SPECIMENS FOR GARDENS.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 18237, 22 November 1924, Page 12

SPECIMENS FOR GARDENS.

VALUABLE COLLECTION

SECURED.

CURATOR'S VISIT TO AUSTRALIA

After a three weeks' visit to Australia, Mr J. Young, Curator of the Christchurch Botanic Gardens, and Superintendent of Christchurch Parkß and Reserves, returned home by the ferry steamer yesterday morning. He has brought with him a very fine collection of plant specimens from the Commonwealth, and these will considerably augment the local supplies at the gardens.

Interviewed by a representative of "The Press" yesterday afternoon, Mr Young said that already some of hi 3 specimens had arrived and were being potted up in readiness for housing in the winter garden. The plants which he had collected came from the various Australian States, but principally from Melbourne, Adelaide, and Sydney. They were mostly sub-tropical plants, and taken as a whole proved a very valuable collection which would last for a number' of years. Amongst tho collection were specimens of thefamous Australian Waratah, and- tho best of Australia's native flowering plants. Some of these would be planted out in the gardens themselves, and those which proved too delicate for the rigours of the Christchurch climate would be planted on the Cashmere Hills. Specimens of all tho best acacias had been secured, as well as all the new varieties of flowering arums, collections of ferns, tropical and sub-tropical plants, and a number of very choice orchids. Besides those, tropical fruit-bearing plants, including papas, new varieties of bananas, pinoapples, breadfruit and guavas, were also represented, but tho flowering specimens were those in which Mr Young had mainly interested himself. A vory fino selection of palms had also beon secured. These included tho date palm, sago palm, cycads, and the palm from which the material for the manufacture of panama hats is obtained. In this last instance, Mr Young stated, the plant was of a particularly interesting species. The palm sent out smooth shoots, somewhat thicker than an ordinary lead-pencil, and from one of these shoots which reached a length of two or three feet, the entire material for a hat could be secured. The fibre itself came from the interior of the shoot, tho outside bark having to be stripped away before the interior fibre could be obtained. Besides the palm plants themselves, a fine collection of palm seeds had also been obtained, and these would bo raised locally.

With regard to the gardens in the various centres which he visited, Mr Young said the Sydney gardens were particularly fine, and in very good Order. The same could be said about the Melbourne gardens. With regard to the streets of Melbourne, Mr Young said he had been considerably struck with the use of rock edgings along the street borders. These gave the place a splendid appearance, and a Bimilar scheme could be used to great advantage in ChristcMrch. In St. Hilda (Melbourne), he had also been impressed with the stone seats which were provided for- the use of the public in the different reserve spaces. The bench portion of these seats was comprised of smooth mosaic work, and the whole proved a convenience which could not be destroyed or carved-—two- common failings with the wooden seats seen in similar places throughout New Zealand. These stone benches could, he thought, be supplied at small cost in Christchurch, and would have the advantage of being practically everlasting." In Melbourne, too, trees were planted in the centre of the streets at a convenient distance apart, and around each of these was a rubble-stone border, the bed at the base of the tree beingplanted with New. Zealand flax or some similar ornamental plant, and the whole presenting a pleasing sub-tropical aspect. Nowhere, howevey. had he seen streets which were better .Kept, or appeared more tidy than those of Christchurch. .

Beforo he visited Australia, Mr Young passed iliiough, Dunedin, and there met the Curator of the Dunedin Botanic Gardens, Mr D. Tannock. That gentleman, said M* Young, was doing very valuable work in connexion with a street planting scheme in Dunedin. In cases where there was not a great deal of traffic, in a street, Mr Tannock had reduced the width of the roadway to 22 feet, with nine fout of grass., on either side and eight-foot pathways. This system would provo beneficial in Christchurch, said Mr Young, and was one he had advocated for some time.