J. C. Loudon

“ Besides it appears from nature, as well as from observing what takes place in culture, that the want of a steady temperature and degree of moisture at the roots of plants is more immediately and powerfully injurious to them than atmospheric changes. Earth, especially if rendered porous and spungelike by culture, receives and gives out air and heat slowly; and while the temperature of the air of a country, or a hot-house, may vary twenty or thirty degrees in the course of twenty-four hours, the soil at the depth of two inches would hardly be found to have varied one degree. ”

“ Although the Pine Apple plant is of such a nature that it will live upwards of six months without earth or water, yet to bring its fruit to perfection, a plentiful supply of both these is required. From the time that the plants are set in earth till they perfect their fruit, it should be endeavoured to keep them constantly in a clean healthy growing state; and when they be thus managed, they will not fail to show fruit when they be grown to a natural size. For these reasons, I would advise that no methods contrary to nature, but methods to assist, be used to make them fruit at certain periods. ”

“ To produce proper fruit, the plant of a sucker or crown must have grown well and bulky, at least for three years; the first sign of setting fruit is, that its leaves spread a little, and the plant opens a little in the heart where the fruit soon shews itself like the head of a large nail. As the fruit and stalk grow higher, the fruit grows rounder, with pointed little leaves like thistles, on some reddish, and on others whitish spreading leaves. ”

“ By this experiment I ascertained that a vegetable can endure, without hurting it, 130 degrees of heat, according to the degrees on Fahrenheit’s thermometer. I am inclined to think that no animal is able to endure such a heat and live. Undoubtedly, insects increase rapidly in hot weather in the open air, especially on the peach tree, and on other trees, against warm walls, both in the spring and summer months; and they increase most rapidly in dry weather; but the heat in the open air against walls seldom rises to 100 degrees. ”

“ Some persons may think that the Pine Apple cannot bear to be watered all over its leaves in winter, because it is of a succulent nature, and able to live long in a hot-house without being planted in earth or set in water. But, for instance, the common house-leek is of a very succulent juicy nature, and will bear the greatest heat of a hot dry summer on the warm tiles of a house: but it is well known that this plant thrives best when it gets occasional showers of rain. The case is exactly similar respecting the Pine Apple, and several other plants, of a similar nature. ”

“ It is of some consequence to remark, that Griffin’s practice in not divesting the plants at any one shifting of their balls of earth, differs from that of Speechly, Nicol, and most other practitioners, excepting Baldwin. It appears highly probable, that by not disturbing the balls of healthy plants, they will produce their fruit both earlier and of a larger size; for the cutting off the roots must produce a check in the growth of the plant, and their renewal must occupy its chief energies for some time, and thus lessen the vigour of the leaves ”

“ He says, “after having studiously observed the nature and causes of the vigorous growth and healthfulness of plants, and of fruit-trees of different kinds, I have been induced to believe that a fruit-tree or plant of any sort requires nothing but proper cultivation in good earth, and in a kindly climate adapted to its nature, to prevent it from being injured by insects, or by blights of any kind, and to enable it to produce, of its kind, abundant crops. However, I wish it not to be understood that I disapprove of using means of any kind to destroy insects which are injurious to plants ”

“ If the soil be properly constituted, and the pot properly drained, the water passes through the mass as soon as poured on it, and the soil at that moment may be said to be left in a state favourable for vegetation. But as the evaporation from the surface and sides of the pot, and the transpiration of the plant goes on, it becomes gradually less and less so, and if not soon re-supplied, would become dry and shrivelled, and either die from that cause, or be materially injured by the sudden and copious application of water. ”

“ IMPROVEMENTS RECENTLY ATTEMPTED IN THE CULTURE OF THE PINE APPLE. The Pine Apple has never been so generally cultivated in this country as it might have been, from an idea that its culture is attended with more difficulty and expense than that of all other fruits; and, also, from the circumstance of the greater number of gardeners being ignorant of its cultivation. With respect to the difficulty of cultivating this fruit, every gardener, who knows any thing about it, knows it is much easier grown and fruited than the cucumber early in spring, or the melon at any period of the year. ”

“ The Pine Apple, as every gardener knows, is propagated in the same manner by all those who grow it; that is, by that singular production in which the fruit terminates, called a crown, and by suckers; these are planted in small pots, or in beds of rotten tan, earth, or dung, at first, and shifted in regular gradation into pots of different sizes, at the discretion of the cultivator. ”

“ Being a plant of low stature, nature has also probably given it the power to ripen its fruit and seed, in the shade of other plants, in its native climate; and I discovered in the last summer, that it possesses the power to ripen its fruit perfectly in a lower temperature than I previously thought it capable of growing in. ”

“ In raising young plants, I have deviated from the ordinary mode of practice by breaking off the suckers when very young; that is, when they are not more than four or five inches long. The fruit is much benefited by their absence; and the cuttings, if placed very close together in a hot-bed, are made to emit roots with little trouble, and afford better plants than they do when they are suffered to remain long upon the parent stem. When the whole are removed at an early period, one or more very strong suckers usually spring out below the level of the soil ”

“ It is observable, that in hot-houses, where Pine-plants are put in a light soil, the young plants frequently go into fruit the first season, and are then what gardeners term runners; on the contrary, where plants are put in a strong rich soil, they will continue to grow, and not fruit even at a proper season: therefore, from the nature of the soil from whence the sward was taken, the quantity of sand used must be proportioned; when the loam is not strong, sand will be unnecessary in the compost for young plants. ”

“ It frequently happens that Pine Apple plants designed to bear fruit do not show their fruit early enough in the spring or fore-part of summer, to ripen their fruit before winter, when there is not sunshine enough to give the fruit any flavour. This may happen because the plants have not come to a proper growth, or their roots may have been injured by too violent a bottom heat, or by being over-watered, or they may have been shifted too late, or been put into pots too large for their roots to have filled them before the end of the growing season. ”

“ The Pine Apple is extensively cultivated in the imperial gardens in the neighbourhood of Petersburg and Moscow, and also in those of a few of the greatest nobility and mercantile men adjoining those cities. Nothing can be more wonderful than to contemplate the resources by which this plant, requiring not less than from 50 to 70 degrees of heat at all times of the year, is preserved in existence through a winter of seven months, during the whole of which the ground is covered with snow, and Fahrenheit’s thermometer, often for weeks together, at 20° below Zero. ”

“ Loudon, at Bayswater, which would prevent the too rapid escape of heated-air in cold weather, I entertain no doubt, that the expense of heating a house forty-five feet long, and ten wide, and capable of holding eighty fruiting Pine plants, exclusive of grapes or other fruits upon the back wall, would not exceed fourpence a day. A roof of properly curved iron bars, appears to me also to present many other advantages: it may be erected at much less cost, it is much more durable, it requires much less expense to paint it, and it admits greatly more light. ”