At most of the more important nurseries there are houses devoted to the culture of various kinds of plants. For instance, the camellia is always given a section; and others devoted to winter flowering roses; plants of ornamental foliage, such as the ferns,clocassia, fancy-leafed caladium, the leaf of which resembles Japanese characters; the cactus and banana; and carnations.

There is an entire house on Mr. Allen's grounds devoted to the cultivation of carnation for winter flowering, and, later in the season, to the forcing of a new series of the same variety of plants for spring sales. The smilax is at present in great demand, and one house, which appears to be given up entirely to its cultivation, contains between six and seven thousand plants, or strings as they are popularly called. As each of these strings is worth half a dollar, the income from the house may be readily calculated.

Of the roses, the finer sorts only are cultivated for winter flowering, while the great mass of mixed plants are propagated from slips, for the wholesale spring trade. Heliotropes, geraniums, English violet, pansies and a score or more of familiar flowers are also cultivated in different sections and are in demand during the season. Later, all of these plants, with the exception of some raised from seed, are brought in training for early spring sales. It is not, however, the plants which have flowered during the winter which are sold, for they exhaust themselves, and slips and younger plants are brought forward for the purpose. These houses are all heated by hot water apparatus, which is a great improvement over the old-fashioned furnace.