Bu
Rhus copallina Shining Sumac Fruits
Rubus Blackberry Fruits
Symphoricar pus 0 a Buckbrush Fruits
Viburnum rufidulur ac aw Fruits
Vitis spp. Wild Grape Fruit

ORNAMENTAL PLANTS

Albizzia julibrissin Tree Mimosa N-ew growth
Steg us pore Chinese Plum-yew New growth
Kalmia latifolia Mountain Laurel N-w growth
Larix spp. Larch New growth
Magnolia spp. Mestad New growth
Nandina ran pa Nan New growth
Rhedodendron s Serre on Azalea New growth
Taxus baccata, T. " chasilete Yew New growth
Thuja occid talis American Arborvit New growth
Thuja orientalis Oren poretetiiogy New growth
pe aired oc New growth
Tsu patois Hemlock “New growth
Ilex ‘tft I vobace Holly New growth
Euonymus Burning Bush New growth

THE GARDEN AND THE ARBORETUM IN MAY

The dramatic Easter Show, planned and executed under the direction of
Mr. Paul Kohl, will continue in the Floral Display House until early in May,
with a series of replacements as the season advances. On May 22 and 23 the
Greater St. Louis Rose Show will be held in the Floral Display House and will
be open to the public. Out of doors the Perennial Garden around the
Linnaean House and the adjacent Rose Garden will be in good bloom for most
of the month. In the Mausoleum grounds near Mr. Shaw’s residence, ‘“Tower
Grove,” the sar of Wood Hyacinths should be at its best about the first
week in Ma t the Garden’s Arboretum (Gray Summit, Missouri) the
wildflower trails a the Glade area will be increasingly beautiful, reach-
ing their climax in early to mid-June with the gigantic yellow flowers of the
Missouri Primrose. Last year’s drought, by discouraging the growth of grass,
has encouraged some of the more interesting wild flowers.

86 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

NOTES

The annual flower sermon, provided for in Henry Shaw’s will, was
preached at Christ Church Cathedral on April 25, by the Rev. Richard H.
Wilmer, Chaplain, Yale University.

Mr. George H. Pring, Superintendent of the Garden, as one of the trustees
of the American Orchid Society, attended the quarterly meeting held on
February 27 at Miami, Florida, at which final arrangements were made for
the first World Orchid Conference to be held in St. Louis, October 15-17,
under the auspices of the American Orchid Society with the cooperavon of
the Missouri Botanical Garden and the Orchid Society of Greater St. Louis.

The naturalized plantings of daffodils at the Garden were at the height
of their bloom during the first week in April, and the display was so striking,
especially along Magnolia and Alfred avenues, that motorists would stop
their cars to admire them. After two hot days (April 5 and 6) and a good
rain, many flowering trees and shrubs—magnolias, redbud, flowering crabs,
plums, flowering peach, etc.—literally “burst” into bloom, and the color
effect in the Garden was almost breath-taking.

Mr. G. H. Pring, Superintendent of the Garden, Mr. G. R. Lowry, in
Charge of Orchids, and Mr. John E. Nies, Chairman of the Horticultural
Council, attended the annual Tennessee Capital Orchid Show, at Nashville,
March 13-15. Mr. Pring acted as chairman of the judges and as commen-
tator of the Orchid Symposium. A collection of Garden orchids featuring
Dendrobiums was staged by Mr. Lowry and occupied 100 square feet.
Although the exhibit was not in competition, it received a special award.

Recent visitors to the Garden library and herbarium include: Mr. Ralph
W. Emons (former graduate student at the Garden), of the Antibiotic
Division, Charles Pfizer & Co., Brooklyn, N. Y.; Sister Mary Aloyse Elling-
son, of the Loretta Academy, Kansas City, Mo.; Dr. M. Truffant Hall, of the
Cranbrook Institute of Sciences, Bloomfield Hills, Mich.; Dr. E. Lucy Braun,
of the University of Cincinnati; Dr. William L. Brown, of the Pioneer Hi-
Bred Corn Co., Johnston, lowa; Mr. R. A. Evers, of the Illinois Natural
History Survey, Champaign; Mr. Franklin Lane and Donald A. Larsen, of
the University of Illinois, Urbana; Prof. Charles B. Heiser, of Indiana State
University, Bloomington; Prof. Taizo Inokuma, of the Institute of Forest
Botany, University of Tokyo, Japan; Dr. Robert W. Schery, of Scott Seed
Co., Marysville, Ohio; Mr. Arthur Smith, of Campbell-Smith Co. Green-
houses, Boone, Iowa; Dr. Ledyard Stebbins, of the University of California,
Berkeley, en route to a year’s study in the Mediterranean.

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Joun S. LEHMANN, President RicHarD J. Lockwoop
DaniEL K. Catiin, Vice-President GrEorGE T. Moore
EuGENE PettUvs, Second Vice-President A. WeEssEL SHAPLEIGH
DupDLEY FRENCH EtHan A. H. SHEPLEY
Henry HitcHcock Rosert BrooKkincs SMITH

EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS
EtrHan A. H. SHEPLEY, Oscar EHRHARDT,
Chancellor of Washington University President of the Board of Education
ArtHurR C. LicHTENBERGER, oe SNe
Bishop of the Diocese of Missouri STRATFORD L. Mor
RaymMonp R. Tuck Liat of ~ pest ek of Science
Mayor of the City of st. Louis of St. Lou

Secretary
GERALD ULRICI,

THE HORTICULTURAL COUNCIL
Clarence Barbre, Albert Chandler, E. G. Cherbonnier, Paul Hale, Mrs. Hazel
Knapp, Martin Lammert II, Emmet Layton, Eleanor McClure, Clarence
McGovern, W. F. Scott, Jr., Mrs. J. Garneau Weld, Harold E. Wolfe, John
S. Lehmann, Edgar Anderson, John Nies, Chairman.

STAFF
George T: Moore_.___—_—_ —<_— Emeritus Director
John’ S. bebmann. _ Acting Director
Edgar Anderson = —___- E Soca Seta ee oe . ssistant Director
Léweter Te Poot 2 Executive Assistant
Cassell W: Dodee. 2 ____-. Mycologist
Robert E. Woodson, Jr._———_______-____---— Conte at Herbarium
Henry N. Andrews ————_____—_-—_-_—_ _____.. Paleobotanist
Rolla M. Tryon_____$_$_____— choi se akc i Herbarium
Hugh Ci Cutler 2 Curator Museum of Economic Plants
Robert: J. Gillespie Research Horticulturist
john D. Dever __Research Associate
George B. Van Schaack____--_--____------- aay Curator of Grasses
Julian A. Steyermark___-_-_____-_----- = Hosorary Research Associate
Ne a elec Librarian and Editor
tins Mecho Assistant Librarian
tis 1 Oe Assistant Librarian
Cedld Vice _______ Business Manager
Cewse H. Peng Superintendent
Soa A Roe ous BS Plosiculeuriat
Badiious (ube edad in charge of Conservatories
Pedcick CG. Moe 2 ' Dendrologist
Kenneth A> Smith eer
August P. lee es anaser ” ce Pe te Summit
Le OO Bini Aseetant Manager of the Arboretum

G. R. ee charge of Orchids

SOME FACTS ABOUT THE GARDEN

The Missouri Botanical Garden carries on the garden estab-
lished by Henry Shaw over a century ago at “Tower Grove,” his
country home. It is a private institution with no public support
from city or state. The old stone walls and cast-iron fences, the
Linnean House, the Museum, the Mausoleum and the “Old
Residence” all date from Mr. Shaw’s time. Since his death, as
directed in his will, the Garden has been in the hands of a Board
of Trustees who appoint the Director.

The Garden is open every day in the year (except New
Year’s Day and Christmas) from 9:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m.,
April to November, and until 6:00 p.m., November to April,
though the greenhouses close at 5:00 p.m. Tower Grove, itself,
Mr. Shaw’s old residence, is open from 1 until 4. The Garden is
nearly a mile long and has several entrances. The Main Entrance,
the one used by the general public, is at Tower Grove and Flora
Place on the Sarah bus line (No. 42). The Park Southampton
buses (No. 80), direct from downtown, pass within three blocks
of this entrance and stop directly across the street from the
Administration Building at 2315 Tower Grove Avenue. The
latter is the best entrance for students, visiting scientists, etc.
It is open to such visitors after 8:30 a.m., but is closed on Sat-
urdays, Sundays, and holidays. There is a service entrance on
Alfred Avenue, one block south of Shaw Avenue.

Since Mr. Shaw’s time an Arboretum has been developed at
Gray Summit, Mo., opposite the junction of routes 50 and 66.
It is open every day in the year and has two miles of auto roads
as well as foot trails through the wild-flower reservation. There
is a pinetum and an extensive display of daffodils and other

narcissi from March to early May.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL
GARDEN BULLETIN

|

|

—_

LU CONTENTS

P

= The Garden’s Most Important Crop Dr. Woodson’s Monograph on Asclepias

eve Marshall Smuts’ Botanical The Garden in June
ollections Reach Garden Harry Collins

Dr. Woodson’s Seven Meditations Bick Reviews: Shepherd’s “History
Mung Beans and Their Sprouts of the Ros

Cover: The Collins Fringe Tree, with a ball of Me tons of earth, being moved fro
its old site in University City. (See p. 100). Photograph by Trifon von
Schrenk.

Office of publication: 306 E. Simmons Street, Galesburg, Illinois.
—— ice: Missouri Botanical Garden, 2315 Tower Grove Avenue,
. Louis, 10, Missouri.
ue monthly except July and August by the Board of Trustees of the
Missouri Botanical Garden. Subscription price: $2.5
Entered as second-class matter January 26, 1942, at the post-office at Gales-
urg, Illinois, under the Act of March 3, 1879

Please: eae not discard a copy of the Bulletin. If you have no further use for yours
it along toa friend or return it to the Garden. Return postage guaranteed.

Missour1 Botanical
Garden Bulletin

Vol. XLY MAY, 1954 No. 5

THE GARDEN’S MOST IMPORTANT CROP
EDGAR ANDERSON

Some of the work which goes on here at the Garden is well appreciated in
St. Louis. The averagely well-informed St. Louisan has heard about our
water-lilies and our orchids; he knows of Mr. Kohl’s talent in designing
chrysanthemum and other flower shows which are both spectacular and in
the best of taste; he has read about the important work in conservation being
carried on at Gray Summit by Mr. Beilmann and his staff. One of our most
important activities, however, he is usually quite unaware of. This work
goes on all the time but the results are usually not visible until after some
years. Yet it concerns what is really our most important crop and the one
of all our activities which results from the most careful planning on Mr.
Shaw’s part. The crop is young botanists, the young men and women who
spend from one to five years at the Garden and eventually depart with a
Master’s or Doctor’s degree from the Henry Shaw School of Botany of Wash-
ington University.

These young people have gone out into the world and made names for
themselves but their work is done all over the globe, and word of their suc-
cess seldom filters back to the Garden’s own particular public in St. Louis.
Here are two clippings which came back to us not so long ago, one from the
Chicago Tribune, the other from a Los Angeles newspaper. Both of them
are about boys from the Greater St. Louis area, trained in the Henry Shaw
School of Botany, who went away and made good. We plan to call the pub-
lic’s attention from time to time to such stories. In any one year there are
only a few young people working in the laboratories at the Garden. But
for over half a century this crop of just a few a year has gone on decade after
decade. The graduates now constitute one of the Garden’s most outstanding
accomplishments and one of which Mr. Shaw would justly be proud. The
first story is about Dr. Julian Steyermark. It appeared in the Chicago Tribune
in Richard Orr’s column “Day by Day on the Farm.”

(87)

88 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Day By Day ON THE FARM
By RICHARD ORR

Within an hour and a half of the Loop by auto is one of the most unique
nature preserves in the midwest. It is a private, four acre wooded tract sur-
rounding the home of Dr. and Mrs. Julian A. Steyermark, 5 miles north of
Barrington.

Dr. Steyermark is curator of the herbarium at the Chicago Natural
History museum. In his small preserve can be found more than 1,000 species
of wild flowers, shrubs, trees, ferns, and other forms of plant life.

Most are native to Chicagoland, but many have been transplanted from
the southeast Missouri Ozarks and from southern and southeastern states.
In the preserve you can see one of the rarest flowers in the world—the spicy,
fragrant, pale pink to lavender blooms of the Kankakee mallow. This holly-
hock-like plant grows wild in only one place—an island in the Kankakee
river.

Plant Rates as “Relic”

Botanists call this plant a “relic,” which means it has lost its capacity to
spread, either because of severe competition from other plants or because of
something in its nature.

Another uncommon resident of this tiny plant wonderland is a type of
grass that is native to China, Japan, and Korea and does not have a common
name. It is a plant of fragile beauty that lifts feathery plumes four feet high
or more and is known to botanists as miscanthus sacchariflorus. There is
said to be a colony of it near Glen Ellyn, one of two places in the United
States [Iowa is the other] where it grows regularly.

Growing nearby is New Jersey tea, a low shrub that produces fragrant
white flowers. American colonists made their tea from this plant after they
refused to buy it from the British.

Elsewhere is another small shrub called Leatherwood, which has such
supple wood that the Indians used it as twine for sewing and for tying
bundles. This is a native shrub, now rare, which blooms with small yellow
flowers in early spring.

There’s Cork Tree

There is a specimen of the cork tree, a small tropical species native to
southeastern United States. It produces the lightest wood of any tree in this
country. And there are a few small seedlings of the American chestnut, a
species all but wiped out by blight a half century ago.

Wildflowers bloom from early spring to late autumn in this preserve. As
many as 80 species may be found in flower at one time in autumn and more
than 140 on some May and June days.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 89

When we visited it recently, several kinds of gentians, native flowers once
abundant but now rare, were blooming. They included the bluish purple
fringed gentian, one of nature’s most beautiful creations; the rose gentian,
the violet colored downy gentian, and the bottle gentian, which never opens
its vivid blue flowers.

There are a dozen kinds of sunflowers, nearly 20 kinds of wild asters, and
several types of prairie grasses that were abundant when the pioneers arrived
but are plentiful no longer.

A unique aspect of this preserve is that six types of natural conditions
have been created within its four acres—dry upland prairie; swamp; dry up-
land oak and hickory woodland; rich, low woods and wooded ravines; low,
swampy meadow, and a miniature replica of the rocky glades of the Ozarks.

The story from Los Angeles is entitled ‘Jungle Explorer has Command of
Arboretum.” It is doubly interesting to most of us on the Garden staff
because Dr. Seibert got his wife as well as his technical training at the Mis-
souri Botanical Garden, having married Isabelle Pring, the daughter of our
superintendent.

JuNcLE Exptorer Has CoMMAND OF ARBORETUM

An Illinois farm boy who grew up to be a jungle explorer is directing
development of one of the world’s most ambitious horticultural plans, the
Los Angeles State and County Arboretum in Arcadia.

“It will be more than a park, you know,” Dr. Russell J. Seibert, direc-
tor of the Arboretum, said. “It’s going to be an educational and research
center.”

The 36-year-old director was one of the key men in the race to find
adequate supplies of natural rubber in the Americas, surveying Panama, Costa
Rica, Venezuela, Colombia, Haiti, Bolivia, Peru and the Amazon Valley of

razil.

From his and others jungle research came U. S$. Department of Agricul-
ture collections of different rubber varieties and knowledge of rubber so that
supplies of raw rubber could be increased in the Western Hemisphere.

Born in Belleville, Ill., Dr. Seibert did his undergraduate work at Wash-
ington University, St. Louis, and Illinois University, taking post-graduate
work at Washington University’s Missouri Botanical Garden and Arnold
Arboretum at Harvard.

He joined the Department of Agriculture staff in 1940, as preparations
to meet anticipated rubber shortages were made. For eight months he sur-
veyed six South and Central American countries and Caribbean Islands. Then
he was sent to Marfranc, Haiti, to establish a departmental rubber test

90 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

station. A collection of rubber plants from the Philippines was propagated
and plants were distributed for test growing.

From this work disease resistant rubber plants adaptable to the South and
Central American countries were developed—plants which today assure the
United States of enough natural rubber when the supply is supplemented
with synthetic rubber.

After further training in Washington, D. C., and Florida, Dr. Seibert
returned to South America to search the jungles of Peru, Bolivia and Brazil
for promising rubber plant specimens. The samples were grown at small
nurseries then flown out to experimental stations. Later he served at one of
these stations at Turrialba, Costa Rica.

Dr. Seibert was in charge of the rubber plant breeding program at Belts-
ville, Md., when he was invited to become the Arboretum’s new director
last June.

In his new job he still has a jungle to explore: the Arboretum’s lagoon and
forest which have been the scene of many Tarzan movies. And he has the
further challenge of collecting not one plant but every type of plant on earth
which might grow in Southern California. These exotics will be grown on
the 111-acre grounds, once the home of Lucky Baldwin. They will be im-
proved for Southland gardens, then made available to home gardeners.

“T hope, as the Arboretum’s development progresses, we will gain the sup-
port of every person interested in plants,” Dr. Seibert said. ‘The county has
agreed to finance the capital improvements, but the planting program, which
will start soon, will have to be financed by private donations.”

With his wife, Isabelle, and three children, Michael, Donna, and Lisa, Dr.
Seibert lives at 605 Hyland, Arcadia.

FIELD MARSHALL SMUTS’ COLLECTIONS REACH GARDEN
HERBARIUM

Among a large collection of specimens of South African plants recently
sent to our Garden herbarium by the National Herbarium of the Union of
South Africa at Pretoria are a number of plants collected by the late Field
Marshall Jan Christian Smuts, one-time Premier of South Africa and world
statesman for over half a century. It is not generally known that Field
Marshall Smuts also was a very active and accomplished botanist. The speci-
mens from Pretoria were sent in exchange for a series of photographs of type
specimens of South African plants provided by the Missouri Botanical Garden.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 91

DR. WOODSON’S SEVEN MEDITATIONS

The Curator of the Garden’s herbarium, Dr. Robert E. Woodson, Jr., is
a scholar with a gift of self-expression and a charming sense of humor which
is not as well known to St. Louisans as it ought to be. Last year he was
president of the American Society of Plant Taxonomists; his presidential
address at Madison, Wisconsin, was a masterpiece which will not be forgotten
by any of those who heard it. Since then this address has been reprinted in
the Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club. With their permission and his
we are reprinting it in this BULLETIN. A few of the allusions in it are so
technical that they will not be understood by any one who is not himself
something of a taxonomist. On the other hand, most of the address is de-
ceptively simple; the tone at times approaches that of Lewis Carroll. It, like
“Alice in Wonderland” and “Through the Looking-glass,” has more real
wisdom than is suspected by stupid readers.—E. A

WHY I LIKE TAXONOMY — SEVEN MEDITATIONS
Rosert E. Woopson, Jr.

I wonder how many of you saw the big full-page advertisement at the
back of the comic section of the ‘Phi Beta Kappa Key’ one Sunday a few
weeks ago? I didn’t see it myself because, although you may not have guessed,
I am not one of the brethren. But a friend of mine who is a Phi Bet noticed
it and thought I might be interested. It read, and I quote (my friend,
that is):

COME “ON E COME, ALL
WIN A BIG CASH PRIZE
[exclamation mark
JOIN OUR COLOSSAL NATIONWIDE CONTEST
ALL YOU HAVE TO DO to win one of these BIG 2 aie PRIZES is to tell u

500 words or less WHY YOU LIKE TAXONOM ae A CINCH “Scie
EVER BODY agi Riaatiniad Troon me Juaeh ach every con-
testant is entitled t rite as many letters as he or she skies telling us why HE

(or SHE) LIKES TAXONOMY, but no entries will be returned to the contestant
and all will be considered the property o
KRISPY-KRUNCHY PLANT shape INC.
Cambridge 38, Mas
[of all places]
Ray RR: Y
pepe ctrl closes conan nee 8, 1953)

It may safely be presumed, I presume, that at this gathering all of us
present like taxonomy, as the advertisement says. And since at least enough
of you, ladies and gentlemen, are my friends to have voted me into my
present unenviable position, I am going to take you into my confidence and
read you my answers before I rush them Special Delivery to beat the deadline.
Don’t look now, but I’m submitting seven entries: Seven—count ’em—-seven!

92 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

I

I like taxonomy because—well—frankly, because I like flowers. I ap-
parently don’t have the passionate feeling that we see in some men and women.
But I hope that I shall always remember how the blue columbine was spangled
with spring raindrops in my grandmother’s garden, and how the white
plantain lilies looked and smelled in the corner of her stone chimney. Aside
from their beauty of form and color, there is a healthful, peaceful detachment
in flowers that (to be cautious about it) must be imparted much less freely
by white mice and fruit flies. Perhaps I just don’t understand, but I feel that
one of the rewards of plant taxonomy is simply the flowers themselves.

Even herbarium specimens, some of them, make one catch his breath for
their beauty. Because, as one of my graduate students once told me in a brief
moment of revelation, when you know them well they aren’t flat any more.

Nearly everyone loves flowers. Why, then, in spite of all the popular
men’s garden clubs and the like, do we sometimes wish that we were zoologists
when another man asks us our business? Do you, as I, sometimes try to
evade by saying that you are a biologist, hoping that the other will infer a
lie? Why should we feel guilty about our association with plants? Are
plants, by their nature, irrelevant and trivial?

I wonder how the flowers feel about it. Are they ashamed to cail them-
selves plants because of their association with botanists—particularly plant
taxonomists? I think that sometimes they might.

Il

To be quite candid, Taxonomy was not my first love. Her name was
Geography. But that was puppy love. You see, I was in third grade. I
can’t look back upon Grade School with any great pleasure except for the
moments—yes, the hours—that I spent with Geography: those vast, beauti-
fully colored maps, the inset sketches and photographs that could transform
a thin, crooked line into a mysterious river, and tiny circles and dots into
cities and towns so different from my own.

So Freud would understand why I like taxonomy because I like the sound
of faraway places. I have not traveled very widely for this day and ages
most of my students have seen more than I, thanks to the wars. But I am
able to tell them still more, and not stir out of the herbarium.

The corner-stone of our herbarium at the Missouri Botanical Garden is
the herbarium of Bernhardi, once professor at the University of Erfurt. When
it arrived in St. Louis in 1858 it was found to contain amongst its treasures
many specimens bearing only such notations as ‘“Unalaschka” or “Sitka,” and
occasionally a name by Schlechtendal and Chamisso. A little detective work
has proved that this collection, indeed, is that made by Chamisso in Alaska
in 1816

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 93

Adelbert von Chamisso was the foremost German lyric poet of his day.
But he, also, loved flowers and the sound of faraway places. In 1815 he
sailed with Captain Kotzebue from St. Petersburg aboard the tiny brig
“Rurisevk,” 27 hands aboard. Out the Neva and south around the Cape and
up the China Coast and at last the fires of Alaska on the beam. Upon that
foggy icy shore the poet found these flowers, and brought them back to
Russia and to us.

Here is the type of Asclepias arenaria. It was preserved for us by Fred-
erick Wislizenus, M.D., esteemed member of his profession in the bustling
frontier town of St. Louis on the Mississippi. The place was the sand dunes
south of Santa Fe, and the time was August, 1846. A band of Gringo scouts
came upon him there and swore he was a mirage. One morning, good Dr.
Wislizenus had set out from his office on Chestnut Street, alone in his sedate
black buggy, and drove and drove on this incredible ride into the midst of
the Mexican War, until we find him here.

These ugly thistles were bought with bombs and death beside Lake Tana,
the Blue Nile’s headwaters. Ethiopia, in 1937! Years afterward my friend
sent them to me; my friend who gathered them, a gentleman and a gentle
man.

Here are three mementos of a Yorkshire boy who ran away to sea. James
Cook was his name: Captain Cook to you, sir. He sailed well and he fared
well, and in 1768 was chosen master of H.M.S. “Endeavour” to sail ’round
the world with Sir Joseph Banks and his botanist, Solander. In 1770 they
sighted legendary Terra Australis and claimed it for His Brittanic Majesty,
George III. There every plant was strange, and Botany Bay it still is. This
blackened, brittle shrub then bloomed on that wild shore; it is here to speak
of Cook, and Banks, and an empire upon which the sun would never set.

This sprig of Nothofagus once rustled in the dwarf forests of Tierra del
Fuego, where it was plucked by the brothers Forster, lucky to be with Com-
mander Cook on his second voyage of discovery, in 1773. No continents
were Cook’s this trip, but the magic of fruits and fresh green herbs.

And this common weed of many shores of many lands. In 1779 it was
gathered by young David Nelson upon the sunny beach where tomorrow the
great navigator would be struck down in ambush. (And ten years more,
Nelson with Captain Bligh adrift in mid-Pacific.)

Ill
I like taxonomy because I like puzzles. Besides the problems peculiar to
itself, biology compounds all the problems of all the other natural sciences,—
plus mathematics. (Always mathematics!) Taxonomy is the apex of this
staggering (and enticing) pyramid of question marks. Beneath it are the

94 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

stones of geography and geology and meteorology; and beneath them the
stones of morphology and anatomy and cytology and genetics; and beneath
them the stones of physiology and biochemistry. . . . And Goodness knows
what else, for the ologies are increasing every day, uy I, for one, cannot keep
up with them. Doubtless within the crypt of the pyramid is enshrined the
nucleus of the sacred atom. But the name of the pyramid is “Organic
Evolution,” and the symbolism of taxonomy is, or should be, the capstone.

In an herbarium we find so many discordant annotations upon the sheets,
so many erasures, so many corrections. In the taxonomic library so much
synonymy, so much criticism (magnanimous and otherwise). Once, in an
idle moment, it struck me that one of the palaces of the New Jerusalem
should be a celestial herbarium, each sheet with but one and truly authentic
annotation. A duplicate set should be housed in Hades, but these, besides
the determinatio Divinitatis, bearing full synonymy; yours and mine, our
forebears’, and of our seed from now till Doomsday. What could be more
damning? But on the other hand, would Heaven be Heaven with all the
puzzles solved? Purgatory may adapt us to it.

IV

We need species for much the same reason that we need inches and centi-
meters and all the rest, we tell our laymen (trying, I suspect, to strike a °
scientific sounding phrase and so impress them). I say that evolution is like
music that we learn by ear and painfully transcribe. Ever-changing moods
and tempo, sharps and flats and signatures; “thundering crescendos,” “hushed
diminuendos,” “rests that speak more eloquent than sound.” We, poor
mortals, set ourselves to score the magic anthem (some tone-deaf or lacking
rhythm).

Our taxa are the measures, phrases, movements—each with its own con-
tribution to the whole. Is it strange that the same bar should be transcribed
so differently by ycu and me?

Taxonomy is re-creative; it is intuitive; it is an art and not a craft. It
is not describing; it is not identifying. Those are just pieces—and not all.
Taxonomy is the whole. And that is why I like taxonomy, because I am
an artisan at heart.

Vv

I like taxonomy because I like the taxonomists. We have a lot in com-
mon. Maybe they are a bit queer, but on the whole they (1 mean we) are a
grand crowd. Of course there is a sprinkling of Dr. Fells amongst us (the
reason why, I cannot tell); and as for the really black sheep of the family

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 95

(and their friends), | can only kow-tow in the general direction of the late
W. S. Gilbert and burst into anguished song:
some day it may happen that a victim must be found,
I’ve got a little list—I’ve got a little list
ht

Of taxonomy offenders who might well ed sik eta:
nd who never would be missed—who n would be missed!

m sed!

There’s the boy s a are wo orking on their merit hides. they say,

And the plant cahidesee— e got him on the list

And the folks who ask for ache _ never think to pay,
ed—they n i

or
And the guy who loves to tell how many species bear Buy name,
i are

And that ultra-modern genius, the wai ici gE
ink he i b

ey'd none of ’em be OE A tar: *d none of ’em be missed!

And ambitious physiologists of an enterprising kind,
Such as—Whatchamacallum, Yhudi, nan habia Nevermind,
And W is Whatsisr a nowho—
The task of filling in the blanks hit sat Mae to you.
a it really doesn’t matter whom you put upon the list,

or they’d none of ’em be missed, a d none of ’em be missed!

VI

There are few things more exhilarating and comforting than telling
something old to someone new. Particularly if that one is the younger. I
like taxonomy because it has led me into teaching.

When I first began to teach, my classes were my younger brothers and
sisters: each year fresh dozens of them; droves of them, so few without one
trait I could admire. Fall was the most exciting time of year, with the new
ones aia Ap in, and some old ones flatteringly “just looking in to see what’s
going on.” I lectured them and evangelized those that I thought would make
good evangelists; and they taught me, too. Agility and patience are required
by students not quite decided if they wish to learn.

And the field trips!’ I wish I knew how many brides have told me:
“Charlie says to ask how you make coffee.” (Or Sam, Russ, Bob, Dick, or
Henry.) Well—you fill a smudgey pot to not-quite- full from the spring
at the foot of the hill. Pull out a few dead leaves and wrigglers. (While
you’re there, snatch a handful of cress.) In stumbling up the slope, be sure
to lose about half to three-fifths of the water. And if the fire is burning
brightly, now get the coffee half spilled in the pack. Count noses round the

96 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

fire—two spoons for each; when the water is hot, throw it in. Then have a
jolly time and sing your songs till the pot bubbles over. And, Oh—at last do
not forget to stir the fire; the ashes will settle the grounds.

I miss them, now that I have grown old enough and wise enough (the
University considers) to be confined to Graduate School. I have disciples now,
and must remember that I am a son of Greenman, who was a son of Engler,
who was a son of Goeppert, who was a son of Beckmann, who was a son of
Linnaeus.

Vil

I was about to write “I like taxonomy because it is my livelihood,” but it
would be more true to say “I like my livelihood because it is taxonomy.”

When students ask me “What opportunities are there in plant taxonomy?”
I tell them: if you would rather study plants than anything, you will be suc-
cessful; if there is anything you’d as lief be doing, you will be a failure. Adopt
no other measure. I would say that happiness is success, and unhappiness is
failure.

Look at me: I am as happy in my work, I think, as any man. But then
look at my salary cheques; I would be poorly paid (working on holidays and
Sundays as I do) if I were a plasterer, a carpenter, a steam fitter, a drill press
or bulldozer operator. . . . How can I say I like taxonomy because it is my
livelihood?

Look at my boyhood friends: stockbroker, bag manufacturer, tobacco
processor, packinghouse executive, iawyer. .. . If they were paid as I, would
they still call their lives successful? If I were paid as they, and they as I,
would not there be more plant taxonomists? What would they do, then,
with their Saturdays and Sundays and all their holidays, and their mornings
before ten and their evenings after four which they use, now, to flee the work
that pays them so well?

I cannot say that I am underpaid. What I am paid is paid to live with
beauty, adventure, day dreams, fascinating puzzles, beautiful and profound
designs, and companionship. These are other men’s relaxations. The things
they hope to do when they retire. I am paid for this; doing the things and
talking about the things I would rather do and talk about, year by year—
each with a fresh group of friends.

A beautiful specimen of the hybrid Epiphyllum “Vive Rouge” has been
given to the Garden by Mrs. Eugene D. Nims, who raised it from a small
cutting. It is now a magnificent plant with hundreds of pendent stems up
to six feet long, and has been placed on display in the Fern-Cycad House.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 97

MUNG BEANS AND THEIR SPROUTS
HAROLD J. KIDD

Have you never felt adventurous and tried a Chinese restaurant for some
variety in your diet? If so, you may well have noted that while most of
the culinary products were identifiable and quite common, a few of the
vegetables were not familiar. One of these was probably the sprout of the
mung bean, technically known as Phaseolus aureus. The sprouts of this
bean are tender and juicy and have a delicate, pleasant flavor.

This legume has apparently been selected for the property of ready sprout-
ing over a long period of years, probably for centuries. They are bush beans
which withstand high temperatures and drouth fairly well. Farmers who
grow mung beans state that they will germinate ‘on a heavy dew.” The
seeds of the varieties which are preferred for sprouting are approximately
three-sixteenths of an inch long and may be shaped something like a nail
keg or a cylinder. The seed-coat is a glossy green and quite handsome.
Closely related types which are usually placed in the same species may be
considerably larger, perhaps twice the size of the sprouting beans. If the
shape is similar the seed-coat will probably be green and may be either rough
and dull or smooth and glossy. Others are nearly globular and a light gold
in color, similar in color and shape to many of the soybeans, but somewhat
smaller.

The larger-seeded beans mentioned above are commonly grown in our
Southwest and have been for some time. The Chinese with whom I have
conversed have not been acquainted with two of them. It would be interest-
ing to know how long these beans have been in North America, including
the sprouting types. Most of the Chinese restaurants are dependent on our
southwestern states (principally Oklahoma and Kansas) for the sprouting
beans since our virtual cessation of trade with China. However, the Chinese
beans are preferred, since American farmers are careless about cracked beans
and pods and broken stems.

The sprouting of seeds for food is probably as old or older than agricul-
ture. It is even conceivable that the practice is older than cookery, since
one could make a hard, dry seed more palatable in this way. In the Orient
many seeds are so treated, particularly in India and Burma. This custom is
much less common in China, although the Chinese were probably the first
to use mung beans.

We should mention that the sprouting of seeds is an ingenious trick for
making good-quality protein from vegetable sources. Nutritionists inform
us that plant proteins, even in sufficient quantities, are deficient for man,
since they lack certain of the protein-building blocks called ‘tamino acids.”

98 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

However, actively growing tissues, whether plant or animal, will be sur-
prisingly similar in their protein quality and amino-acid constituency. Cer-
tainly this type of ‘“‘meat substitute” is much more attractive to your author
than any yeast product he has yet tried.

DR. WOODSON’S MONOGRAPH ON ASCLEPIAS

An event of real scientific importance is the Garden’s publication of Dr.
Woodson’s monograph on the milkweeds of North America. It comprises
an entire number of our ANNALS and an over-sized one at that. It is
basic research and therefore something seldom appreciated at its full value
by the general public. The man in the street values scholarship when the end
result brings something into his life which was not there before. He honors
Edison for the invention of the electric light but neither knows nor cares for
the long line of pioneers who brought our understanding of electricity to the
point where Edison could use it effectively. Basic research is important
because it is basic. It is just exactly that. It is a beginning; it leads to many
other things and no scientist, no prophet, is wise enough to see all the various
end-results to which a particular piece of basic research may lead.

To one who knows a little about such matters, Dr. Woodson’s monograph
has the intellectual beauty of any masterpiece. It has taken a long series of
facts and made some ordered sense out of them. The genus Asclepias with
which Dr. Woodson has been working has as complicated a flower as one can
find in the entire vegetable kingdom. These blooms are so curiously con-
trived that even very few professional botanists can take one apart for you
and explain what all the pieces are and how they function in the complicated
business of getting the plant cross-fertilized and producing seed for another
generation. Dr. Woodson has worked out all that not only for one milkweed
but for the more than a hundred kinds which are included in his monograph.

If one milkweed bloom is complex, the genus as a whole baffles one’s
attempts at description. It seems to be one of those group of plants, like the
orchids, in which Mother Nature has gone off on a wild evolutionary spree
and produced type after type, all on more or less of the same fundamental
ground pattern, yet bewildering in the way this pattern is varied from species
to species. It is as though she had started with a rubber model which was
inflated with air and then for each new milkweed had varied the spots at
which the rubber was thick or medium or thin. Some little hicky which you
can scarcely see in most of the species will balloon out in some of the others
so as to dominate the whole bloom. This group of plants displays such be-
wildering variety that no previous botanist has ever succeeded in getting
enough of the facts in his head so that he could mull them all over and
produce a truly competent monograph.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 99

Dr. Woodson has done this. He has shown where one species leaves off
and another begins. There are maps showing the distribution of each species
and black-and-white illustrations of a typical flower of each. He has worked
with them until he has been able to set them out in a series of groups and
super-groups of related species, according to their resemblances and differ-
ences. But Dr. Woodson is more than just another botanist, and his mono-
graph shows it. He is a natural philosopher and a scholar. Every detail of
the monograph has been meticulously taken care of. His use of Latin has
a polish which is rare in these days; his discussions are effectively phrased and
reveal scientific insight.

Taxonomic monographs of this sort, badly as they are needed for less
basic work, are nowadays considered old-fashioned by some scientists. How-
ever, they have one advantage over more purely experimental studies; they
are of permanent value. The very best experimental work is out of date a
few years later. Further discoveries make it of purely historical interest.
The problem is seen in a new light, and after a decade or so the paper which
once was epoch-making is no longer consulted. This is not true of taxonomic
monographs. If anything their value increases with age. A century from
now the scholars who use it will salute Dr. Woodson’s monograph as the work
of a highly gifted man. They will appreciate his rare kind of imagination
which could consider all the evolutionary complexities of this curious group
of plants and make some kind of sense out of it. They will recognize him
as one of those outstanding scholars who could not only distill a meaning out
of complicated phenomena but who had the added ability to transmit it
felicitously.

THE GarDEN IN JuNE settles down into summer. The big flower shows in
the Floral Display House are replaced with a smaller exhibit of fancy-leaved
caladiums; the water-lilies are set out in the pools but will not make much
of a showing until late in July. The Linnaean Garden is beautiful through-
out the month and the Rose Garden does well unless we have very hot and
very dry weather. At the Arboretum (junction of routes 66 and 50) the
big display of daffodils and spring wild flowers is over but the wild flowers
on the glades are now at their very best. With the new trails provided by
special gifts from the Garden Club of St. Louis, it is now possible for visitors
to reach the glades quickly and comfortably. It is too bad these beautiful
and unique Missouri wild flowers are not better known. There are Purple
Cone-flowers, Wild Coreopsis and Missouri Primroses whose tiny plants bear
big sulphur yellow blooms as big as salad plates. Glade Bluets come into flower
this month and continue all summer. If there are occasional rains the glades
make a dramatic display of bloom well into August.

100 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

HARRY COLLINS

One of the Garden’s most helpful volunteer workers died suddenly of a
heart attack on March 1. He was Mr. Harry Collins, a retired St. Louis
business-man who for some years had maintained one of the finest private
collections of bearded irises in this part of the country. Last year he was a
member of the course for amateur plant breeders which is given each year at
the Garden and this eventually led to his serving as a volunteer helper in the
experimental greenhouse under Mr. Gillespie. It was a wonderful arrange-
ment for every one concerned. Registration in the new courses for amateurs
was heavier than had been expected, and, among other things, Mr. Collins saw
to it that all the supplies were on hand for each class and helped the members
to get flower-pots and propagating flats out to their cars. For him, it was an
opportunity to continue working with plants during the winter months. His
garden kept him pretty busy during the summer but left him relatively little
to do during the winter and he was an active, able man. In the greenhouse
there were plants and people to look after, people who were grateful for his
help and plants which were visibly better for the extra care which they could
not have had without him. He worked closely with Dr. Meyer and Mr.
Gillespie who were young enough to have been his sons. It was pleasant to
drop in during the middle of the morning when they all knocked off work
for a few minutes and served coffee (brewed on the laboratory hot-plate) in
battered old cups. The three of them obviously liked and respected one an-

other and the work of the greenhouse was going forward happily and
efficiently.

The Collins Fringe Tree being placed in its new site at the Garden

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 101

There were many fine things in Mr. Collins’ garden, but the finest was a
magnificent Fringe Tree, over 18 feet high, well rounded and of perfect pro-
portions. After Mr. Collins death Mrs. Collins said that she would be happy
to give the tree to the Garden in his memory. Fringe Trees, even small ones,
are not easy things to move, but Mr. Trifon von Schrenk interested the
Shield Shade Tree Specialists and they contributed their services. The tree
was moved while it was still dormant, with a ball of four and one-half tons
of earth. The final placing of the tree in the new site was quite spectacular
and a good-sized crowd had gathered by the time it was lowered into the hole
which had been carefully prepared for it. It was placed just to the east of
Mr. Shaw’s mausoleum in a spot where three paths converge. When in bloom
it serves as the focal point for several informal vistas. Every care is being
taken to make the tree happy in its new home. It has been well mulched and
it will get thorough waterings throughout the season whenever the weather
is at all dry. It blossomed nicely and as yet shows little or no evidence of
having been moved so recently.

Friends of Mr. Collins and members of his family have made contributions
(somewhat over three hundred dollars in all) to the Friends of the Garden
fund in his memory. For some time we have been planning to hire an extra
gardener to help Mr. Gillespie in the experimental greenhouse and to keep
the grounds around Mr. Shaw’s residence and the mausoleum in better con-
dition. Room had been found in the budget to add such a man beginning the
middle of June. With the money given in Mr. Collins’ memory it was possible
to start this work the last week in April—Edgar Anderson.

History of the Rose. By Roy E. Shepherd. 264 pp. The Macmillan Company.
New York, 1954. $4.75.

This is a remarkable book by a remarkable man. After an art-school
training Mr. Shepherd went into the manufacture of ornamental metalwork.
Taking up horticulture as a hobby, he has spent twenty-five years studying,
collecting, growing, and breeding roses. He has become the world’s authority
on their history and is as responsible as any one person for the recent revival
of interest in old-fashioned roses. This revival has been nation-wide; how-
ever, one has to visit only a few gardens in Greater Cleveland to realize what
an even more profound effect Mr. Shepherd has had in his own community.

“History of the Rose” as a title is an understatement. The history is
there along with much else: descriptions of wild species, discussions of the
work of various hybridizers, an account of the vicissitudes of the great col-
lection of roses brought together by the Empress Josephine. Much has been

102 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

written on the history of the rose, a good deal of it trash, a good deal of it
hearsay. On all disputed points Mr. Shepherd reviews the evidence and gives
his opinion and the reasons for it. He does not hesitate to call a spade a spade,
though he has been more than charitable with professional botanists, many
of whom in the last century have run away from the increasingly difficult
job of putting accurate names on the world’s cultivated plants.

The book has a good bibliography, a general index, an index of roses by
both popular and scientific names, and a two-page diagram illustrating the
rise and fall of popularity for the 24 major types of roses during the last
three and a half centuries. There are 26 black-and-white illustrations of
various roses, most of them half a page in size.

The appearance of books of this sort is a clear sign that the United States
is coming of age horticulturally. On page after page of Mr. Shepherd’s book
there is evidence that though it is based upon an exhaustive study of the
literature, it is no mere job with scissors and paste. The facts have been
digested; the story has been put together critically in the light of the author’s
own extensive experience. This book is recommended reading for gardeners,
for rose breeders, for botanists who think they know something about roses,
for anyone with a love of plants and a lively curiosity.—E.A.

Roy E. Shepherd

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Joon S. LEHMANN, President Henry HitcHcock
Danret K. CatLin, Vice-President RicHarD J. Lockwoop
EuGENE Pettus, Second Vice-President A. WEssEL SHAPLEIGH
LeicesTER B. Faust ErHan A. H. SHEPLEY
DupLEY FRENCH RoBertT BROOKINGS SMITH

EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS

EtHan A. H. x, Osc HR

Chancellor of Washington University Presiden of o Beard of Education
ARTHUR C. LICHTENBERGER, oh tome

Bish ot the Diocese of Missouri STRATFORD L. Mort

ON,
A Tuc President of ” Academy of Science
hayes of the City ees se Louis of St. Loui

Secretary
GERALD ULRICI,

THE HORTICULTURAL COUNCIL
Clarence Barbre, Albert Chandler, E. G. Cherbonnier, Paul Hale, Mrs. Hazel
napp, Martin Lammert III, nee Layton, Eleanor McClure, Clarence
McGovern, W. F. Scott, Jr., Mrs. J. Garneau sihte Harold E. Wolfe, John
S. Lehmann, Edgar Anderson, hk Nies, Chairm

STAFF
Georee T. Moore. pe ee a Se Eeeeritet Director
Edear Anderson Director
Hough Co Coder Assistant Director
ycologist

Carroll W. Dodge ——__-______--____-_--__— eat
Robert E. Woodson, Jr._———-—____-—-----------—- eee of Hiagbatiues

Henry N. Andrews — —_—___________- _Paleobotanist
Rolla M. ne ae geet ee = halo Cerca of Herbarium
Huish © Cuter. Pere Museum of Economic Plants
Robert J. pare ee ie a ce 2 Remar: Mocticulearist
nD. Owves __Research Associate
aes B. Van Schick Soc ae Rul Sacre er a _ectenry Curator of Grasses
Julian A. Steyermark_————--____-____----— appeiig' Research Associate
ee ee ee a Editor

Edna eked Up ieecisheeneimcinues santana Be

aT Se Re eg ek norm tee amano | ss Librarian
Gerald Ulrici. Business Manager
Georse Hi. Piag Superintendent
Paul ART TES eet tse aetna Le ecm
Ladislaus Cutak 7 eiciaren in hae of Conservatories
Frederick G. Meyer ————____________-—__—_ _____ Dendrologist
Engineer

Kenneth A: Sean BOE IS atone ace
August P. ee tae ue the ia aon. Gray Summit
lous G Tienes a Aent Manoger of the Arboretum
G. BR. tay charge of Orchids

SOME FACTS ABOUT THE GARDEN

The Missouri Botanical Garden carries on the garden estab-
lished by Henry Shaw over a century ago at “Tower Grove,” his
country home. It is a private institution with no public support
from city or state. The old stone walls and cast-iron fences, the
Linnean House, the Museum, the Mausoleum and the “Old
Residence” all date from Mr. Shaw’s time. Since his death, as
directed in his will, the Garden has been in the hands of a Board
of Trustees who appoint the Director.

The Garden is open every day in the year (except New
Year’s Day and Christmas) from 9:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m.,
April to November, and until 6:00 p.m., November to April,
though the greenhouses close at 5:00 p.m. Tower Grove, itself,
Mr. Shaw’s old residence, is open from 1 until 4. The Garden is
nearly a mile long and has several entrances. The Main Entrance,
the one used by the general public, is at Tower Grove and Flora
Place on the Sarah bus line (No. 42). The Park Southampton
buses (No. 80), direct from downtown, pass within three blocks
of this entrance and stop directly across the street from the
Administration Building at 2315 Tower Grove Avenue. The
latter is the best entrance for students, visiting scientists, etc.
It is open to such visitors after 8:30 a.m., but is closed on Sat-
urdays, Sundays, and holidays. There is a service entrance on
Alfred Avenue, one block south of Shaw Avenue.

Since Mr. Shaw’s time an Arboretum has been developed at
Gray Summit, Mo., opposite the junction of routes 50 and 66.
It is open every day in the year and has two miles of auto roads
as well as foot trails through the wild-flower reservation. There
is a pinetum and an extensive display of daffodils and other

narcissi from March to early May.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL
GARDEN BULLETIN

Volume XLII

Drawn by von Saltza in 1893

Henry Shaw, 1800-1889—A Pictorial Biography

June, 1954

Number 6

Cover: Portrait of Henry Shaw, drawn after his death from various portraits.

Office of publication: 306 E. Simmons Street, Galesburg, Illinois.
Editorial Office: Missouri Botanical Garden, 2315 Tower Grove Avenue,
St. Louis, 10, Missouri.
Published monthly except July and August by ss Board * — of the
issouri Botanical Garden. Subscription price: $2.5
gan as second-class matter January 26, anh at the post- po at Gales-
g, Illinois, under the Act of March 3,

Please: Do not discard a copy of the Bulletin. If you have no further use for your
pass it along toa friend or return it to the Garden. Return postage vceoueel:

HENRY SHAW—A PICTORIAL BIOGRAPHY

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN was the official name chosen by
Mr. Henry Shaw, the man who left this garden to the public, who
planned it in detail, and developed it as a going concern during the last
thirty years of a long life. Henry Shaw was an Englishman, born in
Sheffield, who came to St. Louis as an enterprising young merchant in
1819, becoming at length the city’s most distinguished citizen. His
death, a full seventy years later, was officially observed by the City of St.
Louis, and after an impressive public ceremony he was buried in the
midst of the garden he had created.

During these seventy years he had made his fortune, had travelled
widely and read even more widely (he read both French and Italian
almost as easily as English). Though he retired from active business at
forty years of age, he increased his income by shrewd investments so
that he was able to build up Tower Grove Park, to provide a School of
Botany for Washington University, end to equip his botanical garden
with greenhouses, gardens, a library, an arboretum, and an herbarium.

He came to St. Louis just at the time when it was developing rapidly
as an outfitting center for the West. He came with a little money to in-
vest, a good training in mathematics and in languages, and from a family
which on both the maternal and paternal sides was connected with the
hardware businéss. He had studied French in school; hé’came to St.
Louis by way of New Orleans; he had a natural liking for French ways
and French people. He was quick to see the advantage of shipping
goods up the Mississippi from New Orleans rather than by the long
overland route from the eastern seaboard. With his knowledge of
French and his contacts in New Orleans he was able to branch out and
carry on such enterprises as buying sugar at a few cents a pound in
Louisiana, moving it to St. Louis warehouses, and selling it advan-
tageously when it became scarce in the Middle West. Before he was
quite forty he had accumulated a fortune of a quarter of a million
dollars, a large sum for those days. He then closed out his business and
travelled widely, making three trips to Europe, one of them of several
years’ duration.

He returned to St. Louis for the last time late in 1851. His country
home, ‘Tower Grove,” had by then been completed and his city home
was well under way. On his last trip he had formed the idea of leaving
his estate for the public to enjoy, much as had been done with such

(103)

104

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Henry Shaw at the age of thirty-five

This portrait shows the successful young St. Louis merchant a few years before he
sold out his hardware business and travelled extensively in Europe. He went back to
Europe three times, and on his longest trip spent much time in the Mediterranean
area, visiting both Constantinople and Egypt. Many of the pictures and other works

of art now on display in his old house date from this journey.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 105

> wr

Society

Courtesy Missouri Historical

Henry Shaw’s city home at the corner of Seventh and Locust streets. From a water-color
made in 1866 by J. H. McNamara. This is the house which was moved to the Garden after
Mr. Shaw’s death in accordance with his will. It now forms the northern portion of the

Library and Administration Building at 2315 Tower Grove Avenue.

106 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Courtesy Missouri Historical Society

Mme. Saugrain’s house and garden. Mme. Saugrain’s daughter, Mrs. von Phul, has told
how He enry Shaw as a young man used to stop by their garden on his booebak rides out
into the country.

English show places as Chatsworth. His close friend, Dr. George Engel-
mann, convinced him that it should be a real botanical garden with
greenhouses, growing plants, a library, and an herbarium. Mr. Shaw
took several years to make up his mind. He respected Dr. Engelmann
but, like most St. Louisans, he thought of Engelmann as a successful
physician and surgeon, never quite realizing that he was one of the
greatest botanists of his day. When Sir Joseph Hooker, the Director
of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, came to America for a long trip
to the West, Dr. Engelmann had him alerted to the situation in St. Louis.
When Sir Joseph stopped off here as the house guest of Henry Shaw he
was prepared to urge upon his host the importance of a first-class botan-
ical garden in the developing Middle West. Mr. Shaw was convinced,
and for the rest of his life, he labored to build up the best possible
botanical garden for St. Louis.

In 1859, Henry Shaw erected a brick and stone building as head-

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 107

eee = . < Se
VIEW OF THE CITY OF 5ST. LOUIS, MISSOTRL

Courtesy Missouri Historical Society

The St. Louis river front in 1854. From Gleason’s Pictorial Drawing-Room Companion.

quarters for the library and herbarium. He sent Dr. Engelmann to
Europe to buy botanicai books and herbarium specimens, books and
specimens which today are worth many times the price then paid
for them. He started an arboretum, he built greenhouses, one of which,
the Linnaean House, is still standing. He brought Mr. James Gurney
from London as a superintendent and hired a curator for the library and
herbarium. For thirty years he kept all the accounts, and made the plans
and hired the workmen. If one examines the old account books at the
Garden they go on for page after page, month upon month, and year
upon year. The disbursements, the payrolls, the names of the gardeners,
the days and hours they worked, are all there, set out carefully and
legibly in Mr. Shaw’s own handwriting. Just for the money value alone
this was no small gift. To have hired others to work as business man-
ager and as director would have cost even in those days around $10,000
a year. For thirty years this amounts to $300,000. Henry Shaw not
only conceived the idea of a great botanical garden; he got one actually
into operation and ran it himself for a third of a century.

108 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

a
TTI

Es eae

Henry Shaw’s city orca (labelled 81) = its nrenae neighborhood. ogc 8
from a plate in Compt Pipes ial St. Louis published i 76. The house stood o
the corner of Seve sen at ust and was saat to the Garden after ques s duh,
scout to the directions in “his will. Had it not been mo rom the second-story
drawing-room (now the Director’s office) one would see the oan Theater from
the north windows and Famous-Barr from the east window

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

if

wet I

Shaw’s country home ‘Tower Grove” as illust rated during his lifetime in

given over to servants’ q w Hed down and completely rebuilt after his
deat ere was no ral heating or ru os water in the bui o this day,
thoug te , there i 1 ing water in the original west wing

m still no run
The ed Sicddis ‘ce been sucilaieds adapted to gas and to electricity.

109

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

A portrait of Henry Shaw by Richard Miller
Commissioned by the Board of Trustees after Shaw’s death.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 111

As the years passed he became more and more the city’s leading citi-
zen. He left the city and Tower Grove only at very rare intervals,
dividing his time between his city home and his estate which was then
well out in the country. (How far out may be realized from a remark
of Dr. Engelmann’s when Mr. Shaw pressed him to become the Garden's
first Director. In refusing he gave one of his main reasons for not being
more closely associated with the Garden the fact that he did not wish to
“live so far away from St. Louis!) Distinguished visitors called on
Mr. Shaw as a matter of course; he was a patron of the theater and knew
visiting actors by name. Though not himself a musician he was inter-
ested in music. In Tower Grove Park, which he founded, he had a fine
open-air bandstand erected. On Sunday afternoons he would drive out
in his elegant victoria dressed in a high silk hat and a formal top-coat,
to listen to the music which was being provided for the public. His
birthdays became more and more times of city-wide celebration. His
official biographer tells us how he was once publicly serenaded by Gil-
more’s band, then giving its annual series of concerts at the St. Louis
Exposition,

“Tt was a lovely October day, with cloudless skies and mild yet
invigorating air; the foliage just beginning to assume the many-
colored livery of autumn, but still retaining the luxuriant growth
of summer. Mr. Shaw was seated upon the lawn in front of the
mansion, with a few friends about him, while at proper distance
in front were grouped the sixty-five members of that famous
orchestra. As the strains of soul-inspiring music saluted the ear
of the venerable gentleman for whom they were primarily in-
tended, his face lighted up with an expression of pleasure too
deep for words, and he leaned forward in his chair as if un-
willing to lose the faintest note of the divine harmony. The
picture of which he was the central figure can never be forgotten
by those who saw it; ‘once seen, became a part of sight.’ ”

On the fourth of May, 1879, when Mr. Henry Shaw was a vigorous
old gentleman just approaching 80, his friends and fellow-citizens made
a formal celebration in honor of the sixtieth anniversary of his arrival
in St. Louis. A local business journal, The Exporter and Importer, gave
a full account of the occasion, explaining that Mr. Shaw was “the oldest
living importer in the Mississippi Valley.” To this fortunate circum-
stance we owe the preservation of Mr. Shaw’s actual words in replying
to the oration of the day. He begins his remarks, as a man of eighty

as

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

y reading and study Mr. Shaw - himself into a worthy proprietor of a botan-
oe This illustration shows e from the original manuscript of one of
several articles and small books an he wrote and published.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 113

William Trelease and a friend around the Garden, after
first Director of the Garden) had been brought

enry Shaw showing Mrs.
the former’s woven shia oo the
shaw as Engelmann Professor in the Henry Shaw School of Botany

to the city by
of Wishintoe foamed

114 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

might well begin, by pointing out that only a very few in the audience
are old enough to remember what St. Louis was like sixty years ago.
Therefore his “impressions and recollections of sixty years ago may not
be unacceptable.”

“When I first visited these grounds, Tower Grove, I was in
my nineteenth year. From the village of St. Louis I came through
the bushes, by a narrow path winding among the sink holes or
natural depressions of the commons, to the elevated ground now
called Grand Avenue, where, open to the river, a beautiful prairie
extending westward, uncultivated, without trees or fences, but
covered with tall, luxuriant prairie grass, undulated by the gentle
breezes of the spring, not a tuft of which can now be found. A
patch of the wild strawberry (Fragraria Virginiae) could oc-
casionally be seen, which has now entirely disappeared. I was
informed afterwards by M. Landerville, an old resident, that
these lands, being fertile and productive, were the first selected
by the colonists of St. Louis for cultivation; and, according to the
French-Canadian custom of allotting or conceding lands, had
been given to heads of families settled at St. Louis for cultivation,
of one by forty arpents, running west, and were called La Prairie
de la Barriere a Desnoyer, from Louis Desnoyer, a concessioner,
who kept the gate or barriere of the fence by which the commons
of the village of St. Louis were surrounded.

‘For a distance of two miles from where the eastern gate of
Tower Grove Park now stands, to Taylorwick Station, or rather
to the pond then and now existing there, no trees were growing;
all was prairie, the long grass of which was annually burnt; it
had for many years been left uncultivated, and had reverted to
the state of a natural prairie, as it had probably existed from all
times. On the small water course, running to Rock Spring and
then to the mill pond of Mons. August Chouteau, now covered by
the streets and houses of the city, were growing the Nymphaea,
or water lily. I also observed on a gently rising ground a clump
of hazel bushes; thirty years later the hazel bushes had disap-
peared, and in their place had grown up a grove of oaks and
sassafras laurels; in 1849 this house and tower were erected, and
it became Tower Grove.”

Mr. Shaw lived on for nearly another decade after this celebration.
His official biographer, Thomas Dimmock, has described his last days
as follows:

“On the 24th of July, 1889, he received numerous visitors to

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Henry Shaw

From a photograph taken four years before his death.

115

Sin
their f

ranging the

ce

|

ace

th

aS

of

e time th
of burial

Norman Conquest, Englishmen of means have

=
ial. Mr. Shaw followed this old custom, planning his
details with the architects and the sculptor, Baron von Mil

often been represented in effigy above
tomb some years before his death, ar-

1 ler.

9TT

NILLATINI NACUVD TVOINV.LO@ TYAOSSIW

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 117

fe

tem |
—_ ta

vert

wBAAaSaS

Te ae

ee

aa
FEET BE)

Bram ws:

what morbid attraction for certain visitors, who nonethele
aha lesson aE the way in which Mr. Shaw sae himself “as the city in which

he |

118 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

congratulate him upon the commencement of his ninetieth year.
He was weak physically, though able to meet them in the draw-
ing-room at Tower Grove, and his mind was as clear as ever.
This, however, was his last appearance in public. An attack of
malaria upon an already enfeebled system speedily dissipated all
hopes of recovery, and he died at 3:25 Sunday morning, August
25th. The death, peaceful and painless, occurred in his icine
room on the second floor of the old homestead; by the window of
which he sat nearly every night for more than thirty years until
the morning hours, absorbed in the reading which had been the
delight of his life. This room was always plainly furnished.
The windows look out upon the old garden which was the first
botanical beginning at Tower Grove. On Saturday, August 31st,
after such ceremonial as St. Louis never before bestowed upon
any deceased citizen, Henry Shaw was laid to rest in the Mauso-
leum long prepared in the midst of the Garden he had created.”

Brassocattleya ““Henry Shaw” (Award of Merit, 1953)

Henry Shaw’s name has been srgcoareaesd by neo plant — and botanists. e has
had trees, shrubs, wild-flowers, and ca med after him. Ther a beautiful water-lily
“Henry Shaw,” and more rec cently ee “hybrid aid: ‘ak of saa: creations of Mr. George
H. Pring, Tie of the Gar

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

JouHn S. LEHMANN, President Henry HitcHcock
DanreEL K. CatTLin, Vice-President RicHarD J. Lockwoop
EuGENE Pettus, Second Vice-President A. WerssEL SHAPLEIGH
LEIcEsTER B. Faust ErHan A. H. SHEPLEY
DupLEY FRENCH RoBERT BRooKINGS SMITH

EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS

ErnHan A. H. SHEPLEY, Oscar EHRHARDT,
Chancellor of Washington University President of the Board of Education
ARTHUR C. LICHTENBERGER, seid ier asin
Bishop of the Diocese of Missouri STRATFORD L.
RAYMOND R. Tucke President < ot ag appr htt of Science
Mayor of the City of st Louis of St.

Secretary
GERALD ULRICI,
iy tested SOG? Mees

THE lanes COUNCIL
Clarence Barbre, — Chandler, E. Cherbonnier, Paul Hale, Mrs. Hazel
Knapp, Martin Lammert III, ae Lavin: Eleanor McClure, Clarence
McGovern, W. F. Score Jr., Mrs. J. Garneau Weld, Harold E. Wolfe, John
§. Lehmann, Edgar Anderson, John Nies, Chairman.

STAFF

George T. Moore _-.-__ ___- ___+>___—_- 2c te. emeritus. Director
Edgar Anderson 2 irector
nn C Cute Assistant Director
Carroll W. ge LAE ed ONE ies io eee en ne ._....---- Mycologist
obert E. Woodson, Jr._.----------_---—-----------------— eae of Herbarium
Henry N. Andrews—————___________--—— -Paleobotanist
Rolla M. Tryoa_______—— Ce stant Curator of Herbarium
Hugh C. Curler oe Curator Museum of Economic Plants
Robert J. Gillespie ———_-_______-___-______--—--—— Research Horticulturist
ohn D. Dwyer___$__-___-_$___-________—_ _Research Associate
Alite F. Tryon Research Associate
George B. Van Schaack._.-----------------Honorary Curator of Grasses
Julian A. Steyermark_—__-.---—--—_---------— Honorary Research Associate
hell fo Mae Le and Editor
Edna Mepham. Ores as a Atant Libearan
iM, Kohl OS ee Assistant Librarian
Gilt ike 2 oe ee eines Manager
George H. Pring Superintendent
Taal A. Bowl __.__Floriculturist
Ladilads Cutsk ect ulewit in chines of Conservatories
Frederick G. Meyer. —______________—__-_—_— Dendrologist
Kenneth A: Sait ee oe eapinecr
August P. Beilmana____- __-.___- ceca * ae Anienn: Gos Summit

Louis G. Brenner Assistant Manager of the Arboretum
GR lower _In charge of Orchids

SOME FACTS ABOUT THE GARDEN

The Missouri Botanical Garden carries on the garden estab-
lished by Henry Shaw over a century ago at “Tower Grove,” his
country home. It is a private institution with no public support
from city or state. The old stone walls and cast-iron fences, the
Linnean House, the Museum, the Mausoleum. and the “Old
Residence” all date from Mr. Shaw’s time. Since his death, as
directed in his will, the Garden has been in the hands of a Board
of Trustees who appoint the Director.

The Garden is open every day in the year (except New
Year’s Day and Christmas) from 9:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m.,
April to November, and until 6:00 p.m., November to April,
though the greenhouses close at 5:00 p.m. Tower Grove, itself,
Mr. Shaw’s old residence, is open from 1 until 4. The Garden is
nearly a mile long and has several entrances. The Main Entrance,
the one used by the general public, is at Tower Grove and Flora
Place on the Sarah bus line (No. 42). The Park Southampton
buses (No. 80), direct from downtown, pass within three blocks
of this entrance and stop directly across the street from the
Administration Building at 2315 Tower Grove Avenue. The
latter is the best entrance for students, visiting scientists, etc.
It is open to such visitors after 8:30 a.m., but is closed on Sat-
urdays, Sundays, and holidays. There is a service entrance on
Alfred Avenue, one block south of Shaw Avenue.

Since Mr. Shaw’s time an Arboretum has been developed at
Gray Summit, Mo., opposite the junction of routes 50 and 66.
It is open every day in the year and has two miles of auto roads
as well as foot trails through the wild-flower reservation. There
is a pinetum and an extensive display of daffodils and other
narcissi from March to early May.

MISSOURI BOTANIC.
GARDEN BULLETI

CONTENTS

Papers on African Violets
by t

’ Council of the African Violet Clubs of St. Louis and St. Louis County
Book Reviews: Terres’ “Songbirds in World Orchid Confere
Your Garden”; aides sitt’s “Dawn Horticultural niealge at i. Garden
Redwood Expedition”; Northens’ during 1954-1
“The Secret of the Giees ‘Chae Coming Attractions in the Floral

Display House

Notes

CovER: Ais peste of African Violets —_ leaves: upper left, two leaves prepared
ing; upper right, two leaves after three months in vermiculite; lower
left, ae from which the cleans at the right have been removed.

Office of publication: 306 E. Simmons Street, Galesburg, Illinois.
seins Office: pa Botanical Garden, 2315 Tower Grove Avenue,
St. Louis, 10, Misso
Published monthly except or and abe by the Board of Trustees of the
Botanical Garden. Subscription price: $2.50 a year.
Entered as second-class matter ies 26, sities at the post-office at Gales-
burg, Illinois, under the Act of March 3,

Please: a not discard a copy of the Bulletin. If you have no further use for r your:
s it along toa friend or return it to the Garden. Return postage seatennsed.

Missouri Botanical
Garden Bulletin

Vol. XLII SEPTEMBER, 1954 No. 7

THE IMPORTANCE OF THE AFRICAN VIOLET

In just a few years the African Violet has mushroomed from a botanical
Curiosity to a country-wide horticultural industry. Industry it really is and
a very important one in terms of dollars and cents. The biggest operators
use mass production methods and distribute the little potted plants by the tens
of thousands to five-and-ten-cent stores and to retail florists, using a truck or
a fleet of trucks and maintaining a more or less regular delivery schedule.
The small operators grow their plants in the basement under fluorescent
lights and sell to their neighbors or to passing motorists. As a national in-
dustry the total value of these operations is staggering. Estimates vary, but
One scientist who has looked into the matter believes it is larger than the total
value of all the fruit-tree business in the United States.

To the scientist, the African Violet presents a unique opportunity. It
was domesticated within the last century. and we can readily compare the
wild and the cultivated plants and determine what has happened in the
Process of domestication. Wheat, corn, barley, oats, rice—these and virtually
all our other important cultivated plants—were evolved under the guidance
of man before the dawn of history. For none of them can we point to the
wild ancestors. What happens when plants are domesticated is still a scientific
puzzle. The African Violet is good experimental material for helping to
solve such riddles.

—E. A.

Note.—This special number of the BuLLETIN has been made possible
through the interest and enthusiasm of the Council of African Violet Clubs
of St. Louis and St. Louis County (an affiliate of the National African Violet
Society of America). Under the leadership of Mrs. Fred Tretter they have
planned and contributed the comprehensive series of articles which make up
the bulk of this issue of the BULLETIN.

(119)

120 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

THE auapyrinp ores pacioophae OF AMERICA
NIA ZIMMER
wae 2 ah African tae: Society

The African Violet Society of America, a national organization, was or-
ganized November 8, 1946. In its nine years of existence it has grown to a
membership of over 17,500. Miraculous though it may seem, this growth
parallels the popularity of the most versatile of house plants, the African
Violet. This membership, international in its scope, has been brought to-
gether by a common interest—the desire to learn more about and grow better
African Violets. This may best be expressed by our national motto: “To
stimulate a widespread interest in the propagation and culture of African
Violet everywhere.”

Through the African Violet Magazine, published quarterly by the Society,
can be found the solution to many problems that confront the growers who
wish to excel in producing outstanding specimen plants. In these magazines
one has a storehouse of information invaluable to both the amateur and
professional grower. Not only are there innumerable helpful articles by
noted horticulturists, but also research reports and the registration report.
All these articles plus those by noted amateur growers throughout the mem-
bership, in which problems and remedies are shared, are looked forward to
eagerly by the members. A Members’ Handbook is also published annually
with a complete list of all members and affiliated chapters. Available to the
affiliated chapters of the Society are color-slides, awards for local shows, and
judging-school information.

The activities of the Society are directed by a group of officers elected
annually and a Board of Directors who serve for a period of three years,
giving untiringly of their time and effort. The Society has eleven regions,
ten of which are in the United States, and one in the Dominion of Canada.
Each of these regions is under the supervision of a Regional Councilor, a per-
son talented and qualified, to whom other members in their region may turn
for advice and counsel.

At the national conventions, which are held annually, the members gather
in a spirit of friendliness and cordiality unsurpassed by other organizations.
The St. Louis chapters were very fortunate in being host to the national con-
vention of the African Violet Society of America in April of 1954. The
talks given were on subjects vital to African Violet culture, by noted
authorities. In conjunction with these meetings was held the National
African Violet Show in which any member in the country could enter speci-
men plants in competition for the ribbons and awards. Only at this time
can one see the wonderful plants exhibited by outstanding growers the
country over and the introductory plants shown for the first time. This is

indeed a sight to behold!

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 121

Affiliated and working closely with the African Violet Society of America
are the eleven chapters in the St. Louis area under the guidance of the Council
of St. Louis and St. Louis County. The organization of the first chapter in
the St. Louis area in January of 1949 and the second chapter within the year
was the nucleus from which the council was formed. On January of 1954
our last chapter applied for admittance into the council, thereby extending
the popularity of the African Violet in our local community to eleven
chapters.

The St. Louis and St. Louis County Council is directed by a group of
officers which are elected annually. Also Participating at the council meet-
ings are the president and two representatives from each chapter. At these
meetings, which are held twice a year, the members gather in a spirit of co-
operation and friendliness. This spirit has been felt not only in the two local
Violet shows staged by the St. Louis chapters but also in the tremendous
success of the national convention.

The African Violet Society is a most vigorous organization desirous of
bringing to all its members the knowledge most vital and imperative to the
successful growing of specimen plants. The African Violet is one of the
newest of house-plants, but in a short space of time it has captured the heart
of all flower growers. Growing African Violets is indeed a source of great
pleasure and handsomely rewards any effort put forth by the Violet-lover.

HOW TO TREAT AN AFRICAN VIOLET
MRS. G. W. ASCHEN, JR.
Amethyst African Violet Club

First, you’ve got to talk to ’em; my Mom says so—and she ought to
know—she talks to all her flowers and has the prettiest and healthiest speci-
mens in town. African Violets are alive too, just like us humans, and nee
lots of pampering and lov’n care.

Most growers lose sight of the fact they grow in damp cool places—so I
always pile pretty rocks and pebbles around the tops of mine, and it doesn’t
hurt ’em—they love it. Activated soil conditioner sprinkled over the tops
and worked in is also a boost to their morale, and as the song goes—

“You’ve gotta water ’em in the morning
Talk to ’em at night

Give ’em lots of lovin’

Treat ’em right,

For a PERFECT Violet is hard to find.”

122 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

GROWING AFRICAN VIOLETS UNDER FLUORESCENT LIGHT

ADELE TRETTER
President, Greater St. Louis African Violet Society

My method for starting African Violet plants is to break off a firm, crisp
leaf from a good, healthy plant. By breaking the leaf with a clean quick
oblique pull, you will not leave a small nubbin to spoil the appearance of the
plant. I always try to take a leaf from the second or third set of leaves.
(Violet leaves always grow in sets of three.) The petiole is then cut about
two inches in length. If the leaf is not firm, it will probably rot before it
makes roots. The leaf is then hung in a small medicine bottle filled with
Hyponex water ('4 teaspoon to 1 quart water). The bottle should be tall
enough so that the stem will hang without touching the bottom. The
bottles should be labelled so that you may be sure, one or two months later,
what plant each came from.

When the leaf has developed roots, it is removed from the bottle and
planted in vermiculite and sand. The leaves should be planted, if possible,
before the little plantlets appear. After the leaves start to sprout they are
watered every other week with Hyponex water. When the plant is about
14-2 inches high, the mother leaf is cut away. Sometimes it rots off before
then. The plants are left to grow until they are about 2—3 inches tall; then
they are removed from this medium and divided. This is done by gently

Bi-color African Violet exhibited at the National African Violet Show, April 22-24, 1954.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 123

pulling the little plants apart, being careful not to break the very fine hair
roots. Another pan is prepared with vermiculite and a small amount of my
planting soil. (I use damaged enamel refrigerator pans which can be pur-
chased very reasonably; mine measure about 12 % 12 and 12 X 24 inches. )
I use the small pans for planting leaves and the large one for the little plants.
These would be much too large for starting just one or two leaves, but the
same procedure is followed for few leaves using a small pan or a shallow
flower-pot.

I make a small hole in the mixture with a pencil or small knife. The
little plant is inserted, and the mixture is pressed close and tight enough to
hold the plant firm. The plants are spaced about 3 or 4 inches apart. Again
they are labelled. Small plastic markers are very nice for this as you can
write on them with a water-proof pencil and they will not rot. The pans
are watered once or twice a month with Hyponex plant food. When the
plants are at blooming size, they can be lifted and planted in 3-inch pots.
The mixture that clings to the roots should not be shaken off.

SOIL.—African Violets like a light, porous soil. My mixture varies, but
I have found the following to be about right. Using a pound-coffee can for
a measure, I take one measure soil, one measure leaf mold, one-quarter measure
sand, one-quarter measure vermiculite, large handful dried egg shells and one
handful charcoal (the charcoal they use for chickens); a small amount of
super-phosphate can be added. I do not use any fertilizers in my mixture as
I feed my plants about once or twice a month.

a, -
Gre ly @ 4,
' ere ae
< » &

Bench of African Violets grown by Mrs. Tretter.

124 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

WATER.—My plants are always watered from the top with warm water.

Plants should not be kept too wet as this would invite crown or root rot.

T.—African Violets like a lot of light, but not much sun. I found,
when I had plants in my windows, that those in the north windows did best
of all, and, they did not have any sun. The plants that do the best for me
are grown under fluorescent light. I have between 500 and 800 plants grown
under light. My lights are the 20- and 40-watt daylight tubes. There are
six 40-watt tubes over one table 14 feet long by 3 feet wide. There are eight
20-watt tubes over another table 6 feet long and 27 inches wide. The lights
are about 12 inches above the tops of the plants. They could be lower, but
it is difficult to water the plants when the lights are hanging too low. The
lights burn about fourteen hours a day. I, for one, would not give up
fluorescent lights for growing African Violets. The plants grow more sym-
metrical; you do not have to worry about turning them in the windows; and
they also have a much deeper shade of foliage and flowers.

A plant started in life with a good root system, not over-potted or over-
watered, under a good strong light, all the suckers removed, and fed about
once or twice a month, stands a good chance of becoming a show plant of
beauty.

THE AFRICAN VIOLET
MRS. W. F. AN SON
Viking pe he Society

The African Violet is really not a Violet at all, but a member of the
Gesneria family, plants having hairy leaves, and is a cousin of the Gloxinia,
Achimines, Episcia, and Columnea. However, the rest of the name is true;
the plants are native to East Africa where they are found growing both in
coastal and mountainous regions where the temperature never goes below 50°
nor above 100° F., the average being between 70° and 80°. The air has a
high moisture content, and the best plants flourish in shaded, wooded areas
among moist rocks, in cracks and depressions containing much organic matter
and rock particles. With this information about the native habitat of the
plants, those of you who are interested in horticulture would have sufficient
information to make these plants at home in their new environment in your
own home.

The African Violet was discovered by Baron Walter von St. Paul, who
sent plants and seeds to his father in Germany. The elder St. Paul gave some
of them to Hermann Wendland, then Director of the Royal Botanical Gardens
at Herrenhausen, near Hannover, who first described the plants botanically
in 1893 and gave the plant the genus name Saintpaulia, in honor of the
family, and the specific name, ionantha, from the Greek meaning “wit
flowers like a violet.” Several other species have been discovered in Africa

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 125

since that time and are gradually finding their way into cultivation, though
most of the present-day varieties are descended by mutation and cross-pollina-
tion from S. ionantha, the first species discovered.

African Violets were exhibited for the first time at the International
Horticultural Exhibit in Ghent in 1893. The first African Violet Show in
the United States was held in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1946. African Violets
have gained great popularity, and feature articles about them appear in the
garden and home magazines, and several books have been written about them.
It is only in the past few years that scientific research has been completed so
that we are beginning to get facts instead of old wives’ tales to guide us in
our culture. The national African Violet Society is sponsoring research at
several universities, and reports of the studies appear in the Society’s quarterly
magazine. Several universities have issued bulletins which give the amateur
a basic set of rules for culture. The Missouri Botanical Garden devoted its
March 1952 BuLLeTIN to African Violets.

Good results with African Violets depend not upon one factor, but a
combination of several factors. At best, we try to duplicate the native con-
ditions in which the plant thrives. If you have been growing them success-
fully, continue doing it your way! If you are not getting desirable results,
perhaps I can offer some suggestions which will help you. You will have to
experiment a bit until you find the right set of conditions in your home
which will bring both abundant bloom and good foliage.

One of the main requirements for beautiful African Violet plants is good
light. Since they flourish in shaded wooded areas in their native habitat, it is
obvious that this is no plant to grow in a flood of sunshine; but lacking suf-
ficient light the foliage grows rank and the plants do not bloom well. Many
growers prefer an east or north window, but African Violets can grow in
any window provided they are protected from the direct sunlight by a thin
screen to give filtered light. We can make a simple check to find if the
light intensity is right. Hold the hand about six inches above the foliage.
If a shadow is faintly visible, the light is right; if there is a distinct shadow,
some shade should be provided. If there is no shadow, the light is not strong
enough to develop blooms. Violets grow beautifully under fluorescent light
without any daylight.

One of the nicest things about our adopted East African natives is their
tolerance of our usual household heat. Too often house plants, for bloom
and survival, require temperatures of 60° or less, an uncomfortable state for
humans. The ideal temperature for Violets is between 70° and 80°. Mini-
mum temperature for good growth is 65°. Less than 60° checks both growth
and flowering. We should check plants at the window-sill to see that the
temperature there does not drop below 65° and that the leaves do not

126 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

actually touch the pane of glass. A circulation of fresh air around the plants
is essential, but they should not be subjected to cold drafts.

n the native habitat, the African Violet grows where there is a high
moisture content in the air. They prefer a humidity of 50-70 per cent. This
is one condition which we cannot meet in our home. We can, however,
maintain a high humidity in the immediate vicinity of the plants by setting
the pots on trays of damp sand or gravel, by spraying the plants with a fine
mist spray on dry days, or by growing them in the kitchen or the bathroom
where the steam from cooking or the shower fills the air. When the air is
too dry, buds fail to open.

In their native habitat, African Violets are found growing among moist
rocks in cracks and depressions. This gives us the ciue to their water require-
ments. The plants like to be kept moist but not wet. When we have learned
the difference between moist and wet soil we have progressed a long way
toward successful African Violet culture. The roots are very fine and
usually shallow-growing. The plant dies if allowed to wilt too often because
the fine roots dry up, and, on the other extreme, the roots rot if water-
logged. They need air in the soil for good health. The basic rules for water-
ing are easy to follow. Soak the plant thoroughly in warm water (rain
water preferred) when you water it; remove any excess, and don’t water
again until the soil surface feels dry, but don’t wait until the plant wilts.

Going back to the native habitat, we know that African Violets flourish
in cracks and depressions containing much organic matter and rock particles.
This tells us that they are shallow-rooted and require a soil that is light,
crumbly and porous, which drains well. Our notive soil is too fine and heavy
for Violets. They need only a moderately fertile soil, but it must be open
and well-aerated. By adding about two parts of humus and one part of
sharp sand to two parts of good loam, we get a basic potting soil which is
satisfactory. A slightly acid soil (pH 6.5) is best. By the addition of
humus in the form of oak-leaf mold we get a slightly acid potting soil. There
are as many recipes for potting soil as there are growers, and some fertilizer
may be added to the soil. However, too much fertilizer will stunt the plant,
and most growers prefer to use a light soil and feed as the Violets need it.
During and after a period of heavy blooming, some fertilizer will be bene-
ficial. Apply from the top in weak doses about once a month. Do not
apply to a dry plant, and don’t spill the fertilizer on the leaves. Heavy
feeding gives good foliage but little bloom. Small plants do not require
feeding until they reach blooming stage.

African Violets are relatively free from insects and diseases. Cyclamen
mite is one of the worst pests and can be controlled by sodium selenate.
Aphids, mealy bug, and thrips sometimes attack the plants and can be con-
trolled by nicotine sulphate or DDT. Nematodes are soil-borne and attack

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 127

the roots. There is no safe home control to destroy nematodes after they
have attacked a plant, but sterilizing the soil will prevent infection of clean
plants. The best pest control is prevention. Isolate all new plants before
introducing them to your collection. Keep Cyclamen plants, Gladiolus, and
Coleus away from the Violets, as they are our most likely source of Cyclamen
mite, thrip, and mealy bug in the home. Crown rot, which is responsible for
the death of a great many Violets, should not be considered a disease, but
rather the result of unfavorable conditions—too rich soil, water-logged plants,
or water standing in the crown.
Montague Free, in his book “All About African Violets,” says:

fertilizer, temperature, correct ea light, humidity, or freedom from pests—
the cultural structure has an uneasy balance and is likely to topple over.”

If you want to grow beautiful African Violets, first choose a variety that
has the habit of growth and the color of blossoms and the type of foliage
that you like. Choose one that will be attractive on your window-sill even
when it is out of bloom. Don’t waste your time trying to produce a specimen
plant from a poor variety. The color of Violet blossoms ranges from pure
white through shades of pink, orchid, and lavender, to deep purple. There is
no rose-red nor yellow Violet yet. Varieties vary in shape of blossoms, as
well as the number of blossoms produced on a stem, and in size of the blossom.
There are double varieties to duplicate nearly every color of the singles.
Foliage varies in color from light green to a deep bronze-green, with some
varieties having variegated foliage. Varieties vary greatly in growth habits.
Some have long petioles even when well grown; some are miniatures; some
have a flat, even habit of growth; some are upright growers; some are droopy.
There is one group of Violets designated as “girl type.” This has nothing to
do with the sex of the plant, but is a descriptive term commonly in use to
designate foliage with scalloped edges with a white or pale green splotch on
the leaf blade where it joins the petiole. The surface appearance of the leaf
varies with the variety. Some are quite hairy, while some are quite smooth,
almost waxy in appearance. The shape of the leaf varies from round, heart-
shaped, to narrow and pointed. The surface may be quilted, heavily veined,
spooned, or sometimes actually bent or wavy. Varieties that have poor habits
of growth are still propagated. Be choosy when you grow a plant! Grow
the varieties that are really beautiful for both foliage and blossoms.

Violets are easily propagated either by division, by a leaf-cutting, or from
seed. This may be one of the reasons for the rapid increase in popularity. It
is very simple to start a new plant from a leaf. Do this with discretion.
Don’t start every leaf that you break off accidentally. Be choosy. Propagate
only the varieties that are worth while.

128 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

WHITE ATTRACTION

MENTOR Boy—violet-blue PurpLe Prince—deep purple

LAVENDER BEAuTY—large-flowered Wire Hysriww

SOME AFRICAN VIOLET VARIETIES

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 129

If you are interested in starting a plant from a leaf, first choose a leaf that
has the most desirable shape. Choose a mature, healthy, well-formed leaf,
which is neither the oldest nor the youngest on the plant. Try to improve
your plants by careful propagation. Break the leaf off the plant so there is
no stub left to rot. Then cut off the petiole so there is 1-1 inches left
below the leaf blade. This leaf may be rooted in water, damp sand, vermic-
ulite, or in a loose potting soil which is not too rich. A very commonly used
Propagating mixture is equal parts of peat moss, sand, and vermiculite.

My favorite method for starting a leaf is to prepare a very small pot just
as I would for regular potting. For me this means protecting the pot rim
with a narrow band of foil on both sides, covering the drainage hole with one
large piece of broken pot, and then covering that with a shallow layer of
sphagnum moss before adding damp potting soil. Next, scoop out the cen-
ter to make a core. Inset the leaf, holding it about 14 inch below the soil
level and fill around the petiole with vermiculite. Support the leaf to keep
it from falling over, by leaning it against a small stick covered with a fat
pad of cotton. Place the pot in a saucer of water until the top soil is moist,
drain off any excess, then cover leaf and pot with an inverted glass. As long
as the leaf remains firm and healthy, all that is required is time until small
plants develop. The pot will need very little watering. If heavy condensa-
tion appears on the glass, I lift it off to let the pot dry out a little. If there
is no condensation, I know the pot needs watering. The pot is kept in a
light, warm but not sunny spot. When the little plants are about 1-114
inches tall it is time to separate them. The mother leaf is left on as long as
it remains healthy, until it begins to shade the young plants, or until time
for separate potting. Small plants should be grown in small pots until there

African Violet leaves being rooted in vermiculite.

130 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

is a mass of fine white roots around the earth ball or until the roots start to
come out of the drainage hole. Shift them to the next larger size pot; don’t
try to make a short cut at this time and put them in a large pot before they
are ready for it. Plants can be grown to blooming size in 21/2 to 3-inch pots,
and few Violets require larger than a 4-inch pot. Repot, adding fresh soil
about once a year. It is better to grow young plants for replacements than
to try to keep a Violet growing well for several years.
+

Here are a few do’s and don’ts for iiobadi

Don’t bury the leaf stem more than one-half inch. The young plants
develop at the end of the petiole. The deeper you bury the stem, the farther
the young plant has to go to reach the light

Support the leaf blade with a padded stick until it develops roots which
will hold it upright; otherwise, if it topples over it will break off the small
roots which have been forming

Do keep the soil moist but not wet, and cover the leaf to keep it in a
humid atmosphere so it won’t dry out until it gets established. Improvise a
temporary greenhouse or Wardian case, a refrigerator dish with a cover, the
inverted glass, a glass lid over a fish bowl, a plastic bowl cover for a lid, or
tie a cellophane or pliofilm bag over the pot.

Don’t over-pot your leaves or your Violet plants. It is easy to over-
water in too large a pot.

Do tamp the soil lightly so there are no air pockets when potting, but
don’t break off the roots by tamping hard, and don’t make the soil a hard,
tight, compact ball. When you have finished, the earth should remain light
and crumbly in the pot.

Here are a few suggestions for taking care of mature plants to produce
specimen plants:

Keep all dead and rotting leaves, blossoms and blossom stems removed.

Remove all suckers when small so they will not spoil the shape of the
plant.

Grow only one plant in a pot. Multiple crown plants are not specimen
plants.

Turn the plant about a quarter turn whenever it starts to lean to the
light, to keep the foliage growing even and symmetrical.

Keep the foliage free from dust by brushing gently with a very soft brush
or by washing under a gentle spray of tepid water.

If you have washed your plant or spilled water on the leaves, be sure it
has a chance to dry before setting back in the light to avoid water spot

Train the leaves in a symmetrical pattern and train replacements to fill
the gap when a leaf is removed or accidentally broken.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 131

With African Violets excesses are to be avoided. Over-potting, over-
watering, over-feeding, and too much shade will produce good foliage but no
flowers. The Violet’s demands are few but constant. Such a handsome
flowering plant is worth a little trouble. Even when out of bloom, if well
grown, the African Violet can be an asset to your window garden for its
foliage alone. If you will try to duplicate its native habitat you should have
beautiful blooming plants.

PESTS AND DISEASES
JEANETTE RIEFLING
President, Evening Sunset African Violet Club

Like most amateur growers of African Violets, I have lost my share of
plants. Luckily, I have had no trouble with pests, but most likely my losses
were due to my own carelessness or irregularity in care of plants. My plants
grow on north window-sills and get the regular or irregular care that a busy
working-person can give them.

Among the pests that worry African Violets are: mites (Cyclamen and
broad mites), mealy bugs, nematodes, black flies, springtails, thrips, and
aphids. One of the best ways to avoid any pest or disease is to isolate any new
plants or any apparently sickly plant so healthy plants are not affected. If
a plant persists in being wilted, dwarfed, or sickly it is best to discard it.

Mites may not get too firm a hold on a healthy plant, but they are a
serious problem and need careful attention. The Cyclamen mite, very small,
is the harder to fight. It attacks young plants and young leaves in the crown,
causing a dwarfed misshapen leaf, usually with hard, upturned leaf edges and
more than usual hairiness. Broad mites are more likely to attack the under-
sides of leaves, causing them to curl down. Mites are most troublesome in hot
weather. Since the treatment, according to authorities, is effected by rather
dangerous poisons, an amateur had better discard plants with mites.

Mealy bugs usually affect the place where a leaf joins the main stalk. Any
one who raises plants of any kind is familiar with this white or gray cottony-
looking pest. There are commercial remedies for mealy bugs, but they may
be exterminated by touching affected spots with cotton dipped in rubbing
alcohol. Since the alcohol has a burning and dehydrating effect, it is well
to wash off the alcohol, or at least dilute it, soon after application.

Nematodes are the most deadly of all the pests. Commercial growers use
commercial preparations to exterminate them. The amateur had best discard
the plants affected. After hearing a talk on nematodes the amateur is sure
that not only his Violets, but he himself has nematodes. In reality, from
knowledge and inquiry, relatively few amateur growers ever have them.

132 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Varieties of nematodes range from microscopic to nearly one-quarter inch
long. The longer the variety, the more likely they are to be harmless. Knotted
petioles (leaf stems), knots, galls, or swelling of roots and root decay are, in
general, symptoms of nematodes. An accurate diagnosis requires a nema-
tologist. As is usual with any diseased plant, discard the plant with nematodes.

Aphids, as most of you know, are insects that suck the sap from plants.
In your garden it is easy to detect aphids by the presence of ants. In the
house you will have to see the insect itself. As a remedy, use usual methods
for aphids.

Thrips, springtails, and black flies are named among the lesser pests. I
have had no springtails, and hope I do not, although they are not harmful.
They sound very interesting to see, from the way they spring about

The greatest difficulties you will meet in raising the African Violet are
crown rot and petiole rot. In crown rot the whole crown turns brown and
the leaves get jelly-like. In most cases this is due to too much water. I find
too little water acts the same way. The best thing to do in either case is to
watch each plant carefully and note the amount of water it uses. Crown rot
usually is caused by allowing water to settle down into the crown. This does
not mean one should not water from the top, but that in watering from the
top water should not be allowed to settle in the crown. When watering from
the bottom, an incrustation forms on the top of the soil and on the collar of
the pot. It is well to keep this washed off. If you are having crown rot,
trim off all affected leaves. Often you can go on from here; again you might

wn rot on Saintpaulia plants. Plant e left is completely
shes oll: that on the right is badly affected hee en could be saved.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 133

have to repot. The petiole rot is usually caused by the leaf stem resting on
the top of the pot where dampness and incrustation causes it to rot and
collapse. If the tops of pots are well covered with metal foil, most of your
trouble will be eliminated. Glazed pots are a good protection to the petiole,
but with them it is harder to control the proper amount of water needed.

On the whole, prevention, not cure, is the better method with African
Violets. They are a much hardier plant than most people suppose, and they
really reward their careless owners more than is deserved. Give regular and
consistent care; study the amount of water that gives best results; water
from top or bottom with warm water (slightly above room temperature) ;
fertilize with some such product as Hyponex as directed on package (that is,
if you have not used some fertilizer when potting the plant); do not plant
African Violets too deep; keep window-sills or shelves where you have them
free from dust; you may occasionally wash the plants at the sink by gently
spraying but be sure you do not shock them with too great a change in tem-
perature; do not allow sun to shine on the leaves or they will be burned. Do
these things and you may enjoy healthy flowering plants.

nd that containers with an inch or more of sand are best to set the
potted plant in. Then water from the top and allow excess water to lose
itself in the sand. If the sand is kept moist, I find that, even through hot
weather, my plants have healthier and greener leaves and develop blossoms.

For those who may wish to do some reading on their own, the following
bibliography is given:

African Violet, a quarterly publication of the National African Violet
Society. Three dollars and fifty cents a year gives national membership and
the magazine. Or, if you are a member of a local violet club, your $3.50
gives you membership in the local club in addition to the above.

Readers’ Guide to Periodical Literature gives under listing, “African
Violet,” magazine articles on the African Violet.

African Violets, by Helen Van Pelt Wilson. $2.95 at local stores. Con-
tains 250 pages of extremely readable material on African Violets. The
author knows her violets, knows how to tell it and, above all, gives freely of
her experience and methods.

All About African Violets, by Montague Free. $3.50 at Iccal stores. Th’s
book of 250 pages covers about the same material as the above but in a dif-
ferent way. While Mrs. Wilson writes of her own Violets, and you realize it,
she writes in a more general way. In Mr. Free’s book you are not only read-
ing about his Violets, but you get refreshing sidelights on the man and ex-
perience some of your own experiences with him. Both books should be on
your coffee-table or other handy table where friends who drop in might enjoy
themselves and at the same time get some knowledge of this lovely plant, the
African Violet.

134 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN
THE THERAPEUTIC VALUE OF AFRICAN VIOLETS
HOPE HOLLOWAY ZIMMERMAN
lonantha Society

The thought entered my mind as I was tying blue ribbon on an especially
beautiful plant at the recent National Show that if the judging were based
on the amount of good the plant had accomplished for its owner how different
the display would have appeared. In all probability the plants which would
have won the most blue ribbons were still at home enjoying life on their own
favorite window-sill or in a basement. In fact, they might well have had no
qualifying points at all. They could easily be just one straggly little leaf
with only faint indications of a root system. For that is really all it takes to
absorb the owner completely and make her (or him) forget the frustrations
of life.

How many times have I retreated to my Violets when the pressure seemed
too great to bear—when my teen-age daughters’ theme song, “We must have
more clothes,” and my husband’s, ““We must cut down on the bills” seemed
like a continuous beating of drums in my ears; when the girls’ discussions
develop into an argument and then literally become a fight, and my aged
parents who live with us offer their advice on rearing children; when far more
serious world problems come shouting over the radio and staring from the
headlines to envelop one in a state of depression! Then again my Violets come
to the rescue and if I can discover a bud on Edith Cavelle (would that I
could!) then I have new strength and courage to enter the fray more calmly
and objectively.

But my own needs and fulfillments are probably infinitesimal in com-
parison to the accomplishments of violets in other homes. There were many
such stories at the recent convention. One that I cannot forget concerned
a woman who was saved from a nervous breakdown when she became inter-
ested in raising African Violets.

There is something about this plant that has the ability or power to com-
pletely absorb attention during the time spent with it. And it also has the
power to make its owner appear slightly foolish to non-converts. When, for
example, one shovels snow and carries it into the house, neighbors are apt to
shake their heads. They cannot understand, of course, how those plants are
thirsting for nature’s own liquid without the benefit of man-made chemicals.
And when friends are telephoned and asked to please not throw away the
water from the refrigerator after defrosting, they too are apt to wonder if
a psychiatrist might be needed. They do not realize that it is just such
actions that are keeping the psychiatrist away from the door.

Husbands are not at all likely to understand or appreciate the vernacular
that absorbs their wives vocabulary. I will omit my husband’s retort when
I proudly announced that Mrs. Pink Cheer had just had twins.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 135

CROSS POLLINATION FOR PROPAGATION FROM SEED
GRACE B. WAYMAN
President, Viking Society

Starting African Violets from seed is one of the most interesting under-
takings you can experience in the growing of house-plants. The process is
still more interesting if you start from scratch and obtain the seeds from
your own plants.

I have read that African Violets occasionally do set seeds in the wild, but
not very freely. On close-up inspection of a flower, you will note that the
styles point to the right or left, well away from the pollen-bearing anthers.
This probably is to prevent self-pollination. The African Violet not only
avoids self-pollination, but I have read that it is difficult to secure cross-
pollination. However, I found it very simple. The style is the stalk of the
pistil, and at its base is the ovary containing ovules, which, when fertilized,
develop into seeds. At its tip is the stigma, a tiny knot on which the pollen
grains germinate to effect fertilization. The pollen is produced in two 2-
lobed anthers placed back to back, and there it stays unless the anthers are
separated. We can only imagine how pollination can be achieved in the wild,
but the following method is how I achieved it in my home.

Apply dark nail-polish to both thumb-nails. Place left thumb-nail
beneath the anthers and crush them down on it with the thumb-nail of the
other hand. This results in a deposit of pollen on the thumb-nail which is, in
turn, gently smeared on the stigma of the flower selected to be a female
parent.

In my experience I have not as yet had a failure. Every flower I pollinated
had a seed-pod. Some of the seed-pods, even though they all had been
pollinated at the same time, were very small, while others were quite large.
I cannot say if this was caused by the amount of pollen applied, or whether
some varieties set larger seed-pods than others. It could be caused by using
the pollen of a flower too old or too young, or by selecting as the female
parent a flower too old or too young. I found the best results were obtained
when mature, but not fading, flowers were used, both to provide pollen and
to receive it.

After a week or ten days, if fertilization has been effected, the ovaries
will begin to swell, and in six weeks will look like an orange or grapefruit
seed, but still far from being ripe. Some seed-pods ripen in four to five
months from pollination to harvest of seed; others, from six to nine months.
I do not know the reason for this, nor, as I have before mentioned, what
determines the size of the seed-

Another mystery to me is whether the time-lapse between ripening and
sowing of seeds has any bearing on the time of germination and the number

136 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

of seedlings. I have read that seeds planted about two or three weeks after
ripening will germinate in about two weeks. I tried this and the results were
amazing. I started transplanting the largest seedlings about three weeks after
germination. I continued transplanting daily to prevent crowding and loss
of what might be unusual plants.

If you care to grow African Violets through pollination of your own
plants, try this method. I feel sure you will have success and bring to us and
the world more beautiful specimens of the flower we love—The African
Violet.

AFRICAN VIOLETS RAISED UNDER GLASS
RUTH LOCKERT*
West Chicago, Illinois

Of course, to me, Violets raised anywhere are extremely interesting. We
do not raise all our plants here in the greenhouse. We have not space enough
or time. I buy new hybrids and raise some of the older varieties. It is very
much easier to get plants to bloom in the greenhouse. Your light and sun-
light can be regulated more easily. Humidity is so important, and by water-
ing under benches, glass walls, or in alleys between benches, it is always
possible to get the humid air Violets thrive in.

Problems in glasshouse gardening are quite different than in a home.
Greenhouses seldom have warm enough temperatures. Most flowers and
plants raised commercially are cool-growing. Violets will live in a day tem-
perature of 60 degrees and nights of 45 or 50 degrees, but will not grow well
or fast, so to have any success raise them by themselves. Many tropical plants,
and other plants of the African Violet family such as Gloxinias, Gesneriads,
and Episcias, will grow well under the same conditions as Violets. I have
raised Gloxinias, but African Violets are the most popular.

Shading the greenhouse glass should begin, in this area, in April and be
continued till September, or as long as the sun is hot. We find it necessary
to screen inside with curtains or something the light will sift thrcugh. This
may sound difficult, but is actually not hard at all.

It is such a help for a commercial grower, as well as collector, to go to
conventions whenever it can be arranged. So much help is given on soil,
fertilizing, and new methods of mixing and sterilizing your own soil. Steril-
izing is a must even for the amateur. Meeting friends, learning others’ ex-
periences, all are to be considered in any hobby. We never can get too
educated in something we are trying to do.

* Mrs, Lockert is not a member of any of the African Violet Clubs of Greater St. Louis,
but this article was requested from her in order to include some material on greenhouse
culture of African Violets.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 137

There is much information, free for the asking. We are very new at this
business, and I have picked up literature all over, and reading, with experience
of course, is helpful. I still enjoy trading rare plants, and have quite a
collection of unusual things.

I have a large collection of Begonias, Geraniums, Cacti, also many Violets,
which was the beginning of this business, starting a very interesting and
self-supporting business from a hobby.

Thanks for reading thus far, and hope you have become just a little more
interested in growing Violets wherever it is possible. They are such fun in the
home or greenhouse. Good growing to all, and learn. Much love and patience
is required to become a good flower-grower.

MY HOBBY
MRS. JOSEPH GERSBACHER
President, Holly African Violet Society

When I first started to grow and collect my vast number of African
Violets, I did not know there were so many varieties. We had a bungalow
with nice sunroom windows on three sides, and large trees shaded my west
windows. My plants in the west window got only sun when it was setting.

I could never pass a florist’s shop without going in, and of course I came
out with one or two plants. How quickly things began to happen as the
weeks went by! My plants began to bloom, and that was all I needed to get
me started on more plants. I also found that you have to stimulate root
growth in African Violets to give good performance. The roots must be
loose and you must have a good soil mixture.

I sent samples of soil my husband had mixed for me to the University of
Missouri, at Columbia, and it was returned pronounced O.K., which pleased
me very much. I plant my leaves in vermiculite to start them and cover
them with wax paper in which a few holes have been drilled. This is a sterile
inert medium for cut leaves and root growth. At first I was very proud of
my blue African Violets, but as time went by I heard of new varieties and I
went on a buying spree. I sent away for many others, waiting impatiently
for the mail. Then we had our first show in Webster Groves and I bought
many leaves and plants. I also joined a club. I had to move my plants to
the basement, and now we have them under fluorescent lights of the industrial
type.

I water my plants from the saucer when I think they are dry. I found
out in the beginning that my trouble was watering either too much or not
enough. I use only rain water or water obtained when my refrigerator is
defrosted or that from my fish aquarium. I also feed my plants every two
weeks and keep them clean from bugs. I water in the morning when the

138 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

temperature is rising. The reason for this is that if water is accidentally spilled
on the leaves and the temperature falls to any extent, the evaporation of water
may reduce the injury from chilling which causes brown spots on the leaves.

If your soil is porous there is little danger of over-watering. I use crushed
flower-pot chips or chicken grit in the bottom of my pots to allow drainage.
These are some of the things I had to learn. I think one of the most im-
portant things is a good, balanced, loose soil mixture. Good food, fresh air,
humidity, light, and proper watering are also necessary. All this has been
successful for m

MISCELLANEOUS DATA ON THE AFRICAN VIOLET
THELMA USINGER
Amethyst African Violet Club

Many thousands of people from all parts of the world have seen and ad-
mired the Saintpaulias (African Violets) at the Missouri Botanical Garden
since 1908; but not for thirty-eight years were they to become popular. A
show was held in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1946, by a small group of people. A
local society was then formed by those who had attended the show. From
that beginning, the African Violet Society of America was brought into being.

The African Violet Society of America, Inc. now has over 18,000 mem-
bers in the United States and foreign countries. Each member receives a
quarterly magazine devoted to African Violet culture. Since variety is the
spice of life, that surely applies to African Violets, for not only are there over
1,000 varieties, there is great variety in the method used to attain success by
the men, women, and children who grow them.

African Violets can be grown in any window or by artificial light. Some
people prefer to grow them in their basements under fluorescent lights; others
prefer window-sills or shelves. Although African Violets need sunlight,
strong rays must be filtered through curtains or tissue paper to prevent plant
damage. Many methods are used to raise these plants, but one rule seems
universal: If the plants are to grow symmetrically, they must be turned often.

atering is important. Plants must not be over-watered, nor under-
watered. Watering may be done from the top or bottom of the container.
The type of water is dictated by preference, but it should be tepid. Water
straight from the faucet, with faucet water allowed to stand over night, or
rain water may be used. Plants should be watered only when the soil feels dry.

New plants may be started by placing a leaf in water in a small glass
container (clear or colored). A pan or tray two inches deep should be pre-
pared with very moist (not wet) vermiculite for planting the leaf when
hair-line roots develop. Holes may be made in the vermiculite with a pencil

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 139

and the leaf inserted. The vermiculite can be pushed up loosely around the
stem so that the leaf stands upright. The tray should be watered whenever
the vermiculite feels dry. When the young plants are a fair size, use a spoon
to lift them out and carefully separate the plantlets from the parent leaf
into small pots or another tray. This time, the tray should be filled with
vermiculite over a one-inch base of peat moss (humus). Proceed as men-
tioned before. The plants may stay in this mixture until ready for three-inch
pots. I prefer this pan method to pots because it takes care of more plants
and conserves space. The parent leaf can be re-rooted again if it is firm.

When the plants need to be transplanted to three-inch pots, a package of
African Violet soil may be purchased, or you may mix your own from the
following formula: 1 part soil, 1 part sand, 2 parts peat moss. Add a little
bone meal and charcoal to the mixture. A small piece of broken pot should
be placed over the hole in the bottom of the three-inch pot, which should be
filled part way with the above mixture. Put the plant in the pot and gently
hold up the leaves while spooning in dirt around the plants. Later, when the
roots grow through the hole the plant needs repotting. To remove the plant
hold the pot firmly in one hand while hitting the rim quite hard with a
hammer. As a rule, the pot will break on both sides; if not, turn the pot
around and strike it again. Replant in the larger pot without disturbing the
roots. Again, you spoon in the dirt to fill the pot, and then water.

here is no need to “baby” the plants, but they should not be neglected

either. When you bring a new plant home, wait several weeks before putting
it with the other plants, until you are sure it is free of insects and disease.

It is not essential that you join an African Violet club to raise African
Violets successfully. However, by doing so, you are given an opportunity
to further your knowledge and to discuss your problems with people who
enjoy the same hobby.

AN AFRICAN VIOLET GROWER
RUTH PENROD

President, County Belles African Violet Society
Mr. Harry O’Brien, of “Dirt Gardener” fame, who was the guest speaker
at the dinner during the African Violet Convention held at the Chase Hotel,
April 22, 23, 24, said in his speech that members of the Society were 50 per
cent nuts and 50 per cent fuddy-duddies! Lo and behold! I picked up the
July Flower Grower magazine, and there, in the article “The Weather-
vane,” the author, Montague Free, who is well known to flower-growers,
quotes Mr. O’Brien and adds, “I would guess that these percentages are wrong

140 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

—75% nuts, 20% normal gardeners, and 5% fuddy-duddies is natural for
any single plant society, most of whose members belong in the ‘one man dog’
class, profoundly uninterested in any plants except those to which they are
fanatically devoted.”

I guess I have fallen into the 100 per cent nut class as I have been bitten
by the African Violet bug, and my other plants, much as I love them, will
have to join the “Plants Must Go Club” so there will be more room for the
Violets. African Violets have won my heart completely. Each day brings
forth new discoveries, new thrills, and once in a while such joy to find a new
little plantlet emerging from the soil that you have mixed and sterilized your-
self. My friends and relatives alike think that I am “real gone” as I talk
African Violets to any one who will listen. Well, I wondered about this “nut”
business myself the other day as my seven-year-old nephew, whom I was
visiting, whispered quite loudly to his playmate, “That’s my Aunt Ruthie,
she’s crazy about African Violets.” I smiled with the expectancy of a smile
in return, but instead they both looked at me as if I were deadly poison. Were
they looks of disgust or contempt? I looked for a hole to craw! in.

Just recently I read of putting lady-bugs around plants which had manure
in the soil. The manure attracts small black flies which the lady-bugs devour.
So out I went to the garden in search of lady-bugs, laughing and thinking to
myself that I should have a butterfly net and a pith helmet. I wondered
what the neighbors would think if they knew what I was hunting for. Just
when the hunting became more than just a game of hide-and-seek, a car drove
in the drive-way and out stepped my better-half; “what ’cha looking for,
doll, lose something?” “Looking for lady-bugs,” I called back, trying to
snare one last evasive creature. “Say, you had better watch out or that man
with the net will be out looking for you,” he shouted. With that last remark
I literally slithered in behind him into the house, taking a peek out the door
to see if any one heard us.

Perhaps we are “nuts,” we members of the African Violet Society, but
some day you too may lose your heart to an African Violet and you’ll not be
a 75 per center or a fuddy-duddy but you'll be “real gone”’—a real 100 per
center. I suspect that both Mr. O’Brien and Mr. Free are both pretty “nuts”
themselves, as Mr. Free has contributed greatly to the knowledge of African
Violet culture by writing the book “All About African Violets” and Mr.
O’Brien even, once in a while, writes about Maggie’s African Violets.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 141

Boox REviEws:—

Songbirds in your Garden. By John K. Terres. 274 pp., illust. Thomas
Y. Crowell Co., New York. 1953. $3.95.

Express highways, super-shopping areas and low ranch houses highlight
the trend toward country living. Accompanying these major changes of
scene new interests are being awakened in the out-of-doors. Suburbanites
are seeking information on gardening, wild plants and animals. This
tells of a new type of bird-watching. The early morning bird trip in field
and wood can be replaced by bidding the birds into your own yard. Terres
explains in much detail the kinds of foods, the types of bird houses, baths and
nesting sites that can be provided at little trouble and expense; and the book
is easily read for all of this practical information is bound together by a series
of beguiling bird stories.

Although his experience attracting nearly 100 species of birds has largely
been in the vicinity of New York the information he presents can generally
be applied throughout the country, and appendices are given for the kinds of
birds and their favored foods for the whole United States. Terres encourages
grosbeaks, orioles, sparrows and starlings alike although he recommends
glassed-in feeders and swaying sticks or suet holders for the smaller birds.
The chapter on ornamental plantings for birds lists shrubs and trees as Dog-
wood, Pin Cherry, Barberry and Cedar that offer food for birds and are at-
tractive plantings as well. Coarse cereals, fruits, breads and especially nuts
will attract birds all the year but the author emphasizes the importance of
continuous winter feeding, for once the birds have recognized your feeding
station they will depend upon it. Some of these techniques of attracting birds
are new, some are modifications of old methods and one is as ancient as the
first Americans, for, as Edwin Way Teale writes in the introduction of this
book, the American Indians hung hollow gourds around their villages to
provide nesting sites for purple martins.—Alice F. Tryon

The Secret of the Green Thumb. By Henry and Rebecca Northen. 431
pp- The Ronald Press, New York. 1954. Price $5.00.

Regardless of how green your thumb happens to be, it will certainly be a
little greener after you have read the “Secret of the Green Thumb” by Henry
and Rebecca Northen. This new book is designed to give the average gard-
ener an insight into the inner workings of that complicated system called a
plant. The scientific facts which form the basis of our knowledge of plant
growth and development are presented in non-technical language, and these
facts are related to actual practice and garden care

Not only have the authors achieved the difficult task of explaining tech-

142 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

nical facts and theories in a simple, easy-to-understand language, but they
have even gone one step further. In their interesting and easy-going style,
the reader actually finds himself enjoying the technical material. All in all,
the book seems to fill a definite need and can be highly recommended for all
garden enthusiasts.—R.G.

The California Academy—Lingnan Dawn Redwood Expedition. By J.
Linsley Gressitt. Calif. Acad. Sci. Proc., Ser. IV, 28:25-58, 13 text-figs.
San Francisco, July 15, 1953. $.60.

The Dawn Redwood (Metasequoia gly ptostroboides ) has been heralded as
one of the epic-making plant discoveries of the 20th century. Much has
already been written about this plant, both in scientific journals as well as
newspapers. The present first-hand record by Dr. J. Linsley Gressitt, now
of the Bernice P. Bishop Museum at Honolulu, is one of the liveliest and
certainly the most comprehensive description of the Dawn Redwood in its
native habitat that has yet appeared in print.

In 1948, the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco sent Dr.
Gressitt and a crew recruited from Lingnan University at Canton, China, to
the only locality the Metasequoia is known to grow—30 to 75 miles south
of Wan Hsien on the Yangtze River on the borders of Szechuan and Hupe
Provinces below Chungking. The expedition spent nearly five months in
this region. The discovery of the living Dawn Redwood in this area by the
Chinese botanist, T. Wang, in 1944 brought to life what previously had been
known only as fossils. Formerly, the Metasequoia occurred over wide areas
in the western hemisphere, and recently it has been shown that the Meta-
sequoia was abundant in western United States some thirty million years ago.

In its present home, the Dawn Redwood has long suffered from the rav-
ages of mankind. However, the expedition counted 1219 Metasequoia trees,
and the author reports that the tree is still reproducing quite freely. The
largest specimen found was 115 feet tall and 8 feet in diameter.

The 34-page booklet is illustrated by 13 excellent photographs of the
Dawn Redwood in the wild, taken by the author.—F. G. Meyer.

THE FIRST WORLD ORCHID CONFERENCE

Elsewhere in this BULLETIN will be found mention of the Orchid Exhibi-
tion to be staged at the Garden, October 15-17, in connection with the World
Orchid Conference, sponsored by the American Orchid Society, Inc., with
the cooperation of the Missouri Botanical Garden and the Orchid Society of
Greater St. Louis, with headquarters at the Hotel Chase. The tentative
program is as follows:

9:00 a.

10:00 a.

2:00 p-

8:00 p.

9:00 a.

12:30 p-

3:00 p.

8:00 p.

m.

m.

m.

m.

m.

m.

m.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 143

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 15

Registration and General Meeting—Regency Room, Hotel
Chase.

Mr. George W. Butterworth, Sr., President of the American
Orchid Society, Inc., presiding.

“What is a Fine Orchid?”—Regency Room.

Moderator, G. Robert Lowry, Missouri Botanical Garden.

Mr. Ira Haupt (New York), Mr. Robert Scully (Florida),

Mrs. L. Sherman Adams (Massachusetts), Mr. William Kirch

(Honolulu, Hawaii), Mr. Gordon Hoyt (Washington), Mr.

Takumi Kono (Hilo, Hawaii), and others.

Orchid Exhibition, Missouri Botanical Garden.

Group discussions on special features.

Tour of Missouri Botanical Garden and Museum.

Symposium: “Recent Advances in Orchid Knowledge” —
Regency Room.

“Pure Research and Its Application”—Dr. John T. Curtis,
Prof. of Botany, University of Wisconsin.

“New Developments in Growing Methods and Equipment”—
Dr. O. Wesley Davidson, Prof. of Horticulture, Rutgers
University.

“Orchid Diseases and Their Treatment”—Dr. D. D. Jensen,
Assoc. Prof. of Entomology, University of California.

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 16
Professional Growers’ Session—Regency Room, Hotel Chase.
Moderator—Joseph Hampton, B. O. Bracey Co.
Several short talks by selected professional growers.
Luncheon—Tiara Room, Park Plaza Hotel.
Speaker—Dr. Gustav A. L. Mehlquist, Professor of Floricul-
ture, University of Connecticut.
Public Education Session—Tiara Lounge, Park Plaza Hotel.
Moderator—Gordon W. Dillon, American Orchid Society, Inc.
“Orchid Societies, Their Problems and Hopes.”
“Orchid Publications, Their Problems and Responsibilities.”
“Orchid Shows.”
Amateur Growers’ Session—Regency Room.
Moderator—Mrs. Rebecca T. Northen, author of ‘Home
Orchid Growing.”

144 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 17
9:00 a.m. Science and Research Session—Regency Room.
Panel—Dr. Lewis Knudson, Cornell University, Chairman;
Dr. John T. Curtis, Dr. O. Wesley Davidson, Dr. D
Jensen, Dr. Gustav A. L. Mehlquist.
11:30 a.m. Busses will leave the Chase Hotel for Gray Summit Orchid
Range of Missouri Botanical Garden.
1:00 p.m. Lunch, courtesy of Missouri Botanical Garden.
2:00 p.m. Tour of Gray Summit Orchid Range. Busses return to Hotel
Chase.
7:30 p.m. Banquet (Informal—Reservations) — Starlight Roof, Hotel
ase.
Résume of Sessions.
Summary of Conference Accomplishments.
Presentation of Conference Awards.
MONDAY, OCTOBER 18
For those who are interested a visit to see the plastic greenhouses of Mr.
and Mrs. F. O. Reh, of Belleville, Illinois, will be possible on the day follow-

ing the conclusion of the Conference. Arrangements can be made directly
with Mr. and Mrs. Reh.

REGISTRATION
The registration fee will be $5.00 for each person. Tickets for individual
activities are separately priced, and total $17.75, registration included. How-
ever, a special rate of $15.00 for advance registration will provide registra-
tion badge and ticket booklet for all scheduled activities. Please use registra-
tion envelope, making check or money order payable to the American Orchid
Society, Inc. Send in your registration at once. Badge, ticket and program

will be ready for you on your arrival.
REGISTRATION FORMS
For registration envelopes, programs, hotel reservation cards, etc., write
to Chairman, Local Committee on Registration, Mr. John E. Nies, 7 Haw-
thorne Court, Kirkwood 22, Missouri, or First World Orchid Conference,

American Orchid Society, Inc., Botanical Museum of Harvard University,
Cambridge, Mass.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 145

HORTICULTURAL COURSES IN 1954 AND 1955

The following courses in horticulture will be given by the Garden during
1954 and 1955. Except for the Orchid course all will be given in the Experi-
mental Greenhouse at the Garden, 2315 Tower Grove Avenue. Please send
all registration fees to:

Horticultural Courses,
Missouri Botanical Garden,
2315 Tower Grove Ave.,
St. Louis 10, Mo.

As materials for each course are purchased after the closing registration
date no registration fees can be refunded after the last day of registration for
any particular course.

CoursE I—GRAFTING AND BUDDING

Two Sections (Indicate your choice) :
1. Friday, Sept. 17, 8:00 P. M., or
2. Saturday, Sept. 18, 2:00 P. M.

Registration.—Sept. 1-Sept. 16 for individual Friends of the Garden,
others Sept. 10-Sept. 16. Limited to 30.

This three-hour course is offered for those amateur gardeners who wish to
learn something of the principles of grafting. A lecture will explain the
basic fundamentals of grafting along with detailed descriptions of the various
types of grafts and their uses. A work session will consist of supervised
grafting on practice material; following this each student will graft a
lamartine lilac on privet stock and bud a hybrid tea rose on a multiflora rose
stock. Each student will be privileged to take home his grafted material.

Registration Fee, $5.00.

Course IIJ—BuLB Forcinc

Nine Sections (Indicate your choice) :
Wednesday, Oct. 27, 1:30-4:00 P. M.

or
Thursday, Oct. 28, 9:30—12:00 M.

2
or

3. Friday, Oct. 29, 1:30-4:00 P. M.
or

4. Wednesday, Nov. 3, 1:30-4:00 P. M.
or

5. Thursday, Nov. 4, 9:30—-12:00 M.

or

146 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

6. Friday, Nov. 5, 1:30-4:00 P. M.
or

7. Wednesday, Nov. 10, 1:30-4:00 P. M.
or

8. Thursday, Nov. 11, 9:30-12:00 M.

or
9. Friday, Nov. 12, 1:30-4:00 P. M.

Registration.—Sept. 15—Oct. 20 for individual Friends of the Garden,
others Oct. 1-Oct. 20. Limited to 200.

Forcing spring bulbs in the home is one of the easiest, quickest and
cheapest methods by which the home gardener can obtain a succession of
attractive flowers. A brief lecture will explain the methods and techniques
of bulb forcing. Following this, each student will be given five pots of
bulbs (one pot each of tulips, narcissus, paperwhites, hyacinths and calla lily)
to plant. These pots will be stored in the Garden cold-frames until ready to
flower. At this time each student is notified by post-card that his bulbs are
ready to be picked up for forcing in the home. Since the greenhouse is used
for various projects the Garden cannot assume responsibility for any bulbs
remaining on the premises longer than two weeks after notification cards are
sent out.

Registration Fee, $5.00.

Course IJI—PLant PropacaTiIon

Four Sections (Indicate your choice) :
Friday, Jan. 21, 8:00—-10:00 P. M. and
Friday, Jan. 28, 8:00-10:00 P. M.

or
Monday, Jan. 24, 8:00-10:00 P. M. and

ea
Monday, Jan. 31, 8:00-10:00 P. M.
or
3. Wednesday, Feb. 2, 1:30-3:30 P. M. and
Wednesday, Feb. 9, 1:30-3:30 P. M.
or
4. Friday, Feb. 4, 8:00-10:00 P. M. and

Friday, Feb. 11, 8:00-10:00 P. M.

Registration Dec. 15-Jan. 15 for individual Friends of the Garden,
others Jan. 2—Jan. 15. Limited to 60.

The course in plant propagation will be offered in two periods of two.
hours each. The first session will give the student a general background in
the basic methods of plant Propagation with actual practice in the making
of cuttings. Each student will receive a propagation pan and cuttings to

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 147

take home. The second session will deal with new methods in plant propaga-
tion. A lecture will describe these methods and show how they can be
adapted for home use. In the practice session, each student will receive one
full size plastic-covered propagating unit (lippigator) with a variety of plant
material.

Registration Fee covering both periods, $10.00.

Course IV—EmsBryro CULTURE TECHNIQUE

One Section—Friday, Feb. 18, 8:00-10:00 P. M.

Registration.—Feb. 1—Feb. 15 for individual Friends of the Garden, others
Feb. 5—Feb. 15. Limited to 10.

This course is being offered at the request of several plant breeders who
want to learn this rather specialized technique which is of benefit to the
professional as well as to the amateur plant breeder.

Registration Fee, $10.00.

CoursE V—OrcHIps FOR AMATEURS

One Section—Thursday, April 14, 10:00 A. M.—3:00 P. M.

Place.—Orchid Greenhouse, Missouri Botanical Garden Arboretum, Gray
Summit, Mo.

Registration.—March 15—April 14 for individual Friends of the Garden,
others April 1—-April 14. Limited to 25.

Morning: 10:00—-12:00 A. M., Tour of the greenhouse with a discussion
of orchid watering, ventilating, and lighting. Lunch: 12:00—-1:00, coffee
furnished. Afternoon: 1:00-3:00, Discussion period. Topics: Orchid Insects
and Diseases, Controlled Flowering, Orchids from Seed, and Potting and
Vegetative Propagation.

Registration Fee, $15.00.

CoursE VI—Sprinc HorrTicuLTURE

Four Sections (each meets five times; indicate your choice) :
Monday morning, 9-12, March 28, April 4, 11, 18, 25,

No

or
Monday afternoon, 1—4, March 28, April 4, 11, 18, 25,

ww

Wednesday afternoon, 1-4, March 30, April 6, 13, 20, 27,

4. Friday morning, 9-12, April 1, 8, 15, 22, 29.
Registration.—March 1-25 for individual Friends of the Garden, others
March 10-25. Limited to 85.

148 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

The Spring Horticulture course is designed to give the beginning gardener
a background of general information on the sowing, transplanting and culture
of annual and perennial plants. It is given once each week for five weeks
with a lecture and lab session lasting 3 hours. Each student is given 4 metal
seedling flats and will be instructed in the sowing and transplanting of seed-
lings in sufficient quantity to fill the flats. When outside conditions permit,
each student can remove his material from the greenhouse for planting into
the garden.

The Registration Fee covers all materials, including flats—$15.00.

COMING ATTRACTIONS IN THE FLORAL DISPLAY HOUSE

From mid-September to mid-October the Garden will play host for a series
of exhibitions arranged by various horticultural societies from St. Louis and
elsewhere.

CACTUS AND SUCCULENT SHOW
September 18 and 19

This will be the annual fall show of the Henry Shaw Cactus and Succulent
Society and will be open to the public on Saturday, September 18, at noon,
and Sunday, September 19, from 9:00 a. m. until 5:00 p. m.

HARVEST SHOW
September 24, 25, and 26

This show, including fruits, vegetables, and flowers, will be staged by the
St. Louis Horticultural Society with the cooperation of many of the more
specialized plant societies in the St. Louis area. There will be special exhibits
by the Iris Society, the Dahlia Society, the Council of Men’s Garden Clubs,
the St. Louis Unit of the Herb Society of America, and the Nurserymen’s
Association. Plans call for extensive outside displays and demonstrations as
well as exhibits in the Floral Display House itself, Since a flower show is
never more interesting than when the various experts are busy putting it to-
gether, the Friends of the Garden are being invited to what can only be
described as a “pre-preview” on Friday the 24th from 8:00 until 10:00 p. m.
The show will be open to the public not only all day Saturday and Sunday,
but on Saturday until 10:00 p. m. as well.

DAHLIA SHOW
October 2 and 3

This will be the annual fall show of the St. Louis Dahlia and Chrysanthe-
mum Society and will be open to the public on Saturday afternoon and
Sunday. From 8:00 to 10:00 p.m. on October 2 the show will be open to
Friends of the Garden and members of the Society.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 149

ORCHID WORLD CONFERENCE
October 15, 16, and 17
In connection with the First World Orchid Conference to be held in St.
Louis on these dates under the auspices of the Orchid Society of America, the
Greater St. Louis Orchid Society, and the Missouri Botanical Garden, there
will be an Orchid exhibition in the Floral Display House. It will include
competitive and educational exhibits from all over the world and should
prove to be one of the most spectacular flower shows ever put on in St. Louis.
VEILED PROPHET QUEEN’S BOUQUET
October 6
The orchid bouquet of the Queen of the Veiled Prophet, which is pre-
sented to her by the Garden at the Veiled Prophet’s Ball, will be on display in
the Floral Display House at the Garden on the day after the ball, October 6.

NOTES

Another course for Amateurs—Elsewhere in the BULLETIN will be found
a description of the courses in Horticulture for Amateurs which are being
offered at the Garden in 1954-55. One of these is being given for the first
time this year. It will include a lecture, a demonstration and a practice session
on the grafting and budding of woody plants. As for all the other courses
offered this year, there will be two registration periods; one limited to the
Friends of the Garden and a second period open to the public at large.

During the summer Dr. Woodson has made a series of trips to the Carib-
bean area in connection with his studies of the Apocynaceae, a family of drug
plants which are becoming of increasing economic importance.

Among our recent visitors was Mr. Charles Miller, an old resident of St.
Louis who is now in his ninety-second year. He was particularly interested
in the old buildings built during Mr. Shaw’s day and told us of attending a
children’s party in what is now Mr. Ulrici’s office.

August twenty-fifth marked the sixty-fifth anniversary of the death of
Henry Shaw. In commemoration of this event, Mr. John E. Nies, President
of the Horticultural Council of the Missouri Botanical Garden, and Mr. John
A. Bryan, of the Henry Shaw Memorial Association, placed a wreath on the
tomb of Henry Shaw. The wreath, prepared by Mrs. John E. Nies, consisted
of Magnolia leaves and Orchids grown at the Garden.

Dr. R. M. Tryon has received a grant from the National Science Founda-
tion which will make it possible for him to monograph the ferns of Peru.

150 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

The grant will allow him to visit Peru and will pay for a technical assistant
who will take over some of Dr. Tryon’s routine chores in the Herbarium.
The ferns of tropical areas are very poorly understood and Dr. Tryon’s mono-
graph will be the first comprehensive study of any considerable area in the
new world tropics. It will be useful not only in Peru but very generally
over wide areas of South and Central America.

This year Dr. Charles Heiser again visited the Garden at the close of sum-
mer school at the Indiana University with a party of young people. They
spent the afternoon in the library, herbarium and laboratories and were enter-
tained at a picnic supper in the experimental plot by the graduate students
and research assistants. They then went to the Arboretum where they stayed
for two nights and a day, making their headquarters in Dr. Anderson’s
laboratory.

Early in the summer the second number of this year’s ANNALS OF THE
Missouri BoranicaL GARDEN appeared in its trim brown cover. The major
portion of this number is taken up with Dr. John Dwyer’s monograph of
Tachigalia, a genus of tropical trees. Dr. Dwyer came to St. Louis last
year as the new head of the Biology Department of St. Louis University.
Since he is a trained taxonomist and needs a large herbarium for using this
training efficiently, he was made a Research Associate of the Missouri Botani-
cal Garden. This mutually helpful arrangement gives him a big herbarium
and botanical library in which to carry on his research; while to the Garden
it means an additional trained member of the scientific staff. His work
helps to keep collections in better order, to bring some of our valuable old
material to scientific notice and usefulness, and, in general, to make the work
of the herbarium go forward more smoothly. The remainder of the number
is taken up with an article by Dr. Anderson and Dr. Louis O. Williams. Dr.
Williams received his doctorate in the Henry Shaw School of Botany nearly
twenty years ago and is now on the staff of the Escuela Agricola Panameri-
cana in the highlands of Honduras. Over wide areas in these Central Ameri-
can mountains, corn and sorghum are planted together in fields prepared not
by plowing but by clearing and piling the brushy thorn scrub and setting it
afire. This operation kills weed seeds, clears the field, and mellows the soil
so that planting can be done with an old-fashioned planting stick and no
further apparatus. The corn and sorghum are planted in the same field at
the same time but are harvested at different times of the year. This curious
survival of a very primitive way of growing crops is of some scientific interest,
and Dr. Williams’ clear and detailed pictures make a permanent record of it.

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Joun S. LEHMANN, a
DaniEL K. CarTLin, Vice-Pre

EuGENE PETTUus, Second Vice- Soe,
B. Faust

LEICESTER
DupLrey FRENCH

Henry Hitcucock

ROBERT Bedonrics SMITH

EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS

ETHan A. H. SHEPLE

Chancellor of Washington University

ARTHUR C. LICHTENBERGER,

Bishop of the Diocese of Missouri

RAYMOND
Mayor of the City me a Louis

Oscar EHR
seh mags ae the one of Education

STRATFORD L. Mor
President — the pnt en of Science
o

Secretary
GERALD ULRICI,

THE Bet Gore COUNCIL

Clarence Barbre, pein Chandler, E.
mmet ow Eleanor McClure, Clarence
Mrs. J. Garneau Weld, Harold E. Wolfe, John

Cherbonnier, Paul Hale, Mrs. Hazel

S. Lehmann, Edgar Anderson, John Nies, Chairman.

George T. Moore

STAFF

Assistant Director

Mycologist

Curator » Herbariu

Robert E. Woodson, Jr

ea,

Henry N. Andrews

Assistant Curator i pPanone

Rolla M. Tryon, Jr
Hugh C. Cutler

Curator Museum of Economic Plants

Robert J. Gillespie

Research Horticulturist

John D. Dwyer

Research Associate

Alice F. Tryon

Research Associate

George B. Van Schaack

Honorary Curator of Grasses

Julian A. ‘sibiinagia

Nell C

Edna Mepham

Assistant Librarian

Assistant Librarian

Business Manager
¢ ve =

George H Pring P

Paul A. Kohl Floriculturist
Ladislaus Cutak H l in charge of Conservatories
Frederick G. Meyer SICA ROT DT
Kenneth A. Smith __Engineer
August P. Beilmann___________ Manager of the Arboretum, Gray Summit

Louis G. Brenner____

G. R. Lowry

Assistant Manager of the Arboretum

In charge of Orchids

SOME FACTS ABOUT THE GARDEN

The Missouri Botanical Garden carries on the garden estab-
lished by Henry Shaw over a century ago at “Tower Grove,” his
country home. It is a private institution with no public support
from city or state. The old stone walls and cast-iron fences, the
Linnean House, the Museum, the Mausoleum and the “Old
Residence” all date from Mr. Shaw’s time. Since his death, as
directed in his will, the Garden has been in the hands of a Board
of Trustees who appoint the Director.

The Garden is open every day in the year (except New
Year’s Day and Christmas) from 9:00 a.m. until 7:00 p. m.,
April to November, and until 6:00 p-m., November to April,
though the greenhouses close at 5:00 p.m. Tower Grove, itself,
Mr. Shaw’s old residence, is open from 1 until 4. The Garden is
nearly a mile long and has several entrances. The Main Entrance,
the one used by the general public, is at Tower Grove and Flora
Place on the Sarah bus line (No. 42). The Park Southampton
buses (No. 80), direct from downtown, pass within three blocks
of this entrance and stop directly across the street from the
Administration Building at 2315 Tower Grove Avenue. The
latter is the best entrance for students, visiting scientists, etc.
It is open to such visitors after 8:30 a.m., but is closed on Sat-
urdays, Sundays, and holidays. There is a service entrance on
Alfred Avenue, one block south of Shaw Avenue.

Since Mr. Shaw’s time an Arboretum has been developed at
Gray Summit, Mo., opposite the junction of routes 50 and 66.
It is open every day in the year and has two miles of auto roads
as well as foot trails through the wild-flower reservation. There
is a pinetum and an extensive display of daffodils and other
narcissi from March to early May.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL
GARDEN BULLETIN

Cattleya O’Brieniana alba

Orchids at the Missouri Botanical Garden

Volume ALII October, 1954 Number 8

All a a used in this number of the BULLETIN were taken by Clifford
E. Paulse

Office of publication: 306 E. Simmons Street, Galesburg, Illinois.
Editorial Office: ae Botanical Garden, 2315 Tower Grove Avenue,
St. Louis, 10, Miss
Published monthly excepr Ply and August by the Board of Trustees of the
Missouri Botanical Garden. Subscription price: $2.50 a year.
Entered as second-class matter January 26, pens at the post-office at Gales-
urg, Illinois, under the Act of March 3, 18

Please: _ not discard a copy of the Bulletin. If you have no further use for yours
s it along toa friend or return it to the Garden. Return postage guaranteed.

Missouri Botanical
Garden Bulletin

Vol. XLII OCTOBER, 1954 No. 8

ORCHIDS AT THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN —
YESTERDAY, TODAY AND TOMORROW
ROBERT AND VALDA LOWRY

Many yesterdays have come and gone since orchids made their first
arrival at the Missouri Botanical Garden. In fact, about three-fourths of
a century of yesterdays mark a very long road back to that day in the late
1870’s when Mrs. Henry T. Blow presented a small collection of Brazilian
orchids to Mr. Henry Shaw, the founder of the Garden. Since that time,
each day has left its bit of history in the making of the huge and varied
collection of orchids now owned by the Garden.

As in all history, there has been every kind of yesterday woven into this
eventful and colorful story which might well be named “The Rise of the
Queen of Flowers in St. Louis.” There have been unhappy days as well
* as joyful, and even a few tragedies appear among the triumphs. Perhaps
one of the saddest yesterdays for orchids at the Garden was in 1903 when
a disastrous fire destroyed a large portion of the collection and left the
remainder badly damaged. By that date the collection had grown to about
550 plants. Shortly after the fire, Dr. Trelease, the first director of the
Garden, made a trip to Mexico and Central America to collect more plants.
An interesting and human touch was that the tragedy prompted the New
York Botanical Garden to come forward with a gift of 84 plants. Evidently,
the fire served as a spur to activity in the orchid department during the
following year, because by 1905 the orchids at the Garden were reputed to
have reached their previous standing.

The year 1906 brought one of the brightest yesterdays for orchids at
the Garden. That was the day that Mr. George H. Pring came to work at
the Missouri Botanical Garden. Besides an intense interest in orchids, this
young man had the advantage of having been trained at the Royal Botanic
Gardens at Kew, England, one of the first institutions in the world to establish
orchids and study their cuiture in greenhouses. Mr. Pring was immediately
Placed in charge of the orchid department, a post which he has held for the

(151)

152 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

past forty-eight years. Under his shepherding, the number of plants has
grown from about 500 to approximately 50,000, and an extensive program
of developing and improving the collection has moved gradually ahead.
Besides work on propagation, investigation of the problems of growing
orchids in the variable and often obstinate climate of the Middle West was
constantly being carried on.

No doubt, every human quality has figured at some time and some
place in the collecting and developing of these thousands of orchids. How-
ever, one trait which shows itself on virtually every page of the record is
that of generosity. Just as Mr. Shaw so generously gave the Garden itself,
many people have given in the same spirit to the Garden. How else could
an institution founded solely for the sake of beauty and knowledge of horti-
culture, operating on a non-profit basis, ever have afforded to build up the
orchid collection to its present status?

In 1918, there was a veritable spill-over in the stream of human kind-
ness and generosity which flows through this story like a bright river. That
year, Mr. D. S. Brown, of Kirkwood, Missouri, a2 man renowned for his
interest in rare and valuable orchid plants, donated to the Garden his entire
collection which he had spent thirty years in accumulating. Besides hundreds
of outstanding species and early hybrids of the Cattleya group, the gift
contained rare botanical specimens and many of Mr. Brown’s favorite
“‘lady-slipper” orchids, the Paphiopedilums (Cypripediums). Some of these
would have been extremely difficult to duplicate at that time. Among them
were twelve plants of P. Maudiae var. magnificum and P. Holdenii, two green
orchids of superior strains which Mr. Brown had imported from England
and even now, thirty-five years later, are considered exceptional. Through
propagation by division, these twelve plants have been multiplied so that
now there are 500 in the Garden collection. It was also through Mr. Brown’s
gift that the Garden acquired such rare old plants as Cattleya Bowringiana
var. splendens, C. Dusseldorffei var. Undine, C. Skinneri var. alba, C. “Prince
Edward” and C. O’Brieniana alba, as well as many others valued highly today
as parents of future hybrids.

There have been three other outstanding and large bequests to the
Garden. The first of these arrived in 1926 from Mr. C. W. Powell, of
Balboa, Canal Zone. Mr. Powell, from his vantage spot in the tropics, had
built up a very fine collection of Central American orchids. When this was
donated to the Missouri Botanical Garden, probably there were envious
twinges in every orchid circle around the globe. The second giant wave of
generosity to wash upon the Garden’s shores came in 1931. That year,
Dwight F. Davis, Governor-General of the Philippine Islands, presented to
the Garden his collection of Philippine orchids, including a number of

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 153

Cattleya Bowringiana splendens, from the D. S. Brown collection.

species and varieties completely new to St. Louis. The most recent large gift
was received in the years 1949, 1950 and 1951, from Mr. Herbert L. Dillon
of Long Island, New York, and comprised about 3000 plants, mostly
Cattleya species and hybrids.

Obviously, the bulk of the plants donated to the Garden have come
through the desire of many people to lend support to a public institution
dedicated to horticulture. The generous tide has also been due to the willing-
ness of orchid growers, private and commercial alike, to share in neighborly
fashion an occasional worthwhile plant. Through the years many exchanges
have been arranged, resulting in plants which otherwise the Garden could
not have afforded.

As one walks through the greenhouses at Gray Summit, he is impressed
by the beauty of the orchids and the wide variety of odd species. There is
another impression too—an intangible quality which he feels rather than
sees. Perhaps it is a subconscious awareness of all the mysterious yesterdays
in all the far-away places where these exotic plants grew before they came
to the greenhouse bench. Certainly the chain of events accompanying the
arrival of virtually every plant, whether it came from a laboratory flask or
a tropical forest, would made a fascinating story in itself. As an example,

154 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

why not reconstruct just a few incidents from the life of one plant in the
Garden’s collection. Picking at random, we might choose an exceptionally
fine specimen which came to the Garden directly from the jungle. The
facts for the story could be taken from the memories of a man who, without
a doubt, has been responsible for more of the orchid plants at the Garden
than any other one person. High on its perch atop the uppermost branch of
a giant jungle tree, a very fine plant of Cattleya Trianae stretched its lusty
green leaves to the humid morning. On some long-ago yesterday, the fertile
seed which produced it had evidently been carried by a vagrant Pacific
trade-wind to a crevice in the tree’s rough bark. There it had germinated
and, clinging to its leafy haven, it had flourished in an abundance of sun,
wind and rain. As if aware of its excellence and its practically inaccesible
stronghold so high above the tangle of roots, plants, and vines which ensnared
its tree, the proud Cattleya Trianae seemed to smile down in an extremely
taunting way. At least that was the impression received by the orchid
collector who stood far below on a narrow trail gazing through field-glasses
at the wonderful plant.

This silent jungle scene could have been both the beginning and the end
of this story had not this particular orchid hunter been blessed with a special
gift for acquiring what he wanted. “That fine plant has to come down,”
the orchid collector said to his native guides. They only shook their heads,
for they knew it would take hours of laborious hacking away at the jungle
growth before even the tree trunk could be reached, For a while they re-
mained adamant, but finally, through much bribing and oratorical wheedling,
the collector persuaded them into the difficult feat of bringing down the
coveted prize. That was a poignant moment of triumph for Mr. Pring,
who, as you may have suspected, was the collector involved in this bit of
Garden history. To relive that moment, Mr. Pring needs only to walk into
the Cattleya Trianae house at Gray Summit. There, hanging in a favored
spot among its several divisions and numerous progeny, is that same proud
Trianae, many years older, but still vigorous and perhaps still smiling. Inci-
dentally, this plant was given the varietal name ““D. S. Brown.” Because of
its superior quality and vigor, it has been used frequently as a progenitor of
many of the Garden’s Trianae hybrids. Among its offspring are such out-
standing plants as Cattleya ““A. A. Hunter” (C. Trianae var. “D. S. Brown”
> C. Nelsoni) and the Garden’s own cross, B.C. ‘Henri Constantin” var.
“Henry Shaw,” which won an Award of Merit from the American Orchid
Society in 1953,

From that first memorable trip to the tropics, Mr. Pring returned with
some 5,000 Cattleya plants, mostly varieties of C. Trianae and C. Schroederae.
Through an exchange with Mr. C. W. Powell of Balboa, he also brought

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 155

back about 200 botanical orchids. In all, the Garden acquired 39 species
and varieties which were introduced to this country for the first time.

Many more plants were obtained through another trip to the tropics in
1926. That trip was also instrumental in establishing the Garden’s tropical
station at Balboa, Canal Zone. This station proved to be an unparalleled
aid in the collecting of tropical orchids as well as in studying plants under
tropical conditions. During its existence, the station has been headed by
three managers, successively: Mr. C. W. Powell, Mr. A. A. Hunter, and Mr.
Paul A. Allen. Each of these men played important parts in many yester-
days connected with orchids at the Garden. Besides the numerous plants
collected through this station, many valuable dried specimens were obtained
for the Garden herbarium. Mr. Allen was especially successful in discover-
ing rare and valuable plants. Probably his outstanding achievements were
the discovery of Sobralia Powellii and the rediscovery of Oncidium Powellii.

As industry and population grew in St. Louis, smoke and smudge caused
atmospheric conditions to become deplorable for orchids. In 1924, the
Garden’s Board of Trustees decided to purchase a tract of land outside the
smoke area where a range of greenhouses could be built to house the orchid
collection. Accordingly, 1300 acres near Gray Summit, Missouri, about 35
miles southwest of St. Louis, were acquired in 1925. By the end of 1926, a
range of eight greenhouses had been erected and the entire orchid collection
was moved to the new extension. True, having the orchids thirty-five miles
away from the City Garden has occasionally presented problems, but the
advantages of better growing conditions have always outweighed the
inconveniences.

This panorama of orchid progress at the Garden could in no way be
complete without a tribute to the many yesterdays in the laboratories where
thousands of hybrids of numerous genera have emerged from seed. Elinor
Alberts (later Mrs. David H. Linder) was contracted to handle the seedling
work. She was the first person at the Garden to use the symbiotic (fungus)
method in germinating seed. Along with the sowing and germinating of
seed, many phases of orchid culture were investigated.

That the Missouri Botanical Garden was outstanding in its success with
orchid hybridizing is evidenced by two significant events. The first, in 1920,
was the flowering of the first hybrid orchid developed by the Garden. This
plant, one of the “difficult-to-germinate” Paphiopedilums, was a cross between
P. barbatum Crossii and P. Harrisianum superbum. It was named Paphio-
pedilum “D. S. Brown.” Just ten years later, in 1930, the Garden received
an award at the American Orchid Society show at Washington, D. C., for a
demonstration by Mrs. Linder of the development of orchid plants from seed.

156 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Epidendrum polybulbon.

By 1931, there were so many hybrid seedlings that it became necessary
to construct three new greenhouses at the orchid range at Gray Summit. As
the seedlings developed they required more and more room, and it was
considered prudent to curtail the hybridizing program, at least for a time.
By 1937, forty different hybrids, all of them in quantity, had developed
to blooming size. The superior vigor and size of many of these hybrid
plants and the deeper coloring and heavier texture of their flowers compared
to those of species made it apparent that a return to hybridizing was neces-
sary if the Garden’s orchids were to keep pace with modern hybrids. Con-
sequently, in the latter part of 1937, a laboratory was equipped at the experi-
mental greenhouse in St. Louis. There, along with hybridization and
seed-sowing, experiments were continued with various culture media, seed-
sterilizing solutions, effects of normal and artificial light, and feeding
solutions. Last, but not least, investigation was begun in testing the value
and effect of gravel culture on the growing and flowering of orchids. This
entire experimental project was carried on during the years 1937-46 by Dr.
David C. Fairburn.

In 1939, Mr. Pring purchased in England a large group of superior bi-
generic hybrids, with the genus Cattleya predominating, to serve as a nucleus

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 157

of worthy breeding plants. That was a most notable yesterday in the devel-
opment of Garden orchids. From those plants have come many of our
finest hybrids such as: Laeliocattleya “Dr. George T. Moore,” L.C. “St.
Louis,” L.C. “Mimi Koehler,” and Brassolaeliocattleya “Washington Centen-
nial.” The great number and variety of orchid plants at the Garden afford
a succession of rare and exotic blooms throughout the year.

Since the first small display of blooming epiphytic orchids at the Garden’s
Christmas show in 1918, St. Louisans have become more orchid-conscious.
This probably is due, in a large measure, to the ever-changing variety of
orchids which can be shown in the Garden’s alcoves every week of the year,
as well as to the huge orchid show taking place annually during the month
of February.

Beginning in 1925, the Missouri Botanical Garden has annually presented
to the Veiled Prophet’s “Queen of Love and Beauty” a bouquet of rare and
enchanting orchids, sometimes consisting of as many as 300-400 flowers.
It is carried by the beautiful young maiden to the throne where, in a setting
of royal pageantry, she is crowned. After the magnificent ball, the bouquet
is displayed for a day at the Garden—a symbol of the countless yesterdays
which have made possible so great a gift of beauty.

TODAY

Orchids are more popular at the Missouri Botanical Garden today than
ever before. From far and wide, visitors come not only to see their beauty
and to enjoy their charm, but also to learn about their culture. This is
because in the past decade, throughout the United States, there has arisen
a new hobby—that of collecting and growing orchids at home. Most
amateurs grow their orchids in small greenhouses, while many are growing
them in Wardian cases or even on window sills.

Because of the speed of modern transportation, as well as the new
asymbiotic methods of seedling culture, orchids are being brought into the
lives of the American public in ways which a few years ago would have been
impossible. All of a sudden, every one has discovered that orchids are so
much more than just the top word in glamour for a lady’s shoulder on the
gala occasions in her social life. Orchids are for the home!

People are amazed to find that there are so many different kinds of
beautiful blooms to be found in one of the largest and most varied of all
plant families. Actually, there are types of orchids suitable for every occa-
sion where flowers are in order. Whether one wants a striking and different
centerpiece of lacy fern and soft white Phalaenopsis for a bridal luncheon,
or just a bright accent of tiny golden Oncidiums for the hall table, usually
they can be had. If one doesn’t raise these “new” flowers in his own green-

158 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

house, he can buy them from his florist, and usually at a comparatively
moderate price. No wonder the demand for orchids increases day by day!
They are a new challenge to the hobbyist, particularly in the Middle West,
as something different to be grown and flowered in the greenhouse.

This trend has placed another responsibility on the Missouri Botanical
Garden—that of supplying information on the culture of orchids in the
Middle West. How fortunate that the Garden has been so well prepared
by all those yesterdays of caring for and developing the large and varied
orchid collection!

As the trail of yesterdays grows dim, the realities of today rush in and
surround us. Connecting the past and the present, however, is a deep reser-
voir filled with the cultural experiences acquired through seventy-five years
of developing and maintaining orchids in an area so alien to their natural
habitat. From all these lessons of yesterday there must be several which
could make today’s problems less difficult for the beginning orchid grower.
At best, his road is a bumpy one. After months of trying to acquire all the
cultural knowledge possible, he often finds himself certain only of the fact
that there are “almost as many ideas as men.” However, there is one opinion
that he finds readily agreed upon by every source: that orchid plants will
grow luxuriantly in any location where the proper balance of light, air,
heat, and moisture exists.

But where, asks the inquiring midwestern grower, should he draw his
information for the right amount of these four all-important ingredients?
How can he get that elusive “proper balance” which growers everywhere
talk about? Should he adopt the methods used in sections of our country
where temperature and maximum sunlight are fairly uniform the year
around? Can he grow his plants by the same plan used where humidity
fluctuates from average to a degree where leather goods mildew merely from
spending a night in the clothes closet? Should he perhaps follow directions
used for keeping orchids happy in areas where heavy fogs and cool nights are
usual the year around? Should he follow the directions of orchid-growers
who are located 2000 or more feet above sea level? Obviously, he cannot
wisely adopt directions given for any of these areas just described. These
sections are all blessed with natural advantages for orchid culture which
the midwestern grower will never receive from nature. One of his major
problems will be creating, either manually or mechanically, substitutes for
those natural conditions. There will be many times when the methods he
employs would be unnecessary or even foolhardy in places more naturally
adapted to orchid culture.

In thinking about orchids, we like to remember the way they grow in
their natural habitat. The epyphytic types seem to thrive best in a tree-top
where they receive an abundance of sun, wind, and rain. To us, that is

steno

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 159

really ‘tthe key to the situation.” Doesn’t it follow that if these plants can
be given, as nearly as possible, the same conditions in which they thrive in
nature, they should thrive anywhere, no matter what part of the country?

he confusion, it seems, all springs from the fact that giving orchids an
abundance of sun, wind (air), and rain (water) requires widely different
methods in different areas.

Here in the Midwest, particularly during our scorching, dry summers,
proportioning the correct amount of water for orchids is probably the most
asked-about problem. The amateur who purchases his plants from a section
of the country which normally has high humidity is often told that too
much watering for orchids is dangerous. He is instructed to water his
plants well, let them dry out thoroughly, and then soak them again. During
our extremely hot, dry season, from May until September, we have found it
quite easy to lose a plant by such a watering method. Throughout this
central belt we feel that far more plants have been lost by under-watering
and improper potting methods than have been lost by over-watering. In the
dry midwestern summers, orchids demand an abundance of water. It is
needed to help raise normally low humidity, to lower the excessive heat in
greenhouses, to check the over-rapid loss of plant moisture, and to supply
the plants’ root systems. We find that the need for water at the roots is
best supplied by keeping the potting medium moist at all times. With a
little experience the grower soon learns the technique required in his own
particular growing-house for keeping the medium in this condition. By
correlating procedures, he can, in one operation, give the necessary water
required to take care of excessive heat and low humidity.

We realize that this idea of keeping the potting medium moist is directly
opposite from that prevailing in many sections of the country. Repeatedly,
one hears or reads the statement that orchid plants cannot develop strong
root systems in a constantly moist medium. For our area, that statement
is not true. The condition which orchid roots cannot tolerate is one which
will not permit excess water to drain away or evaporate. If the medium
drains well and there is a proper balance of the other growing factors,
orchids grow luxuriantly in a constantly moist medium. The best demon-
stration of this fact can be seen by hanging a mature, well-established
Cattleya plant in a bright spot in the greenhouse. During every bright day
in summer, this plant can be watered—not heavily soaked, but finely
sprayed, blending air and water, until the osmunda fiber is wet throughout.
If the plant is potted properly, the excess water will drain away rapidly and
the abundance of heat, light, and circulating air will cause much of the
remaining water to evaporate gradually. This procedure, carried out every
day except during cloudy or rainy weather, will cause this “test plant” to
develop vigorous roots and robust new growths.

160 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

By no means are we advancing the idea that every Cattleya plant in every
collection in the Middle West should be grown in a hanging position. How
ever, the only impractical angle to such an idea would probably be the ae
of available space. We feel that one needs only to observe a single plant
growing in such a manner to realize that orchids can and will prosper by
the use of an abundance of water if applied when the high temperature
demands it and if light and fresh air are available. From watching this
orchid plant thrive in its hanging position, the grower will find himself
with the desire to duplicate as nearly as possible the same growing conditions
for his plants on the benches. Realizing that these bench plants drain more
slowly, receive less air circulation, and shade each other a certain amount,
he will modify the watering just enough to keep the factors in balance.
Because they receive a little less light, heat, and air circulation, with a little
less water, the potting medium of the bench plants can be kept at the same
degree of moistness as that of the hanging plant. Logically, the grower
will then want to give the bench plants as much light and as much space
between the pots for air movement as is practical.

Many orchid-growers shudder at the thought of well-established Cattleyas
growing in a medium covered with a blanket of moss. It is true that bot
the pots and potting medium of plants growing in a hot, humid but stagnant
atmosphere will develop a dark, slimy surface. This condition is an indication
of either poor light or insufficient air circulation and should be remedied
immediately. In our area, however, we feel that the gradual development
of a cushion of green moss over the surface of the potting medium is
evidence that the plants are receiving sufficient water.

An important fact for the orchid-grower of this region to keep in mind
is that watering methods must be flexible enough to allow for our changing
seasons. They will need to be altered considerably as we move from summer
into fall—on into winter and then spring. Late fall and early spring are
the two danger periods for possible over-watering. Prolonged periods of
wet, cool, cloudy weather, interspaced with days of bright, warm sunshine,
can create a problem. During such times, if both house and plants are kept
“more to the dry side,” there will be no cause for concern. The weather
cycle soon moves on into either winter or summer, and our day-to-day
problems are then more uniform, In winter the use of water for the plants
and their growing area should be curtailed considerably. Syringing the
foliage, and “throwing” water through the air in the houses in an effort to
lower temperature will be unnecessary. While we still prefer keeping the
potting medium moist in the winter, it will take much less water to do the
job. Wetting the walks, floors, and the space between the pots on benches,
in an effort to add sufficient moisture to the air, will be one of the major

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 161

winter watering tasks. This chore should be done early enough in the day
to allow the houses to dry out thoroughly before the ventilators are closed.

The period from the first of December until the last of February should
find the greenhouse glass washed clear of all shading. Only in this way
can the plants receive full benefit from the amount of winter light available.
Direct sunlight is needed at this time of year, not only because of its warmth
and drying effects, but also to keep the processes of plant growth functioning
properly. Plants must be exposed to full sunlight gradually. If they are
to receive the essential amount of sunlight in winter, the grower must
remember to take one precaution weeks in advance of the winter season. He
should remove some of the shading in early fall, either by washing it con-
siderably lighter or, better still, by removing it in 34-inch strips at 4- to
6-inch intervals. The plants are then exposed to more light by degrees, and
by December they have acclimated themselves to the full sunlight. If the
shading is maintained until December and then removed in one operation
the change will be too sudden and severe for the plants.

There is no need to be further concerned about improving any of his
culture methods if the grower has unknowingly forfeited his chances of
success by slipshod potting. ‘“Over-watering” and “to much water” are
reasons often given for failures when, actually, they were due to other circum-
stances more difficult to recognize. Quoting from our earlier “Cultural
Notes” in the American Orchid Society Bulletin (1953), the grower should
consider:

In relation to watering, the condition and texture of the potting medium are very
important. When the medium is too loose and placed in the pot in a haphazard
mass. n

g ms a solid m
Water cannot drain away quickly. Either condition prevents proper aeration at the
roots and consequently is conducive to root decay. Overwatering is blamed for losses
of that kind when actually an inferior potting job is the true culprit.
ere ru i nt here
in the middlewest where heavy watering is necessary. First, the osmuda fiber used
i i i t u

0
must be taken that plants are not over-potted. Repotti
i eaves each grower with plenty of margin to employ his own pet
tricks and personal ideas in the operation. As long as the ideal goal is reached, the
exact methods of approach may vary with the individual’s preference. However, the
ideal goal is always the same—a potting medium which is of proper amount and
consistency to afford the best possible drainage and aeration.
“The degree of firmness of the osmuda fiber usually is a major concern to be-
sinners. To get the pieces of material fitted firmly into the p ith the fibers in an

another.
the fibers run vertically in pieces about 3 or 4 inches in length. Chunks this size are
long enough to be bent in half with both fibrous ends turned upward when inserted

162 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

a

Dividing and repotting a Cattleya plant (see opposite page).

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 163

into the pot. Working at this stage with nothing but the hands—no potting tool—
each succeeding piece of fiber is folded and tightly inserted along side the preceding
one unti rm layer is fitted i , by ins g 6 i the folds of
fiber, this entire layer can be sho id tly into wer ot. tampi
action will move the mass of fiber into position more easily. The one thing to gua
against is a heavy pounding ea cat oh h will beat the fiber into an i i
olid. If, in the first step, the pieces of osmunda are compressed firmly together,

and then. pushed or ramped into place, the tapering sides of the pot will. lock each
sada ‘ogee as a ma
f the layer of fiber was res firmly locked together before it was shoved on
nt e po Id n

— into the ho be ver m, yet still s Th e con-
sistency to be d nes of laye ill, of course, be governed by the size
of the pot. Usually, three layers are required to inst ee a Cattley: a five
inch pot. After | littl ic in € pieces ee the individual soon

Because it is most important that the surface rema aie m, yet open enough to
allow water and new roots to penetrate easily, this he ing method w orks especially
‘“ :

orchid roots have the inclination to take the course of least resistance. If the medium
is too hard for them to enter readily, the roots will either crawl over the surface

bie ‘ouside of the pot, or grow along the surface for a few inches and
piper! come to and-still because of insufficient moisture.

“The type of os coke used in th Bie opt gd over the drainage crock is
especially important to the way a = drain veg ure neither Sat nor anyone
potting your plants ever uses soft, dirt-filled fiber n the bottom of the

“When it is desirable to save the back-bulb portion of a en rane which is
being repotted, there are several ways of accomplishing the
method used here, we have jeune : carpenter's key-hole saw, aye its blade ‘eblocbined
to about half the — length, is an indispensable tool. As can be seen in
Fig. [see page 162], the saw is shown as. it’ is heed oe into the potting
medium at the point deci varus n for division. The ome can now be severed
easily; the potting medium cee with its mass of roots, is cut through from
one side = the Es to the other. As can be note ted in this particular case, ane division

be left tatict in du Fig. 2 shows the plant with the se comp

GS ¢ on
which to re is the easi ne to oe ct them from being broken as new osmunda
fiber is ked around ei plant in ropettl ng. Careful protection of that small
eat Late _ of new roots is — the plant becoming quickly and safely
established in its new pot. As can be observed in he phot Selah; this is doubly
important in the ca Pte here because ae new growth is in sheath and will flower
in the not too dat fut

“Figure 3 also shows mle back-bulb section of the plant after it has been re-worked

ro

°

ri year, a back- ‘
m pm el half of the original as Fig. 4 shows how a section
in this

flowers within a

164 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

While this speed of development will not always occur in one year’s time, the
t new growths will almost invariably be strong enough to reestablish the plant to
1 th.

i re it w
This method of back-bulb propagation has proven advantageous, we believe, for
s. When i f i ay g

S. s tak }
the root area of the older section, there will, in most instances, be enough life
somewhere in some of the old dormant roots to produce new short lateral ones. n
when new roots do not develop and the potting medium is left undisturbed and kept
constantly moist, the back-bulbs appear to get enough moisture, possibly through
osmotic action, to stay in good shape and produce a worthwhile first grow th.’

Phalaenopsis Luedemanniana, with plantlets from spent flower spikes.

In some of the orchid genera there are certain species which can be easily
propagated in another manner. These species produce new divisions of
adventitious growths as part of their normal growing habit. In this group
there are two types of plants—one which produces adventitious growths
from the old flower spikes, the other which produces its new divisions, or
plantlets, from the matured, old canes.

Phalaenopsis Luedemanniana is the best example of the type of orchid
plant which produces adventitious growths from spent flower spikes. If,
after flowering, the old spikes are left on the plant, small plantlets will
wood.” These little plants develop
quite rapidly and will need to be either removed early or left on the old

ec

appear from nodes on the ripening

spike and pinned down to thepotting medium of the parent plant.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 165

3 4
1. This plant of L.C. ‘Rosamunde” (‘Brittania” > ‘“Sargon”), with its root growth
rams would be in an silos al stage to repot if it were not for the buds developing in the sheath.
Rather than disturb it at this time, it will be handled as illustrated in figs. 2-4.
A chunk of ne medium-grained osmunda fiber is cut to fit beneath the new growth.
Tw ch engths of light-weight Lie vanized wire are bent on one end to clip over the rim of the
sik and ‘Mei bent at ie angles at the other end to fit over the osmunda pad. The wire on

the left side is shown sped in place; that on the right side is supported against the pot
merely to show the pattern

3. The gansunds Shea: is placed in the wire “cradle” and firmly held in position by wires
bent in a “square U” fashion.

4: ‘The scot system of the plant handled last season has now grown through t the added
h his season, the plant had just finished flowering as the new roots starte - to move
t rough the osmunda fiber. The plant can now be repotted without a serious set- ack.

166 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Dendrobium Thwaitesiae var. Ve itchii, with ease growths
from canes of previous yea

Dendrobium nobile is typical of the type of orchid which produces ad-
ventitious growths from the old mature canes of previous years’ growths.
The grower should let these initial growths develop for the first year on the
parent plant. When the second growth is about one inch in length, the
small individual plants can be cut from the old canes and reestablished: in
individual small pots.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 167

TOMORROW

Every task that is performed today in the caring for orchids is done with
eyes and hopes set toward tomorrow. Every flower and every plant of
tomorrow is a product of today or some yesterday. Actually, the whole
relationship between past, present, and future of orchids at the Garden is
so closely interwoven that it is impossible to draw a definite line where one
era ends and the other begins.

It is a foregone conclusion that future orchids at the Missouri Botanical
Garden will continue to hold, and to improve upon, the high esteem that
has been theirs in the past. There is virtually no end to the things yet to
be learned about and enjoyed from this large and increasingly popular family
of plants. Remaining yet to be done is a great deal of study on effects of
artificial light on growth and development as well as flowering. It may
become possible in our midwestern climate, as indications show it may in
more suitable locations, to develop orchids from flask to flower in 21 to 3%
years. Should this happen, the Garden, much sooner than has been expected,
would be able to take advantage of some of its outstanding potentialities
for hybridizing.

New advances in materials, equipment, plant foods, etc., open many
possibilities for improving growth and growing conditions for orchids.
Problems involving better air circulation and the addition of more moisture
to the air are but two examples of subjects for further experiments. The
use of fiber glass or plastic panels to replace glass in the construction of
greenhouses offers a large and comparatively new field for contemplation and
research. Even changing the structural design of greenhouses has interesting
possibilities,

Of course, one of the largest and most intriguing subjects connected
with orchids of the future is breeding and hybridizing. For a non-
commercial institution such as the Garden, interested chiefly in acquiring
knowledge of plants, perhaps no better program could be instigated than
that of developing superior strains of species which would breed true to the
variety. There is a lamentable need for such plants. Although hybridizing
has been moving along at a furious pace for the past twenty years, orchid
hybridists realize that there has always been a vulnerable spot in the founda-
tion of the program. The use of superior plants for parents has not always
resulted in superior progeny, because these excellent varieties, as often as not,
do not breed true. Few commercial firms are prepared to lend the time and
space involved in working through a program of several generations of in-
breeding which would be required to develop such plants. However, the
orchid range which finally introduces these much-needed stabilized superior

168 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

varieties of species for stud plants will be performing a very great service
to the future of orchids,

There is another much-needed breeding program which could be a boon
to the future of certain yellow types of Cattleya and Laeliocattleya hybrids.
This would involve remaking the primary cross, C. Iris (Cattleya bicolor
Cattleya Dowiana) to serve as a foundation for the reconstruction of the
entire family of yellow, spade-lip type hybrids.

When the original C. Iris was produced in the late 1890’s, evidently the
particular plants of C. bicolor or C. Dowiana used were either not compat-
ible, or one or the other parent had a certain recessive fault which became
apparent in the hybrid. In C. Iris some factor exists which produces flowers
with unbalanced petals and blister-like distortions. Evidently, hybridists
disregarded the malformation in this early cross, and used C. Iris as a parent
in producing many of our modern spade-lip type yellow and bronze hybrids.
Sometimes C. Iris appears as often as four or five times in the parentage of
some of these crosses; and this same deformity, in varied degrees, is in evi-
dence. It would seem that the only solution to eliminating this crippling
influence from future Cattleya and Laeliocattleya hybrids of this group,
would be to remake C. Iris from selected superior varieties of C. bicolor and
C. Dowiana.

The possibilities for the great number, the variety, and the breath-taking
beauty in future orchids are almost staggering to the imagination. All of
these possibilities will never be explored, of course, mainly because hybridists
must be practical, at least to a point, in the creation of new blooms. For
instance, it does not seem wise to develop great numbers of orchids, no
matter how gorgeous, if they bloom when there is little demand for that
particular type of flower. Neither is it practical to develop lovely blooms
which possess poor “keeping” quality. Perhaps, however, an institution such
as the Garden could be more justified than commercial firms for creating
orchids only for beauty or botanical value.

At present, there seems to be a growing demand for hybrid Cattleya
flowers which are smaller, flatter, and of superior texture—‘‘cocktail orchids,”
some florists call them. They would help to bridge the gap between the
flamboyant types and the smaller less conspicuous sprays. The Garden has
a number of fine old primary hybrids and superior varieties of species in its
Cattleya collection which could serve exceptionally well as progenitors in
developing a new class of smaller but superior flowers. Cattleya “Portia”
var. gloriosa, C. Bowringiana var. splendens, and C. O’Brieniana var. alba are
three of the most outstanding of these. All of these plants have exquisitely
formed flowers with symmetrically full and quite flat petals, Both in size
and appearance, these blooms resemble excellently shaped flowers of Phalae-

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 169
nopsis rather than those of conventional Cattleyas. The rich glowing colors
of C. “Portia” var. gloriosa and C. Bowringiana var. splendens are equalled
in quality by the marvelously firm texture of the waxy, all-white C. O’Brien-
jana var. alba. The Garden is indeed fortunate to have these rare and re-
markable plants. If they can-be made to breed true, surely their offspring
will some day make orchid history.

For many years, the orchid collection of the Missouri Botanical Garden
has been a sort of living orchid file—a plant index where any one at all
interested in orchids could see the rare botanicals as well as modern hybrids
which they read about. In fact, the Garden is one of the few places in the
country having such a large and representative collection of orchids which is
open daily to the public at no charge. Let us hope that no future day will
bring a necessity to change that policy. Also, let us hope that the Garden may
continue to acquire and contribute knowledge concerning this very worthy
family of plants which is just now at the threshold of a new prominence in
the modern plan for every-day living.

Cattleya Trianae var. “D. S. Brown.”

SOME FACTS ABOUT THE GARDEN

The Missouri Botanical Garden carries on the garden estab-
lished by Henry Shaw over a century ago at “Tower Grove,” his
country home. It is a private institution with no public support
from city or state. The old stone walls and cast-iron fences, the
Linnean House, the Museum, the Mausoleum and the “Old
Residence” all date from Mr. Shaw’s time. Since his death, as
directed in his will, the Garden has been in the hands of a Board
of Trustees who appoint the Director.

The Garden is open every day in the year (except New
Year’s Day and Christmas) from 9:00 a.m. until 7:00 p. m.,
April to November, and until 6:00 p-m., November to April,
though the greenhouses close at 5:00 p.m. Tower Grove, itself,
Mr. Shaw’s old residence, is open from 1 until 4. The Garden is
nearly a mile long and has several entrances. The Main Entrance,
the one used by the general public, is at Tower Grove and Flora
Place on the Sarah bus line (No. 42). The Park Southampton
buses (No. 80), direct from downtown, pass within three blocks
of this entrance and stop directly across the street from the
Administration Building at 2315 Tower Grove Avenue. The
latter is the best entrance for students, visiting scientists, etc.
It is open to such visitors after 8:30 a. m., but is closed on Sat-
urdays, Sundays, and holidays. There is a service entrance on
Alfred Avenue, one block south of Shaw Avenue.

Since Mr. Shaw’s time an Arboretum has been developed at
Gray Summit, Mo., opposite the junction of routes 50 and 66.
It is open every day in the year and has two miles of auto roads
as well as foot trails through the wild-flower reservation. There
is a pinetum and an extensive display of daffodils and other
narcissi from March to early May.

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Joun S. LEHMANN, President Henry HitcHcock

DanieEt K. CatTLin, Vice-President RicHarD J. Lockwoop
EuGENE Pettus, Second Vice-President A. WeEssEL SHAPLEIGH
LEICESTER B T ETHAN A. LEY

RoBERT BROOKINGS SMITH
EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS

DupLEY FRENCH

EtHan A. H. SHEPLEY, Oscar EHRHA

Chancellor of Washington University deg of the gid of Education
ARTHUR C. LICHTENBERGER, i

Bishop of the Diocese of Missouri STRATFORD L. Mor

RayYMOND R President of ya _ tae of Science
Mayor of the City v3 co Louis of St.

Secretary
GERALD ULRICI,

THE HORTICULTURAL COUNCIL
Clarence Barbre, Albert Chandler, E. G. Cherbonnier, Paul Hale, Mrs. Hazel
Knapp, Martin Lammert III, Emmet Layton, Eleanor McClure, Clarence
McGovern, W. F. Scott, Jr., Mrs. J. Garneau Weld, Harold E. Wolfe, John
S. Lehmann, Edgar Anderson, Toba Nies, Chairman

George T. Moore ARUN a laee la omc aoaec eas
sila Boge DEAR Dspace trees Each I eel ieee Ree aa Director

OPN ee lS asmbbane Director

Hugh C. Cutler
Coie W@W, Dede Sra ee
obert E. Wenn, eo eS of Herbari
ite Paleoborci

Henry N. Andrew SE RE ee:

Renee} Gilles oc Research Horticulturist
John D. Dwyer ae aes ee eee aren h Associate
Ace. Vevon oc Research Associate
George B. Van Schaack___________---------- Honorary Curator of Grasses
Julian A. Steyermark Honorary Research Associate
Nell C. Horner ie Cee oe ean eae Pee
Edos Mestam = At Librarian
Ida M. Kohl en esl ois 2 etn Laeetiae
Gerald Ulrici Co ie Manage
George H. Pring SOS) es ee Seeneenent
Paul A. Kohl _________.Floriculturist
Ladislaus Cutak by Siena eels in ee of Conservatories
Frederick G. Meyer ee a orice nee ees al ke ae Den drologist
Kenneth A. Smith es __Engineer
August P. Beilmann______. ee ue a Acie: , Gray Summit
Louis G. Brenner Assistant Manager of the Arboretum
________In charge of Orchids

Owry SEND
2

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MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

ANNALS OF THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN.
Published in February, May, September, and November. Sub-
scription price, $10 per year.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN.
Published monthly except July and August. Subscription price,
$2.50 per year.

A TOUR OF THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN.
A guide for Garden visitors. Price 25 cents.

HENRY SHAW.
A Pictorial Biography. Price 25 cents.

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN
What it is and what it does. Price, fifty cents.

POST-CARDS.
Garden Views. Two sets of four each. Price 25 cents a set.
Garden Water-lilies. Price 25 cents for set of 8.

A TOUR
SHAW’S GARDEN

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN
Volume XLII November, 1954 Number 9

a
ee ENE
wi

ie syne

SHAW’S GARDEN IN 1876

Office of publication: 306 E. Simmons Street, Galesburg, Illinois.
Editorial Office: Missouri Botanical Garden, 2315 Tower Grove Avenue,
St. Louis, 10, Missouri.
Published preathly except nif and August by the Board of — of the
Missouri Botanical Garden. Subscription price: $2.50 a yea
riggs as second-class matter January 26, ae at the nui at Gales-
g, Illinois, under the Act of March 3,

Missouri Botanical
Garden Bulletin

Vol. XLII NOVEMBER, 1954 No. 9

A TOUR OF SHAW’S GARDEN

Many visitors ask us, “Which is the best way to see the Garden?”
So we have planned a trip of less than an hour which will let you see
those places which visitors enjoy the most. This trip is leisurely and
you will have time to stop to study the flowers, enjoy the pleasant views,
read the labels, and note which plants you would like to try in your
own garden. But an hour is far too short a time in which to see more
than a fraction of one of the world’s best botanical gardens, so we hope
you will return again and again.

Over the Main ENTRANCE, at Tower Grove Avenue and Flora
Boulevard, you can see a stone, carved with Henry Shaw’s choice of a
name for the Garden, ‘Missouri Botanical Garden, 1858.’’ But even
today, more than 65 years after Shaw’s death, St. Louisians and many
others still call this place “Shaw’s Garden” in memory of the man who
bought the land and planned and built the Garden as a country home.
Long before his death, at his house in the Garden, Shaw had given
nearby Tower Grove Park to the city. In his will, he left most of his
wealth in a trust to support his Garden so it could be enjoyed by all the
people. Most of the money for maintaining it still comes from Henry
Shaw’s estate, but a constantly increasing number of people are helping
to support the Garden by means of contributions and bequests.

Directly ahead, as you enter the Garden, are the WATER-LILY POOLs.
Here, from late July until frost, may be seen some of the finest tropical
water-lilies ever grown. Many beautiful varieties, like the pure white
“Missouri” which was developed at the Garden, bloom at night but are
usually open in the early morning, in late afternoon, or on cloudy days.
The best of the varieties are the day-blooming tropical hybrids. Nearly
all of the ones to be seen in the Garden were developed by the super-
intendent and one of the first he produced, the white variety, “Mrs. G.
H. Pring,” is named for his wife. By using a wild African yellow

(171)

TROPICAL

WATER-LILY POOLS

cZI

NILATTIONI NAGUVO TVOINV.LOG IYAOSSIW

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 173

water-lily, Mr. Pring was able to develop several excellent new yellow-
flowered plants. “African Gold” was one of the earliest ones and is
still one of the yellowest, but some of the recent hybrids which originated
at the Garden have much larger flowers. The giant water-platter, or
Victoria water-lily, from the Amazon region of South America is grown
in the central pool. The leaves have upturned margins and are sup-
ported by such strong ribs on the under sides that some of them can
bear the weight of a small child.

The beds bordering the lily pools are usually planted with tulips in
the spring and with ornamental foliage plants in the late summer. One
oddity is a variegated-leaved form of cassava, a South American plant
which is best known in this country as the source of tapioca. If you now
walk to the north (to your right as you entered the gate), you will pass
a row of old hawthorn trees and young flowering crabapples which are
covered with bloom in the spring. The Rose GARDEN you enter is
especially interesting to St. Louis gardeners because here rose varieties
sent in by nurseries and growers from all over the country are tested.
One may see which roses do best in our climate when grown under con-
ditions very much like those in the average home garden. The roses

NYMPHAEA “DIRECTOR GEORGE T. MOORE”

174 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

THE ROSE GARDEN

are at their prime in June, but many of them have some flowers
throughout the summer and most kinds have a second burst of bloom in
September.

Beyond the Rose Garden is the LINNEAN House, the only green-
house Mr. Shaw built which is still in use. Along a ledge in front of
the Linnean House is a hedge of Korean boxwood. This grows quite
well in our climate and persists when many of the English varieties die
from cold, drought, windburn, or hot summers. Even better for St.
Louis gardens are some Serbian varieties of boxwood. The Garden has
introduced several of these but they are still too scarce to be available
from most nurserymen. You can see some plants in the Mausoleum
grounds later on in your tour. Above the doorway of the Linnean
House are busts of Linnaeus, the great Swedish botanist, and of two
famous American botanists, Nuttall and Gray. The ornamental brick-

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 175

A fine permanent planting of yuccas in the Linnean Garden

work and the relatively small area of glass are typical of greenhouses
built before 1881. Within the Linnean House is a collection of camellias
and other winter-flowering shrubs, most of them in bloom from January
to March. The most attractive part of the interior is the rear wall, almost
completely covered with an evergreen creeping tropical fig.

he LINNEAN GARDEN surrounding the Linnean House has been
designed to produce a succession of bloom through the year with a
minimum of labor. Here you will find many of the old and new varieties
of spring-flowering bulbs, iris, peonies, day-lilies, African lilies, hardy
chrysanthemums, and many other perennials. In July the tall stalks of
waxy white yucca flowers make a nice contrast to the dark red brick of
the old greenhouse.

You can leave the Linnean Garden through an archway in the old
limestone wall. Just before you pass through the archway, notice the
pair of boxwoods and the pair of southern magnolias, or bull bay trees. '
The southern magnolia is not completely hardy in our climate unless it
is in a protected place, but the plant is worth effort and worry because
the large leaves are green and attractive throughout the entire year. To
your right, after you pass through the gate, you can see a large river
birch, a native of stream-sides of eastern Missouri and an attractive tree,
especially when young. The driveway crossing this path leads to a work

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A CHRYSANTHEMUM SHOW IN THE FLORAL DISPLAY HOUSE

941

NILATTINI NACUYVOD TVOINV.LOG TYNOSSIW

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 177

area which is not open to visitors. In this area are some facilities for
gtowing plants to be displayed indoors and outdoors, storage houses, the
many workshops needed for a large botanical garden, and the heating-
plant.

After you cross the road, you will see a large pin oak to your left.
Pin oaks do very well in St. Louis. They have a pleasing shape, grow
quite slowly, their leaves turn in the fall and many of them hang on the
branches in winter. All the trees along the wall on the Tower Grove
Avenue side of the Garden are pin oaks. To the right of the curving
stone walk which leads to the Floral Display House is one of the many
sweet gum trees in the Garden. It is easy to recognize by the star-shaped
leaves and the fruits which look like Christmas-tree ornaments. Most
of the plants in the Garden are labeled, and Boy Scout troops, garden

VANILLA ORCHID FLOWERS

178 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Cryptanthus zonatus

clubs, and school classes can often be seen, notebooks in hand, identify-
ing and studying the plants in the collections.

In the FLorat Disptay House exhibits and flower shows can be
seen from November to April. In November there is the Chrysanthemum
Show; in December, the Poinsettia; in February, a magnificent display
of orchids; and in March and April spring-flowering plants. Besides
these Garden exhibits, there are the special shows of many plant societies
such as the St. Louis Horticultural, The Cactus, Gladiolus, Iris, Dahlia,
Rose, and Orchid societies. Bordering the inside of the Display House
are tropical trees, most conspicuous of which is the fiddle-leaf fig. Small
plants of this are often grown in homes because the large leathery shiny
leaves fit into modern decorating schemes.

Connected to the Display House and down a small flight of steps is
a greenhouse filled with plants which like a warm and wet habitat. Here,
amid large-leaved philodendrons, exotic shrubs of the tropics, and bird-
of-paradise plants, are to be seen a few specimens of the Garden’s large
collection of orchids and rare bromeliads.

The orchid collection was started in Shaw’s time and gradually grew
until now there are more than 50,000 plants, most of them grown at the
Garden’s Arboretum at Gray Summit, Missouri, about 35 miles west of
St. Louis at the junction of Highways 66 and 50. Included in the col-
lection are a large number of wild orchids which were either given by

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIV 179

orchid fanciers, gathered in the tropics by members of the Garden staff,
or purchased from orchid collectors and growers in many parts of the
world. Since 1927 the Garden has bred orchids and produced many
hybrids. Some of them, such as the deep purple varieties, “Director
G. T. Moore” and “Washington Centennial,” are far more beautiful
than the commonly seen corsage orchids. Each fall the Garden selects
over 300 of its best orchids for the bouquet carried by the Veiled
Prophet's Queen at the outstanding social event in St. Louis, the Veiled
Prophet's Ball. A beautiful yellow orchid is named “Mimi Koehler”
in honor of the queen who first carried it in her bouquet.

To some plant fanciers, the bromeliads, a group of plants to which
the pineapple and Spanish moss belong, are even more attractive than
orchids. They usually grow in trees or on rocks and require little soil.
The scaly leaves of the bromeliads retain moisture, and in many of them
the leaves form a funnel-shaped receptacle which holds water, hence the
popular name “‘tank plant.” Besides the plants shown in this tropical
house, others are grown on the ground and on the trunks of trees in the
Palm House.

Leaving the Display House by the south door, you pass between a
large boxelder (on your left) and a butterfly-bush (on your right), and
turn right. At the south of the walk the pagoda tree, or scholar tree,
from China, greets you. It has beautiful feathery leaves, and in late
summer long clusters of creamy-white flowers hang from the branches.
A few feet beyond a large purple beech, turn to your left and walk up
the steps toward the pergola. Beside the walk are several of the very
low, bronze-leaved Andorra junipers and the taller, blue-green Pfitzer
junipers. Both of these trees are good for planting in the St. Louis
region and, once established, grow well even through dry, hot summers
and cold, snowless winters.

From the wisteria-covered pergola you can look over the ITALIAN
GARDEN, a geometrical arrangement of flower beds centered about a
statue of Juno which Mr. Shaw imported from Italy. Formal European

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

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As you enter the greenhouses from the left you see banana plants,
some of which are usually bearing bunches of fruit, and coffee bushes.
Several kinds of hibiscus are usually in flower in this same end of the
greenhouse and strengthen the impression of a tropical farm, for hibiscus
is often planted as a hedge around the gardens of coffee plantations.
The coffee bushes frequently have flowers, green berries or ripe red
berries, but seldom as many as grow on bushes in the tropics. Most of
this greenhouse is filled with succulent plants from Africa. Nearly
every one knows the common house plant called “mother-in-law’s
tongue’, “bowstring hemp”, or “‘sansevieria”, but not many know that
there are about one hundred other kinds of sansevierias which are native
to Africa. Many of the kinds shown in the greenhouse are frequently
grown in pots in the home. Since they are natives of the desert, san-
sevierias stand the dry winter heat of modern homes and sometimes live
even when watering has been neglected for several weeks. Another
plant easy to grow in the home is the wax plant, or hoya, a vine with
thick, shiny leaves. Its clusters of waxy flowers resemble those of our
native milkweed, as they should, because the two plants belong to the
same family. Like our milkweed, the wax plant has a milky juice.

Up a few steps is the FERN AND Cycap House. Here are many
kinds of ferns even though it is difficult to keep them growing in dry
smoky city air. Several specimens of an Hawaiian tree fern grow well
here and increase rapidly in height and in number of lacy fronds. Most
striking are the many kinds of cycads. Cycads look very much like
palms but they are far more primitive. Botanists consider them a sort
of connecting link between ferns and flowering plants. The kinds alive
in the world today are few in comparison to the number which flourished
long ago and which we know now only as fossils. One of the cycads
in this greenhouse, the sago plant, comes from western Asia. There it
is frequently cut down to harvest the starch which is stored in its trunk.
Its palm-like leaves are dried, dyed, and shipped to this country for use
in wreaths and similar decorations.

greenish when ripe and, like the pineapple, are composed of many small
fruits, the size of which can be judged by the markings on the composite
fruits. ‘The breadfruit belongs to the aroid family to which also belong
_ the many philodendrons, the Jack-in-the-pulpit, skunk cabbage, and

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

THE ITALIAN GARDEN

184

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

19

¢.

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ont &

VIEW IN THE DESERT HOUSE
calla lily. In the vestibule at the entrance to the Palm House you will
find two sign panels that will direct you to many of the kinds of aroids
commonly grown in homes and greenhouses.

n warm regions the several thousand kinds of palms provide food
and fuel, thatch and wood for building, and sugar and oil which can be
In the PALM Housz are several date

sold to buy clothing and luxuries,

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 185

palms, the African oil palm, and the sugar palm. The California sentinel
palm grows so tall that it sometimes threatens to push out the roof and
must be removed. Familiar to Florida visitors is the palmetto, with fan
shaped leaves. It 1s sometimes cut down to obtain its heart, called “palm
cabbage’’, which is eaten cooked or in salads. Climbing up the palms
are tropical vines, bromeliads, and several kinds of orchids including
the vanilla plant, one of the few vine orchids, which in season bears
flowers or vanilla “beans”. African violets, relatives of the spiderworts,
more bromeliads, and other plants which like moist shady places grow
on the ground. From the west porch there is an excellent view of the
Italian Garden, while the east porch faces the water-lily pools and the
Main entrance.

Continue on south through the Palm House to the Economic HousE
where many tropical trees and shrubs grow. Here you will find young
specimens of trees which give us rubber, chewing gum, kapok, and
mahogany, as well as trees which are not so well known.

At the end of this house a flight of steps leads down into the DESERT
House. From the steps you can see the great diversity of plants native
to the deserts of the Americas. The spurges which are so prominent in
the African Desert House are not common here, although there are a
few such as the poinsettia and candle wax plant from Mexico. Cacti
dominate the American desert scene. There are about 2000 kinds,
ranging from miniature pebble-like plants to many-branched giants
larger than the saguaro of the Southwest. The pereskia, one of the few
cacti with ordinary leaves and which is often grown as a hedge in the
tropics, may be seen at the left of the stairs. The fruit of most cacti is
edible, and that of the flat-pad opuntias is the best. Called “‘tuna’’, it is
sometimes sold in large markets, especially in Italian and Greek neigh-
borhoods, for New World cacti have been cultivated in the Mediter-
ranean region for a long time. Many cacti have beautiful flowers. The
Christmas cactus, easily grown in the home, bears rose-red flowers about
Christmas time. Some cacti, such as the night-blooming cereus, flower
at night, and by the time the greenhouses open the petals have closed.

Notice that most of the plants have waxy coverings to prevent evap-
oration of their stored water, and nearly all have spines to protect them
from animals which try to eat the plants for their moisture. The spines
on the barrel cactus protect it from animals but not from the knives of
man. Many a thirsty wanderer in our deserts has been saved by the
water contained in a barrel cactus. Even the desert barberries have
spines on their leaves, although animals are free to carry the unprotected
berries and thus spread the seeds.

186 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Demonstration plot of barberry hedges in Economic Garden

The yuccas and agaves are not cacti, but relatives of the lily and the
amaryllis. Most yuccas and many agaves flower every year, but some
agaves flower only when they are mature and then die. The century
plant, an agave, gets its name from the belief that it flowers only when
it is a century old, but actually it may flower when it is as young as ten
years old. Several important Mexican products such as the alcoholic
beverages, pulque and mescal, and the fibers, s7sal and henequen, are
obtained from agaves.

You can leave the Desert House by the north door and pass through
a corner of the Italian Garden to reach a gtavel path bordered by Osage
orange trees. On your way to the Economic Garden you walk by sev-
eral Chinese spindle trees and further on the closely related ground
cover, the winterberry euonymus. The ECONOMIC GARDEN is a series
of terraces on which plants are tried out for use in this climate. The
entire area is surrounded by a trellis covered with climbing roses. Of
interest to nearly all home-owners is the demonstration plot of hedges.
Oriental arborvitae, boxwood, yew, shingle oak, dwarf maple, Siberian
elm, privets, some of the many barberries, ninebark and burning-bush
have been maintained for several years in an effort to learn which hedges
are suitable for St. Louis. Over the central path arch espaliered apple
trees. These trees yield very few apples in our climate but this system
of training the branches is useful in locations with cool summers and
little sun. Many of the newer iris, as well as some old and good
varieties, bloom in the Economic Garden each spring.

{ISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

\

AN AZALEA PLANTING WEST

OF THE MAUSOLEUM GROVE

188 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

When you reach the row of white birch at the center of the Economic
Garden, turn to your left. You will soon see a Chinese pistachio tree
and the silk-tree from southeastern Asia. Off to your right is an oddly
branched ginkgo tree, one of the many which were planted when the
Garden was young.

The path passes between two of the most perfectly shaped holly
trees in the Garden. Holly berries turn red in late November and stay
on the trees until early spring when birds eat them. Not all the trees
bear berries because some are male and bear the pollen which is needed
by the female tree to set fruit. There are several clumps of azaleas at
the junction of the paths. Azaleas are becoming popular in St. Louis
because gardeners have learned to keep the soil acid, and the beautiful
new varieties are now being successfully grown.

Probably the most beautiful view in the Garden is from the north
entrance to the Mausoleum in April, when azaleas are in bloom and the
flowering crabapple trees on the knolls are solid masses of color. Over
the grassy meadow you can see the old Linnean House and off to one
side are several redbud trees, both the usual pink and the rare white-
flowered forms. The white limestone pillars and black iron fence of
the Mausoleum make a good frame for this springtime composition.

The MausoLeuM grounds are green through the year. Besides well-
known evergreens such as the junipers and yews, there are many other
plants wh‘ch do not shed their leaves. Evergreen barberries, mahonia,

architect of his time, George Barnett. The tomb figure was done by
Ferdinand Miller of Munich, several years before Shaw’s death.

When Mr. Shaw acquired the land the Garden now occupies, there
were scarcely any trees except a clump of sassafras which still persists at
the south end of the Mausoleum gtounds. Because of these trees and
the tower on his house, built in 1849, he named his country home
“Tower Grove”. Mr. Shaw’s country house is kept as much like it was
in his time as is possible. Most of the furniture belonged to him, and
the pieces which did not are largely from houses of prominent St. Louis
families of his period. Members of clubs belonging to the Missouri

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 189

BULGARIAN IVY IN THE MAUSOLEUM GROVE

Federation of Women’s Clubs serve as hostesses from 1 to 4 p. m. daily.
The house is maintained by contributions and through the sale of pub-
lications of interest to visitors.

As you leave Mr. Shaw’s country home you will walk under the
arching branches of an American elm tree. This tree was grown from
seed taken from the ‘Daniel Boone Judgement Tree’? under which
Daniel Boone held his court in the years just before Mr. Shaw arrived
in St. Louis. To the south you can see the building which contains the
administrative offices, the library, and herbarium (dried plant collec-
tions). The north end of this building was Mr. Shaw’s town house,
erected in 1859 at Seventh and Locust Streets, and moved to its present
site in 1891. The library and botanical collections are mg the best
in the world and are used by the staff and research worker

In 1859 Mr. Shaw built a “Museum and Library” Spodeied after the

190 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

ae

eat

“TOWER GROVE,” HENRY SHAW’S COUNTRY HOME

one he saw at Kew Gardens in London. This still serves as a research
center and a meeting place for gardening and botanical groups. Small
exhibits are also sometimes staged there. This is probably the oldest
Museum west of the Mississippi River. Around the walls are portraits
commissioned by Mr. Shaw of early botanists.

You can leave the Garden by the Cleveland Avenue entrance, in
front of the Museum, or, passing a pavilion with a statue of the “Victory
of Science Over Ignorance’ erected by Mr. Shaw, follow along the old
limestone wall to the main entrance.

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

BOARD OF TRUSTEES \

JoHN S. LEHMANN, President Henry Hircucock

Danie K. Catuin, Vice-President RicHarp J. Locxwoop
EUGENE Pettus, Second Vice-President A. WeEssEL SHAPLEIGH
Leicester B, Faust ETHAN A. SHEPLEY

DupLeyY FrencH RoBERT BrookIncs SMITH

EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS

ETHAN re H. SHE H. M. SToLa)
Chancellor of Shanieraat University President of ont Board of Education
of St. Louis
ARTHUR C, LICHTENBERGER,
Bishop | of the Diocese of Missouri STRATFORD L. Mor
RAYMOND R. Tuc bears ae ne the sake of Science

Mayor of the City of of Se Louis of St. Louis
Secretary
GERALD ULRICI

THE HORTICULTURAL COUNCIL
Clifford W. Benson, Clarence Barbre, Albert Chandler, E, G. Cherbonnier,
Paul Hale, Mrs. Hazel Knapp, Emmet Layton, Clarence McGovern, Gilbert
Pennewill, Mrs Roland R. Read, W. F. Scott, Jr., Harold E. Wolfe, John S.
Lehmann, Edgar Anderson, John Nies, Chairman.

STAFF

George T. Moore Emeritus Director
Director

Paleobotanist

ry
August P, Beilmann ____.______ Manager of the Arboretum, Gray Summit
nstant 5 anaes of the Arboretum

Louis G. Brenner—__—____________

Ladislaus Cutak charge of Conservatories
Hugh C, Cutler. Assistant Director and Curator of the Museum
Carroll W. Dodge -_Mycologist
John D; Dwyer. Research Associate
Robert J. Gillespie___________ Research Horticulturist
C. Horner Salonen © and

ia Me One cee Assistant Librarian
Paul A. Kohl loricul

ry. In dukes of Orchids
Edna Mepham ______Assistant Librarian

ick G, Meyer __ Dendro

George H. Pring Superintendent
Betty O’Brien Putney. Assistant to the Director
Kenneth A. Smith = piece
Julian A. Steyermark__.. Honorary Research Associ
Alice F, Tryon Research Associate
Rolla M. Tryon, Jr. Assi Curator of Herbariur:
Gerald Ulrici iness Manager
George B. Van Honorary Curator of Grasses
Robert E. Woodson, Jr. Curator of Herbarium

iy AN

SOME FACTS ABOUT THE GARDEN

The Missouri Botanical Garden carries on the garden established by Henry Shaw
over a century ago at “Tower Grove,” his country home. It is a private institution
with no public support from city or state. The old stone walls and cast-iron fences,
the Linnean House, the Museum, the Mausoleum and the “Old Residence” all date
from Mr. Shaw’s time. Since his death, as directed in his will, the Garden has been
in the hands of a Board of Trustees who appoint the Director.

The Garden is open every day in the year (except New Year’s Day and Christ-
mas) from 9:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m., April to November, and until 6:00 p.m.,
November to April, though the greenhouses close at 5:00 p-m. Tower Grove, itself,
Mr. Shaw’s old residence, is open from 1 until 4. The Garden is nearly a mile long
and has several entrances. The Main Entrance, the one used by the general public,
is at Tower Grove and Flora Place on the Sarah bus line (No. 42). The Park
Southampton buses (No. 80), direct from downtown, pass within three blocks of
this entrance and stop directly across the street from the Administration Building at
2315 Tower Grove Avenue. The latter is the best entrance for students, visiting
scientists, etc. It is open to such visitors after $:30 a. m., but is closed on Saturdays,
Sundays, and holidays. There is a service entrance on Alfred Avenue, one block
south of Shaw Avenue.

Since Mr. Shaw’s time an Arboretum has been developed at Gray Summit, Mo.,
opposite the junction of routes 50 and 66. It is open every day in the year and has
two miles of auto roads as well as foot trails through the wild-flower reservation.
There is a pinetum and an extensive display of daffodils and other narcissi from
March to early May.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL
GARDEN BULLETIN

CONTENTS
A Christmas Tree Farm “Christmas Trees around the
near St. Louis World”
A Botanist in the Christmas Botany Course for Gardeners
Tree Market

General Index to Volume XLII

Volume XLII December, 1954 Number 10

CovER: gg was are} in the St. Louis Garden Club’s “Christmas Trees —

orld” by a presepio or scene at the manger in Bethlehem. The fi
ae is ‘eid to been built by St. Francis of Assisi in 12 The a
year-old figures in the pre of —. as around the World” are made
of carved and painted wood and are richly dressed in costumes of the 17th
nd 18th centuries. A Della Robbia asrland, made of laurel, oak, and pine
leaves and accented with cones, and fruit, was an authentic frame

for the manger scene. Photo by Shao Trefts.

Office of publication: 306 E. Simmons Street, Galesburg, Illinois.
Editorial Office: — Botanical Garden, 2315 Tower Grove Avenue,
St. Louis, 10, Miss
Published monthly except apr and August by the Board of Trustees of the
tanical Garden. Subscription price: $2.50 a year.
Entered as second-class matter January 26, 1942, at the post-office at Gales-
burg, Illinois, under the Act of March 3 9

Please: a not rig a copy of the Bulletin. If you have no further use for yours
t along toa friend or return it to the Garden. Return postage guaranteed.

Missouri Botanical
Garden Bulletin

Vol. XLII DECEMBER, 1954 No. 10

A CHRISTMAS TREE FARM NEAR ST. LOUIS
JAMES M. NELSON

There are many articles on Christmas tree planting but very few of them tell
about efforts in the St. Louis region. We asked Mr. James Nelson to describe the
od i just

methods he uses and the results he obtains on his e Christmas tree farm, j

three miles up the Mississippi River from Alton and twent five mil

town St. Louis. e land is too hilly for farming, so Mr. Nelson decided to grow

trees and to harvest them as four separate crops: as Christmas trees, as posts, later
logs.

as
as pulpwood, and finally, after twenty or thirty years, as saw

Our first tree order, from the State of Illinois Nursery, was for 2000
Virginia Pine, 1000 Pitch Pine, 1000 Jack Pine and 650 Multiflora Rose.
The roses were to form a hedge along the edge of the bluff and furnish
berries and cover for wildlife. The trees arrived in March, 1949, by rail
express, in four bales wrapped in flat veneer mats tied around damp sphag-
num moss, each bale weighing about forty pounds. They were promptly
unpacked and heeled-in prior to planting. During the first two years a
shovel was used to dig the holes in the contour furrows already plowed. An
instructor in vocational agriculture at a neighboring high-school agreed to
furnish half a dozen boys to assist in planting, and although they needed
supervision they worked fairly well.

Through the crucial summer months of their first year away from the
nursery the 1949 plantings achieved a 100 per cent survival rate. By
autumn I was sufficiently encouraged to order not only a lot more young
pines but 200 Tulip Poplars for a ravine and 500 Rosa multiflora plants for
placing around the small natural pond in one of the several sink-holes so
common to this general area. Because the project was, and still is, to a
degree, experimental, the State’s District Forester and I decided to order
different species of pines. We settled on 9,000 Red Pine, 2,300 White Pine
and 1,000 Shortleaf Pine, after assuring ourselves of the absence of Ribes
(gooseberry or currant) from the area proposed for the White Pine, which is
subject to a fungus disease known as White Pine Blister Rust if planted
within 300-400 yards of those bushes. The fungus requires two alternate
host plants, Ribes and White Pine, to complete its life cycle. Many local

(191)

192 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

areas and the entire region south of United States Highway 40 in Illinois are
practically free from Ribes. We are close enough to the line of demarcation,
although actually north of the highway, to be relatively safe.

For setting out the 12 thousand transplants and seedlings in March of
1950 we started with a crew of about fifteen boys, impressing on them
constantly the necessity of keeping the young pine roots wet before planting
and also of pressing the soil firmly around the roots to avoid air pockets.
The small trees, 6-12 inches over all, were carried in clean old 5-gallon
paint or grease buckets half full of water. We planted them four feet
apart each way, and thus used 2,700 trees per acre that year. I discovered
that fifteen lively young boys throwing mudballs at each other and admiring
the river view on a warm sunny day did not accomplish as much as half that
number working to keep warm, to get the task completed, and to get their
wages, on a cold or rainy day. In fact, it was during one of our March
snowstorms that six of us must have established some sort of record by
planting five thousand trees in one day. But I'll remember that day for a
long while—and so will the boys!

In March of 1951, 15,000 more young trees were planted, mostly Red
and White Pines, with some Loblolly, Red Cedar, Bald Cypress, Black Walnut,
Red Gum and Tulip Poplar either intermixed or placed in appropriate loca-
tions. For instance, the Loblolly were planted in alternate rows with the
Shortleaf Pine, the Black Walnut on crests of hills, and the Tulip Poplar in
the ravines, as recommended.

I had learned a more efficient method of planting from a visit with
Forester Lane at the Shawnee National Forest in the southern extremity of
Illinois. We discarded the old long-handled shovel in favor of a planting
bar with a tapered wedge on one end, specially designed for the purpose.
Instead of digging a hole and then filling it, we made a slit in the earth with
the bar without removing any soil. After the roots were placed in the slit,
a couple of firm foot stomps compacted the soil around the roots. The
saving in time, trouble and expense was considerable. It now took only an
eight-hour day for three men to set out one thousand seedlings. Other
methods of planting forest trees employ the mattock or spade, the former
being adapted to removal of sod. Most of our land is not sufficiently leve)
to allow the use of tree-planting machines.

Competition of younger small pines with honeysuckle, blackberry, locust,
sassafras, and weeds was not too serious the first two or three years. A
scythe was used once or twice to cut the weeds in some places, and a wheel-
barrow-type hand-sprayer with a 1/100 solution of 2,4,5,-T ester and water
proved successful for brambles, honeysuckle and younger locusts and sassa-
fras. Larger locusts, which during the winter are cut to sell for fine fence

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 193

ae ia Mall pre =

Seedlings are kept “heeled-in” in a furrow until planting time.

posts, are prevented from resprouting by covering the surface of the stumps
with either Ammate crystals or painting with a solution of one quart of
water to one or one-half pound of Ammate. For the more tenacious Osage
Orange, its stump is saturated not only on top but on the sides with a 1/16
or 1/20 solution of 2,4,5,-T and fuel oil or kerosene.

At least 90 per cent of the young pines have thrived with relatively little
attention. Practically all of those planted during the three years before the
. disastrous droughts of 1952, 1953, and 1954 are doing fine, but the plantings
of spruce and fir, obtained from a commercial nursery, and of Scotch, Red
and White Pine, after 1951, have produced scarcely a tree. Because of the
intense heat during the last three summers, we have lost almost every one
of the ten thousand young pines, spruce and fir planted. The 30 thousand
older pines, however, some of which (especially the Virginia Pines) have now
reached a height of between ten and fifteen feet, will carry us over to more
normal (?) productive years—we hope. Now we are using mostly the top
six to eight feet of these taller trees because most people prefer that size.

Pine and spruce, unlike fir, may need some pruning to develop a dense
merchantable form. We have so far not done much of this work because
there has been little need to do so. Hand-pruners, lopping shears, and a rope-
operated pruner on a six-foot pole are the tools used. The Red, White, and
Scotch Pines do not have buds and small branches between the whorls (lateral

194 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

boughs) which mark successive years’ growth. If a portion of the leader is
cut off too late in the growing season, the remainder may die back to the
whorl point in the fall or winter and the laterals will turn skyward to become
leaders, forming thereby a less desirably shaped tree. If, however, the leaders
and laterals of pine are cut off before a new terminal bud forms, in May or
June for this area, there is enough of the growing season left to form a
cluster of new buds at the ends of the shortened leaders and laterals. Unlike
the spruce or fir, pines begin to grow tall by the third or fourth year after
planting, especially the four-year-old (2-2) transplant stock. Here, height
can increase by as much as two feet annually but such wide spacing between
the laterals will naturally preclude development of a more compact and bushy
tree. Early pruning can be important by the third or fourth year. Both a
science and an art, it takes, after experience, but a deft movement for each
tree.

Most of our pines so far have not had more than a satisfactory twelve or
fifteen inches growth between laterals. On some of the faster-growing trees
the leader is pruned at this point and the surrounding shoots, which are
laterals of that year, are trimmed to eight or ten inches. New growth at
the end of the laterals of previous years is treated in the same way. The
most simple and successful rule for amateurs, such as we, to follow, is to
shape the tree to a symmetrical cone.

We have done some experimentation with so-called stump culture. When
our Virginia Pines are severed above live branch whorls, the uppermost re-
maining limbs, or newly developed adventiticus buds, usually form new
leaders. Even more fascinating are the Pitch Pines, which sprout prolifically
from a stump cut close to the ground with nothing left attached. Next
spring, after allowing over one year’s growth from the 1953 harvest, we plan
to eliminate all but the most promising leader from those stumps which are
still living and hope it grows into a satisfactory “‘turn-up” tree. Forester
Fox, at Sinnissippi Forest in northern Illinois, told us he has produced some
Christmas trees this way but that they are sometimes not so marketable as
the original trees. Needless to say, the developed root system of such a
stump tree is capable of producing growth in a shorter period than that
needed for an original crop tree.

Christmas of 1953 was the first season we marketed trees. After dicker-
ing with several wholesalers in St. Louis Commission Row and with chain
grocery stores, we decided to sell directly to the consumer here. About one
mile from our tree farm is the highway, where we placed green and white
signs. We also advertised in the local newspaper every day the two weeks
before December 25th. The price was made deliberately lower than store

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 195

trees, and response was better than expected for our first year of selling a
tree different from the traditional fir or spruce. Week-ends were so busy
that we had to have two or three helpers, sometimes more, such as unsus-
pecting friends who came for what they thought would be a nice, relaxing
afternoon far from the madding crowd.

People would get us out of bed at dawn, and get us out of bed at night.
Children would become lost in the forest. Their parents would take an hour
finding them and another hour selecting a tree unless we were blessed with
cold winds, which made their selections less tedious, for us. Finnian, our
oafish young Irish Setter pup, would infuriate our customers by jumping
up on them with muddy paws. An indignant mother drove off in a huff
because Sissy, our cat, had the audacity to scratch her eight-year-old son
when he puiled her tail hard. We hastily took out liability insurance against
the Great American Public tripping over Christmas tree stumps and breaking
their necks. Come night, instead of accepting merrie olde Yuletide invita-
tions from family and friends, we were too exhausted to do anything except
to fall thankfully into bed. But our hard work and years of planning and
perseverance had compensations, too, because an idea which had become a

obby was now a business, a growing concern.

City people liked to drive out in the country with the children to get
some clean air, a fine view of the Mississippi, fresh trees which retained their
needles for weeks, a large selection and—considerable savings in money.
Country people were also even more aware of the advantages of home-grown
produce over trees cut months before, kept in cold storage, shipped thousands
of miles, and thrown around in bundles perhaps a dozen times before finally
reaching their destination. A few potential customers were rather difficult,
it is true, but most of them recognized a good buy when they saw it and
one man even invited us aboard his yacht. Nor was our selling confined to
the two hectic weeks before the Big Day in December. In April a woman
telephoned to ask if she could buy a tree to celebrate a postponed Christmas
with her wounded soldier son, due home from Korea. In September, the local
Little Theatre needed a Christmas tree for a play they were about to present.
In October, the Garden Club and City of Alton wanted bids for large orders
of trees in the coming holiday season. Churches and schools placed orders
weeks ahead of time.

Of the recently estimated 22 million domestic Christmas trees sold
annually in this country, 97 per cent are represented by the eleven species
of conifers listed below. Leading the list is the old faithful Tannenbaum or
Balsam Fir, still preferred by some older conservatives, but in our opinion

196 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

not so attractive as some of the long-needle pines which furnish a refreshing
version of a tradition perhaps four hundred years old or more:

Species Number Per cent
Balsam Fir 6,435,000 30
Douglas-Fir »830,500 27
Black Spruce 2,363,000 11
Eastern Red Cedar 2,128,545 10
White Spruce 990,200
otch Pine 806,925 4
“Southern” Pine 652,550 3
Red Spruce 594,160 i)
Virginia Pine 370,000 2
White Fir 335,000 1
Norway Spruce 303,400 1
97

States bordering Canada produce most of our Christmas trees. For in-
stance, over half of the Douglas-Firs come from only two Montana counties.
Nine out of ten trees come from private lands. In recent years one out of
three Christmas trees distributed in our own country has been imported from
Canada. Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, Labrador and the Dominican Repub-
lic have also shipped a few thousand trees to the United States, during the
last ten years. Of 39 million families in the United States, according to the
1950 census, about one out of four apparently has no Christmas tree because
only 30 million trees are distributed, including an estimated four million
trees for decorating cities, schools, churches and other institutions. Although
43 per cent of Americans claim no religious affiliation it may be rather con-

fusing to learn that only about one fourth of our families do without a
Christmas tree.

A BOTANIST IN THE CHRISTMAS TREE MARKET
EDGAR ANDERSON

To the alert botanist the Christmas trees offered for sale in St. Louis for
the last thirty years have formed an interesting pageant. Too far south for
northern evergreens, too far north for southern evergreens, so close to the
mid-continental plains and prairies that no evergreen is really happy here,
St. Louis is the perfect vantage point from which to view the contest
between the west coast and the east, between the long-needle pine swags of
the south and the ground pine of the north.

Twenty-five years ago the North and East seemed to have the bulk of
the Christmas tree business in St. Louis. There were northern White Pines
with their soft needles in little bunches of five, and many Canada Balsams,
their shiny dark green needles sticking out so clearly on either side of the

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 197

twig that they looked like nothing so much as a little boy whose mother had
just parted his hair with a comb and sent him off to Sunday school. Ropes
of northern Ground Pine were sometimes seen in the stores, and the farmers’
markets had stickery Red Cedars from the near-by Ozarks. Even in those
days, however, the West was not far away. If one went to Kansas City
during the holidays he found the markets flooded with short-needled Black
Hills Spruce to the virtual exclusion of eastern species.

Now it is all changed; western trees flood our markets, the exact species
varying from year to year as different parts of our rich western flora are
sampled by Santa Claus’s business partners. Long ropes of Mountain Laurel
foliage still come to our markets from the South and East. The big cones
and the handsome young branches of our southern pines turn up here and
there, but the bulk of our Christmas tree business is now with western
species. These come from such a wide area, the species and varieties differ
so much from one year to another, that it would be a very bold forester who
would be willing to identify at sight all the trees he might find in any one
St. Louis super-market. However, it is quite easy to classify all the Christ-
mas trees as either spruces, firs or Douglas-Firs.

Were it not for the Douglas-Firs the cataloguing of Christmas trees
would be simplicity indeed. Spruces and firs are very much alike; they are
all shortish-needled evergreens with a stiff central axis and whorls of branches
in almost mathematical perfection. There are many ways of telling spruces
and firs apart, some of them very simple indeed as we shall see in a moment.
But the Douglas-Firs (or Douglas-Spruces which they might just as well be
called and sometimes are) are, strictly speaking, neither spruces nor firs. They
are another kind of evergreen; they belong in another genus (with the
mouth-filling barbaric scientific name of Pseudotsuga). In some ways they
are like spruces, in some like firs, and in some just like themselves. Their
most fantastic character is their cone. In addition to the chaste regular
symmetry of brown scales of ordinary evergreens, it has bracts which stick
way out between the scales like so many forked snake-tongues. The Douglas-
Fir cone has a very gay unnatural look, like something thought up by an
interior decorator.

The Douglas-Firs are most easily identified by the buds at the branch
tips. The Douglas-Fir forms a whole species complex throughout the West,
all the way from the Rockies to the coast. The various races have many
minor differences but the buds at the branch tip differ from those of other
conifers. They are slenderish and pointed, and they narrow in at the base.
In other words, at the point where the bud springs from the twig, it is not
quite as wide as it is just a little farther along. No other kind of evergreeen
in christendom has a terminal bud of this sort.

198 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

With the Douglas-Firs (spruces) out of the way, it is easy to distinguish
all the firs of the world from all the spruces. When spruce needles fall
off they leave little sharp projections on the twigs. When fir needles fall off
the severed connections are smooth. One can tell a fir from a spruce by
touch alone. Just put your hand in back among the foliage till you come
to the older twigs on which the needles have fallen. The firs feel like smooth
twigs; the spruces are a regular succession of sharp little points that press
into your flesh, a sort of super sandpaper. The Douglas-Firs (spruces) feel
to the touch as they logically should. They are about half way between.
They have little bumps where the needles fell off, but the bumps are not at
all sharp.

“CHRISTMAS TREES AROUND THE WORLD”
EDGAR ANDERSON

The first week-end in December, from Thursday noon through Monday
night, the Garden was host to an exhibit arranged by the Garden Club of
St. Louis,* “Christmas Trees around the World.” The Federated Garden
Clubs, the Federated Women’s Clubs, and the Horticultural Council of the
Garden cooperated in selling tickets, and caring for the enormous crowds.
Over nine-thousand visitors paid to see the Christmas trees and associated
displays which were staged in the Museum building and in Mr. Shaw’s old
residence, “Tower Grove.” There were trees of many countries in authentic
detail, replicas of Mexican Christmas fiestas, and Japanese and Hawaiian

oliday decorations. One of Mr. Shaw’s old bedrooms was charmingly fitted
up to represent a Victorian Christmas-time bedroom as it would have looked
when the children had just run off downstairs. The room which now dis-
plays Mr. Shaw’s personal library most appropriately showed a typical old-
fashioned English Christmas with Yule log and boar’s head and gifts bpiagaee
up for the traditional English “Boxing Day,” December 26th. Mr. Shaw
portrait hung prominently in the background of this English display, paking
him seem the personal host for the occasion, as indeed he was. He would
undoubtedly have been pleased to see the beautiful old buildings erected
under his personal supervision, again open for official entertaining as they
were in his day; would have been pleased also with the taste and dignity with
which the whole affair was conducted and the thousands of dollars which
were raised for the Garden and for the new national home of the Federated
Garden Clubs.

* By invitation several other St. Louisans created special Christmas exhibits to accompany
the “Modern American” tree in the Museum building.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 199

A BOTANY COURSE FOR GARDENERS

An introductory course in Plant Morphology and Physiology, sponsored
by the Men’s Garden Club of Webster Groves, will be given by Dr. John
D. Dwyer, Research Associate at the Garden and Professor of Biology, St.
Louis University. The course, consisting of eight sessions, will be given
every other Monday, January 3—April 18, from 7:30 to 9:30 P.M., at the
Museum Building in the Garden. It will give, in a simple fashion, the ele-
ments of plant structure and of how the plant lives and reproduces.

The course will be free to “Friends of the Garden” but enrollment is
limited to fifty persons. Information on registration may be obtained by
phoning the Garden, Prospect 6-5567.

200

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

GENERAL INDEX

Figures in ifalics refer to page numbers of illustrations.

AARS, All American Rose Selections,
African patton collected by Field Marshal
Garden herbarium, 90; in the

Garden ae 18
African Violet: bicolor, exhibited at
tional African Violet Show, 122; history
ae 124; specimen plants, suggestions for,
ons Violet Clubs of St. oe and St.
Louis County, papers ions aie Council

of, 119-140: The African Violet 124;
An African Violet grower,
African Vi olet Soci

“S38

Growing A

Z treat an
African Violet, 121; The importance of
the African

e Violet, 119; Miscellaneous
data o frican ol 138 y
hobby, ; Pests and — fs ty be e
therapeutic value of African Violets, 134

African Violet Society of eaice 119, 120,
1
econ? Meee; bench o
; diseases of.
rot, vide Ge y 292s do'san faa eter.
130; fertilizing, 133; neice ‘liane for
, 123; greenhouse culture of,

we afceet sortaaaent
wn

12
> ,
coted in vermiculite, 123, 129,
123, 126; temperatures for,
125, 136; varieties

ommended, 7,
128: watering, 122,

1
124,126, 127, 133;

pain 186
Airplane view of Missouri Botanical Garden,

ree Elinor, ein seedling work of, 153
aul A

Alton, Ill, a Christmas tree ie near, 191

So cour for ardening and

on ac 1954s, 145,199

ie fe
34, 40: A cage in the
: t

S73. 1
— Se biography,
103; The importance of the African

ace Lie, Plants fora St. Louis garden,
r Grove in the 1870’s
Andesce: oN W. F.: The African Violet,

Annals of mn Missouri Botanical Garden,

46,905 1

Annual Pah sermon, *

Rana research w Si 8

Ap ate gt rican ‘vets $ on roses, 7

ica rch as 39;
" ne er” na use * gh daffodils at, 45;
deer damage to woody plants at, control

a fOSTE ee

dnicietnn pool with

comme: 39; Gate House at,

ah x in ‘May, $5 ; logs being Douled: to
pu

fro ge-
table” plate for en 81; wildlife at, wr

r.: How to treat an

Asclepias: Dr. Woodson’s monoraph on, 98
or novae recieans 24: giueer gees 21

Aster, New England, 21; Ozark,

as Willia Growing ioe ouse

in the garden 64; using Shading dich rae
his mum i

Azalea planting west of Mausoleum Grove,
187, 1

Bachelor’s Buttons, 20

Backyard: gardener can grow pregren
mums, 47; growing mums in a pit Ss
in the, 66,

ald ress,

alkan Ivies, 22, 43, 188, 189

et s as Christmas trees, 191, 194, 196
Barberry he dg es in economic ga en 186

Bean, mung, as food,

Beaver work c along the eee River, 39
Beilmann, P., wage system
sludge as a say bande te Pee feeding, 23
Belent ice eee et

Be oS L : Growing the large chrysan-

emums outdoors, 61; in his garden lean-

Bequest form, Feb, Bull.

ook-Flowe F Guild i in 1907, receiving flowers

after owes s :
Book Reviews: Dony’s “Flora of senate

shire,” essitt’s “California Academ

80; Gres
Lingnan Dawn Redwood Expedition,” 142;

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

rie as “Secrets of the Green Thumb,”
141; epherd’s ‘History of bees R ose,”
101; Sat “Songbirds in Y

arden
141; Weber’s iorpaatrind soe of the
Colorado Front Range,”
n Garden library, ot 42; Dr. En-
ocd-cuts
Shaw, manuscript

pr
Botanist in the Chilvcoss tree markets, 196
Botanists: the Garden’s most important

crop, 38; visiting, 31, 8

Botany course for gardeners, 199
x WoO ard 74,

iapesemee ya nry Shaw,” 118; aa
Con in. “Var. “Henr Shar

Braslalioatly “Washington panies
nial,” 157, 1

Breadfruit, te

Brenner, Louis G., 39: The Arboretum—a
“vegetable plate” for deer, 81; Control
of deer damage to woody plants at the
Arbor device for sweeping

, 79
Bromeliad collection at Garden, 43,
Brown, D rchid collection given
maa 152, Serial from collection ms

Bole, ae * flower show, 35; course in
forcing of,
Bull Ba
Bulgarian Ivy, 22, 43; in Mausoleum Grove,
» 189

c
cti in Desert House, 185
cee and Succulent ‘Show, 148
Pa ars 0

se Zone, Garden’s Tropical Station at,
Gane
Cattleya: Actelion a smaller, 168; dividing
an jotting a,
Cattleya

: bicolor var. Dowiana, 168;
a

to re
var. “Undine,” 152; “ unter,”
aris, 168s CY Biiesians var. alba, Oct.
cover, 152, 168; “Portia” var. gloriosa,
168; ‘Prince E Edward,” 152; Skinneri var.
alba, 152; Trianae, 154, var. “D. S$
Brown,”

Cedar, Re 92

Chicago Tribune, story about Julian Steyer-
mark in,

Chinese f g beans in

“Chipper” sedans weed rected into chips,
39

201

A Christmas tree farm near St. Louis

as a business, age as a hobby, 191; ue

grown, 196; marketing, 194; stump cul-

ture, 194

Christie tree market, A botanist in the, 1
“Chris rees ind the Id,” fe

Italy representation in, De ver
Chrysanthemu ow Floral Display

House, 30, 176, 178; Tescing basket in,

Pee

; beds sh pase 68;
ing

eo 4
51, 61, 67; disbudding, 49, 6; dis-
playing, 70; exhibition m ;

ropagating, 52, 61, 64,

on growing, 68;
for, 50, 58;

7; shading, 64, a shelter
ua for, 48, 53, 57, 63, 69
5 6

4, 56, 63; staking, 48, 51, 68; varieties
recommended St Louis area, 57,
3 Winter care of,
City garden, Plants a.

Callstion - the Garden: bok, 42; dried
plan

anted ia memory of, ny
cover, 100, 100; “rind of hi rden”
contributions in me of,

Compton’s “Piccorial St. gers
from, Jan. cover, 108 ;

Coneflower, purple, eaten by deer, 76, 81

Conifers grown for Christmas cries. 192, 196

Corn bree ding, Anderson’s work on,

Courses in oirde ening and Se ieilanon 41,

‘reine

Crown rot of African Violet, 132, 132
Cross sedliuaeion for propagating African
seed, 135

Cycads at the Garden 112
an. 178
n Violets from, Sepé. cover,

ie 1385 growing chrysanthemums

Phioes ‘at i Gerden n,
Cypripedium, see Pa sripectilors

D
Daffodil Ss at Ar sry 44, guide
to, at Gar in Apri
Dae, “growing gene elated between
of,

Da hhlia Show
Dahlia and AAS Oa Society, Greater

202

St. Louis, es ca say arranged by, 47
Daisy, grow er, 2

Daniel Boone Tudeanane ify 8 -
Deer at the Arboretum, 39, 8 ontrol of
damage to woody p ante chink sa, 773 food
references of, 81, 8
Dendrobium nobile, 166; Thwaitesiae var.
Veitchii,
Desert House, 784, 18
Device for sweeping leaves from trails, 79, 70
illon, H. L., orchid plants donated by, 153
Diseases: of African Violets, 127, 131; of
chrysanthemums, 48; phloem necrosis of
elms, 72; White Pine blister rust, 191
Douglas-Firs, or = glas-Spruces, 196, 197
Duggar, = Big 8; and a group of his
studen
Dwyer, De. irre 150,- 199
E
r Show at Garden
Echinacea pl eaten oe dee pe
, hedge uauneniie plot
in, mer ay
Economic Sah plants in,
Elms, phloem necrosis in, eciatos Spencer’s
treatment cae gi 4

o cu er technique, course in,
and the buen:
1It

Epiphyll “Vive Rouge,” 96

Eupatoriu algo 2

Evergreens: a e Garden, a 188; as Christ-
mas 135,

a Cheysanthemams, Growing, at

Exhibition in soiree Display House, 44, 85,
176,

ter: account of c

elebra-
of Shaw’s arrival

illustrations from, 70

Exporker ae fa m por
of 60th anniversar
ney Louis, #t1;
1 7

F
Fairburn, pate! ish
charge of,

Federated Gea Clubs,
arden

orchid laboratory in
volunteer help at

Pit vce Women’s Clubs as hostesses at

ower Grove,” 32, 71,
nd Cycad House, plants in, 182
Fertilization of trees, 23; formula calcu-
lated, 28, meth x

Fertilizer, sewage system sludge as a, 73
Firs, Douglas, 196, 197
Floral —— fogs Reswce or ox in, 38,

, 85, 148, 7 76,
Flower sermon, an
Flower shows hi wit 38,44; the new

and the sn e
— lighting for African Violets,
122, 123; 8

Foliar feeding: ff roses, 11; of trees, 30

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Forsythias,
Friends ag! the Garden,” fund contrib-
uted t emory of ie arcy Collins, 101
spe a being sed to Garden, May

T; 0,
ruits as deer Ae at ~ Arboretum, 85
Fungous diseases of roses

sag tt ede mums in a, 55, 56; lean-
0, grow ms 2
card, see ay rae eae Garden and
Garden

and Horticulture,

eurs in, 41, es 199
e at Arboretum, 45

Gersbacher, Mrs. J eck My hobby, 137
a ground-cov

courses for

ding, cou 7 in

Gray, Asa, and Shaw’s oe

Gray it, orchid range at,

Greater St -— Dahlia and Prive nthe-
mum iety, a symposium on chrysanthe-
mum esting: arranged by a committee
f the, 43-70

Greenhouse: at Garden in the 1870’s, Nov.
back cover; growing mums in a, 47, 49,

64; plastic, 51, 52

Growing acs chrysanthemums at home,

Gum, Red, 192
Gurney, James, first Garden superintendent,
107

H
Hartman, Harold R.: The backyard gard-

can grow greenhouse mums, 47;
entering his backyard greenhouse, 40
Harvest Show of St. Louis Horteuttarsl
Society, ilk
ed

191, 7

as “trees, 03
ion,’ **Calypso,”

19;

ool of te aren 37.4
at geek oe: red tee. “bs
uis Herb Soc
, Garden, a. ie. rags a
co i ach, 90;
gins ann, 43,
Hitchonck heii re y RE ece

Hitchcock n — of Bulletin, 33-44
Holly tree 8
Hollyh

oO
sevierias, 182

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

a in Feb, Bulletin, note about, 45
Insects: pen African Violets, 126, 131;
Ral 60, Pe and diseases
atta a roses, "9 031
Instruction at Garden 50!
Iris chaem se 19; germanica, 19; Kochii
‘Blac Cee 19 Mi dnight, eee
pallida Sie ig Victor, ” 19; pumila var.
atrocaerulea, 1

44;

i

January 1954 BuLretin, Note about, 1

June, the Garden in, 9

Jungle ee at Los Angeles Co. Arbo-
retum

Kidd, sib 1
sprouts,
Kohl, Paul oe Growing roses, 2

Mung beans and _ their

i
oat “Dr. George T. Moore,”
57; “‘Rosamunde,”

157

1573
Koeh 1 re
a 165; “St. Louis,”

Leaves: propagating coh a Violets from,
cover, 107, 138
Libeate. mt books. ouechaad by Dr. Engel-
f, 37, 42; rare books

d

d by Shaw, 107

rescent, Growing African Violets

AL in late spring,
ay,

climbing roses on, I2

uth: pe here Violets raised under

t and Valda: Orchids at the
ouri Bexanical prregeme Jenene, to-
ay and tomorrow,

M
Machinery, use of, at cgi m, ee
Magnolia, i jonlenguing wir
. Ioan ng” by buck deer, ova. eaten
Ma ain Gate, 171; in the nineties, 35
Mausoleum Lacan 71, 85, 117, 188; Bul-

, 188, 189
Gud aa the Arboretum in, 85
Mealy Peedi control of, 131
Men’s Garden Clubs, help of, at Garden, 71

: ee Spider,

203

Midwest, culture of orchids in the
— ee of America,
aph on, 9
Miller, “Richard, "A portrait of Henry Shaw
by,

Wondeon* s

Milor; rgan
Micron ian front in 1854, 107
Missouri Botanical Garden, see ‘also Shaw’s

Gar
eae grieen al Garden: airplane view of,
41; Balkan Ivies in, 43; “Christmas Trees
around the World” exhi oe at,
analyte and routine work
; Italian icles 5
ou

haw’s Garden
or

: T., 38
Motorized equipment at Garden, 35
Mulching material, a “ chipped?

weed brush for,
66; see also irr ecars
g beans and their sprouts,

reducing

Museum and old library, - ie: “Christ-
Trees around the World” in, 191;
interior of ir ee um,
useum of Economic Plants, 35
Narcissus: at the Arboretum, i “February
Gold,” 18; ‘Sir Watkin, ”

Native ola as deer food at he Arboretum,

meres, James M.: A Christmas tree farm
r St. 191

m
Neoregelia marmorata, 44
mphaea: — Gold,” 173; “Director
eorge T. 6 27a; ee Ge
Pring,” ees
Oo
Oaks, Pin,
O’Gorman, .: Chrysanthemums, one

of our cde owes, 57; watering plant ts

in his mum shelter ee

Old Residence He one my Shaw's: 1, > 188;
“Christmas Trees around the World” ex-
hibited in, 198; Federated Women’s Clubs

204

as hostesses at, 71, 189; illustrated dur-
ing his lifetime, 100 09; renovation of, 32,
43; Mena | Prophet s Queen greeting schoo

childre , 43; view of, throu ee —
leum — 43—See also Tower

Ollinger, John: Growing mums in a pga
greenhouse, 51, 52

Oncidium Powellii, 155

Orchid Conference, First World, 142: pro-
gram o show at Garden in con-
nection iy 149

Orchids: amateur course in growing,
arriving at flower show, 35; at the Mis
oO

tory for growing seedlin ngs,
161, 162, 164; Powell’s gift
manian, 152; shading, 160; transplanting
hi 37; vanilla, 177; Veiled Prophet

n’s bouquet, 37, 45, 149, 157, 179;
aha: 160, 161; yellow types, 168
Organic wastes as fertilizer, 75
Osage Orange, 193

Palm House, plants in, it
sg rng nae “DP. S. Bro
audiae var. phy

atte: gure

bod Pallet
: An African best fig grower,

Periwinkle as
Phalaenops
5

a ground cover, 22
psis Laedemannions, 164, 164

Syne
Jack, 191; Loblolly,
3 Red, 191) Scotch.
193; Shortleaf, ‘191; Virginia, 191, 192;
oe 19E. 196
t house for growing mums, 66
eae sama = a St. Louis ke 18
Poplars, Tulip, 1
Sede Caw: site ~s Lehi by, 152
Pring, George H. 3 nglish hybrids ne
chased by, 15 & eres expedition
i department developed
ing by,

anthemums,

52, 61

, 64, 67
of orchids, 37, 86, 156, 162; of plants,
course in,

Pruning perce 193
Pseudotsuga,

Phare" Garden, 36

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Queen’s Bouquet, see Veiled Prophet Queen’s
Bouquet
Quercus palustris, fertilizing, 20

Rabenau, Ralph H.: Growing chrysanthe-
ms from cuttings, 67; on a glass-en-
saga front porch, 68
Ribes,
Res eae at the Ga

rden, 37
Pests and diseases [of

Riefling, Jeanette
Africa ngs
osa: alba, at t

sdinsetion building,
edge, 191

175, 274
es aig the Grea ter St. Louis, at the

2 oes pa

3. Spr ayi ng, 10,
: Trailing, 1 175 varieties crue for St.

een 16; watering, 5; winter production,
12, 74,
Rosinweeds, eaten by deer, 81

St. Louis: A Christmas tree farm near, 191;
of, 18; river frout
ce and Locust streets,

in 1866, 105, and neighborhood in the
re ’s recollections of, in

uis Die. and Chrysanthemum So-
ciety, 148
St. Louis pula ce: help of, at ies Resi-
istma

den ; s a rees around the
Wo ie arran — by,

Saint Louis aecacat aa Harvest
Show, 148

Saintpaulia, see African Violet

Salt as a cure for — necrosis in elms, 72

Sandefur, Hubert G.: Five rules I use in
growing pace ae mums, 55; in_ his

garage,
Saugrain’s, Mme., house and alee es
Sc eae George A.: A pit hous Ww
ing mums in a small pit house 14 pik ee

Seibert. 3 Russell J., sy

Sedum spectabile,

Sewage system es as a ea age 73; use
of, at Arboretum, 74,

MISSOURI BOTANICAL

Shaw, Henry: A pictorial biography, 103-
18

Henry: as proprietor of a bo a
nor

portraits: at age of dirty five, 3, 104 oy
Richa ee vi ler, 77 his
dea

rtraits, agrbide cover,
ouse

c
cESSs as illus.

Trees around
196; from the

“History of the

” by,
Phiced ne : Vas gee be

Silphium spp. eaten = sige

Sludge, sewage syste ees tilizer, 73

Smuts’, Field Ma sil, plane satlcckicke reach
Gard en “gta

Snowballs, 2

Snowdrop ne at Garden, 37
Soil: at Garden, 25; for Afe rican Mapes
123, ay oe Phi yenehiiienis: 57;
for rose
cerry any effect of deer browsing on, 82,
South African “— collected by Field
hal Smuts,
8 a effect ey deer browsing on, 82,

sag treatment for phloem necrosis in
Ims, 72

Spring howd culture course, 147
oo sag or ig 97
Steyerm

87
Spruce, oie Hills, oe Deals, 196,

oo The Garden’s most important crop,

Stump culture of Christmas trees,
Sturtevant collection of old ama a
43

Sweet Gums, 177

GARDEN BULLETIN

te
Tank plants, 43, 1
“Taxonom my; cree I like’—Dr. Woodson’s
address,
eed Miss Julia, Queen of the Veiled
rophet,
Therapewti value of African eas 134
Tomb, Henry Shaw’s, 117, effigy on, 116
Tour of Shaw’s Garden, 1
Tower Grove Park, 11
wer Grove, Shaw’s coun home, 43,
3.08 O; as illserace onal his
lifetime, 100; in t , Jan. cover
—See also Old Res ence
“Trail bn - use Arboretum, 79, 70
ae feeding fo iter, is formula for,
3; dos ee alee 28 » 29; pressure
pid 5 CAS dia if ft. h-bar
method of, a6 es
Trees: at Garden, 175, 177, 179, 188,
os aera tree farniing, 191 , marketing,

Treen, William, 113
ele: eal i Violets
es

R. of Nation Science
Pan tation erant to, 14
Usinger, Thelma: Hee data on the
African Violet,

a bl ue, from coe collection, 45
oe Be ‘ib of, in grass her-
A “repeal plate” for deer—The Arbs-

retum,
— rakes Queen greeting visitors in
>

Queen’s bouquet, 45, “149,

Vermiculite, use of, in rooting African
i 8
Victoria water-lily,
Volunteer help at a Cickea: 71, 100, April
cover
Vriesia splendens, 43

Walnut, black,

saintigor ti breeding Garden, 33, ies
pools of, 47, L723 ‘opted . day- bloo:
ing, 33, 36, a

wate diy CRAM Go a 73 - St.

TE 2
Wayman, Grace Cross pollination for
ae a eta Violets] from

Wax i
Weeders pie 2 Garden Club, 71

206

Weeds: effect of deer browsing
elimination of,

White Pine a rust, 19

Wild flower. Arb

oretu

3 seen on
trails in Mas 85; threatened ise ex-
tinction by brow: ete deer,
Wild life. at ‘Arbre
Winter view

Gate hans at Arboretum, 45
Wood-cuts ses old volumes in Garden’s
Set y ary, 42

ood Hyacinths e Mausoleum groun
ert

ax-

onomists, 91; refer og to b in
arden library,

Woodson’s ‘Flora of Panama,’ 37; mono-

graph - Asclepias, 98; “Seven Medita-

tions,”

on, 82;
on Christmas tree farm,

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN

Woody plants: control of deer damage to,

76, 77; course in grafting and breeding.
145, 14

Woodcock’ t Arboretum, 39

World Orchid 0 aed the first, 142

bf
Yuccas,.-1863..a
Linnean Garden,

permanent planting of, in
175

ZL
Zimmerman, Malas Bhs African Violet
Societ of Americ
Zimmerm man, Hope

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

JOHN S. LEHMANN, President Henry HitcHcock
Danie K. CaTiin, Vice-President RicHarD J. Lockwoop
EuGENE Pettus, Second Vice-President A. WEssEL SHAPLEIGH
LEICESTER B. Faust EtHAaN A. H

DupLEY FRENCH ROBERT BROOKINGS SMITH

EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS
EtHAN A. H. SHEPLEY, i. STOLAR,
geod of Washington University President of the Board of Education
of St. Louis
ARTHUR C, LICHTENBERGER,
scat of the Dice: of Missouri Sreavvon 1. Moe
RayMonp R. Tuc President of the ay of Science
itor at the City mg es Louis of St. Louis

Secretary
GERALD ULRICI

THE HORTICULTURAL COUNCIL
Clifford W. Benson, Clarence Barbre, Albert Chandler, E. G. Cherbonnier,
Paul Hale, Mrs, Hazel Knapp, Emmet Layton, Clarence McGovern, Gilbert
Pennewill, Mrs Roland R. Read, W. F. Scott, Jr., Harold E. Wolfe, John S.
Lehmann, Edgar Anderson, John Nies, Chairman.

STAFF

George T. Moore Emeritus Director
Edgar Anderson i
Henry N. Andrews Paleobotanist
August P, Beilmann__._____ ____.__Manager of the Arboretum, Gray Summit
Louis G. Brenner. Ass ssistant Manager of the Arboretum
Ladislaus Cutak H in charge of Conservatories
Hugh C, Cutler... Assistant Director and Curator of the Museum
Carroll W. Dodge Mycologist

yer Research Aenictate
Robert J. Gillespie Research Horticulturist
Nell C. Horner __Librarian and Editor
Ida M. Kohl Assistant Librarian
Paul A. Kohl Floriculturist
G. R. Lowry In charge of Orchids
Edna Mepham Assistant Librarian
Frederick G. Meyer ee ees Dendrologist
George H. Pring 3 Sepetineendent
Betty O’Brien Putney ones Asinant to the Director
Kenneth A, Smi _Engineer
Julian A. Pohakborods ee eae Reseirch Associate
Alice F, T esearch Associate
Rolla M. daa J et ie of Herbariur:
Gerald Ulrici Business Manager
George B. Van Schaack Honorary Curator of Grasses

Robert E. Woodson, Jr Curator of Herbarium

PUBLICATIONS FOR SALE AT THE
MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

ANNALS OF THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN.
Published in February, May, September, and November. Sub-
scription price, $10 per year.

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN.
Published monthly except July and August. Subscription price,
$2.50 per year.

A TOUR OF THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN.
A guide for Garden visitors. Price 25 cents.

HENRY SHAW.
A Pictorial Biography. Price 25 cents,

THE MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN
What it is and what it does. Price, fifty cents.

POST-CARDS.
Garden Views. Two sets of four each. Price 25 cents a set.
Garden Water-lilies. Price 25 cents for set of $s.