Читать книгу The different modes of cultivating the pine-apple - J. C. Loudon - Страница 9

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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.

The head gardeners of the emperor, and the great nobles of Russia, are, for the greater part, Britons; and the sort of houses they erect, and the mode of culture they follow, is as nearly as circumstances will admit, those of Speechly or Nicol.

The culture of the grape is, to a certain extent, combined with that of the Pine Apple; the former is trained on the rafters, and the latter grown in a pit, surrounded by flues and a path. In addition to the flues, many of the fruiting-houses have stoves built in them, on the German construction, which are used in the most severe weather. Sometimes there is a double roof of glass; but more generally the roof, ends, and fronts, are covered with boards; which not only prevents the weight of sudden falls of snow from breaking the glass, but by admitting of a coating of snow over them, prevents, in a considerable degree, the internal heat from escaping. This covering, or a covering of mats or canvass, as practised near Moscow, and from which the snow is raked off as fast as it falls, is sometimes kept on night and day for three months together. The plants being all the while in a dormant state, it is remarkable how little they suffer.

The best ranges of hot-houses in the neighbourhood of Petersburg, have been imported there from Leith, or London. At Moscow, where the same facility of importation is not afforded, they are constructed on the spot, in a very rude manner; in the best of them, the interstices between the sashes and rafters are so large, that they have to be stuffed with moss. Still it is astonishing how well the Pine Apple is preserved in them through a long winter, and what excellent peaches and grapes they produce during summer. The cause seems to be owing to the great care and skill of the gardeners, in keeping the plants in a dormant state, when there is but little light; and in applying powerfully all the agents of growth and culture, during the short, but warm Russian summer.

There are some German gardeners in Russia, who cultivate the Pine Apple in pits as in Holland; and crowns and suckers are forwarded in this way by them, and also by the British gardeners settled in that country.