NOTE.--Different varieties of same kind will bloom at different times.

==================+=========+=======+========+========+============+==========

START

BLOOMING NAME

COLOR

HEIGHT

OUTDOORS

GOOD FOR

PLACE

SEASON ------------------+---------+-------+--------+--------+------------+---------- Akabia

Violet-

Light

May, June (_Akabia

brown

screen

quinata_)

Bittersweet

Yellow

20 ft.

In the

Sun or

Bright (_Celastrus

fall

shade

seeds scandens_)

for winter

Cinnamon Vine

White

15 to

Plant

Rapid

Sun

July, Aug.

(_Dioscorea_)

30 ft.

roots in

growth

early

spring

Clematis

White

5 to

Start in

Rapid

Stands part

Different (numerous

Red

25 ft.

early

growth

shade

kinds at varieties)

Purple

spring

different

times.

June

to frost

Creeping Spindle

Evergreen

Varies

Procure

Wall

(_Euonymus

trailer

in

roots

covering

radicans_)

height

like Ivy

Dutchman's Pipe

Brownish-

Grows

May

Dense

Anywhere

(_Aristolochia_)

yellow

to 30

shade

ft.

Honeysuckle,

Yellow-

15 ft.

Procure

Trellis

June to j.a.panese

white

plants

Fence

Aug.

(_Lonicera

Walls

Halliana_)

Hop, Perennial

Green

15 to

Procure

Trellis

Sun

(_Humulus

20 ft.

roots

lupulus_)

Ivy, Boston or

Spreads

Procure

Covers

Sun or

j.a.pan

rapidly

plants

walls

shade

(_Ampelopsis or

or trees

Veitchii_)

Ivy, English

Evergreen

Procure

Wall

Shade-loving

(_Hedera

plants

covering

helix_)

Kudzu Vine,

Rosy-

10 ft.

Early

Thick

Sun

August j.a.panese

purple

First

spring

screen

(_Pueraria

year

Thunbergiana_)

from

seed

Matrimony Vine

Purplish

Shrubby

Procure

Ornament

Sun

Late (_Lycium

roots

and use

summer barbaum_)

Pea, Everlasting

Red

6 to 8

Plant

Trellis

Sun

August (_Lathyrus

White

ft.

tuber or

or rough

latifolius_)

seed

places

------------------+---------+-------+--------+--------+------------+---------

CHAPTER IX

Shrubs We Love to See

"Every yard should be a picture. The observer should catch the entire effect and purpose, without a.n.a.lyzing its parts."

--_Bailey._

OF course you want to know something about shrubs. For what? Possibly just to make a tiny hedge around your garden, or a taller one to shut out the view of some neighbor's untidy backyard. More likely for a lovely specimen plant for your own grounds. In that case, don't, oh, don't! set it out in the middle of the lawn! And two or three thus dotted around (in "spotty planting," so called) are the acme of bad taste, and violate the fundamental principles of landscape gardening.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CLEANING UP AROUND THE SHRUBS]

Our grandmothers all loved the tall syringa, honeysuckle, s...o...b..ll, strawberry shrub, weigela, rose of Sharon and lilac, while they hedged both their yards and gardens with box, privet and evergreens.

Today we use a good deal of the j.a.panese barberry, while Uncle Sam's recent free distribution has widely introduced that pretty little annual bush-like plant--the kochia, or summer cypress, good for low hedges.

But there is that publisher cutting off my s.p.a.ce again! So I can just add a word about the lovely new summer lilac or buddleia. A tiny plant of this, costing only 25 cents, grows into a nice four-foot bush the first summer, and blooms until late in the season.

Most of these shrubs can be easily grown from cuttings, however, so just ask your friends to remember you when they do their pruning.

SHRUBS

================+==========+===========+===============+================ NAME

COLOR

HEIGHT

GROWN FROM

BLOOMING SEASON ----------------+----------+-----------+---------------+---------------- Althea, see

Rose of Sharon

Azalea

No blues

1 to 6 ft.

Spring, early

summer

Barberry, j.a.pan

Red

4 ft.

Seed

Red berries all (_Berberis

berries

winter Thunbergii_)

Boxwood

Green

4 to 20 ft.

(_Buxus

sempervirens_)

Bridal Wreath,

see Spirea

(_Thunbergii_)

Buddleia

Lavender

3 to 6 ft.

Cuttings

July to frost

Currant,

Yellow

4 ft.

May Flowering

(_Ribes

aureum_)

Deutzia

White,

3 to 12 ft.

Cuttings

May, June

Pink

Forsythia

Yellow

6 to 10 ft.

Cuttings or

Earliest spring

seed

Golden Bell,

see Forsythia

Honeysuckle

White,

6 to 12 ft.

Cuttings or

March to June (numerous

Yellow

seed

varieties)

Pink, Red

(_Lonicera_)

Hydrangea

White

8 to 12 ft.

Cuttings

July to November (_Paniculata

generally

grandiflora_)

j.a.panese Quince

Scarlet

8 ft.

May (_Cydonia

j.a.ponica_)

Kochia (small

3 ft.

Seed

Bush reddens in annual bush)

fall

Lilac (_Syringa

Lavender,

5 to

May, June vulgaris_)

White

20 ft.

Mock Orange

White

10 ft.

May, June (_Philadelphus

coronarius_)

Privet

Green

15 ft.

Cuttings

(_Ligustrum

unless

ovalifolium_)

sheared

Rose of Sharon

White,

Up to

August to (_Hibiscus

Pink to

18 ft.

October Syriacus_)

Purple

s...o...b..ll,

White

8 to

Cuttings

May, June j.a.panese

10 ft.

(_Viburnum

tomentosum_)

Spirea

White

2 to

May (_Thunbergii_)

4 ft.

Spirea (numerous

White,

4 to

Different months other

Pink, Rose

6 ft.

from May to varieties)

September

Strawberry Shrub

Chocolate-

6 to

By division

May

colored

10 ft.

Syringa,

see Mock

Orange

Viburnum,

see s...o...b..ll

Weigela

White,

6 ft.

June (_Diervilla

Pink, Red

florida_)

----------------+----------+-----------+---------------+----------------

CHAPTER X

Vegetable Growing for the Home Table

The life of the husbandman,--a life fed by the bounty of earth, and sweetened by the airs of heaven.

--_Jerrold._

IT is predicted that this year,--1917,--will be the greatest year for gardening that the country ever has known!

The high cost of living first stimulated interest. Then after war was declared, the slogan, "Food as important as men or munitions," stirred young and old. Garden clubs sprang up everywhere, and in free lectures people were instructed how to prepare, plant and cultivate whatever ground they could get, from small backyards to vacant lots.

In our neighborhood last year a man with a plot of ground less than half the size of a tennis court, grew $50.00 worth of vegetables,--enough to supply his whole family! He got his planting down to a science, however,--what he called "intensive gardening," so that every foot of the soil was kept busy the whole summer. He fertilized but once, too, at the beginning of the season, when he had a quant.i.ty of manure thoroughly worked in. Then between slow growing crops, planted in rows as closely as possible, he planted the quick-growing things, which would be out of the way before their s.p.a.ce was needed.

Incidentally he worked out a chart (which he afterwards put on the market), ruled one way for the months, and the other for the number of feet, with name cards for the vegetables that could be fitted in so as to visualize--and make a record of the entire garden the entire season.

Such a plan means a great saving of both time and s.p.a.ce.

Garden soil must be warm, light and rich. It must be well spaded to begin with, well fertilized, well raked over, and kept well cultivated.

Vegetables require plenty of moisture, and during dry weather especially must be thoroughly watered. As I have said before, simply wetting the surface of the ground is almost useless, and often, by causing the ground then to cake over the top as it dries, worse than none at all, if the soil were cultivated instead. Pests must be watched for on all the crops, and treated according to the special needs of each variety when whale-oil, soapsuds, tobacco dust or insect powder seem ineffective.

Then with weeding, and reasonable care, you can safely expect to keep your table supplied with that greatest of all luxuries,--your own green vegetables, fresh from the soil.

VEGETABLE GUIDE

_Beans. Bush_

Plant from early May on, every two weeks, for succession of crops. Drop beans 3 in. apart, in 2-in. deep drills, allowing 2 ft. between rows.

Hoe often, drawing the earth up towards the roots. Be sure that the ground is warm and dry before planting, however, or the beans will rot.

_Beans. Pole_

Set stakes 5 to 8 feet high, in rows 3 ft. apart each way; or plant in drills to grow on a trellis. Put four or five beans around each stake, and when well started, thin out the poorest, leaving but three at each pole. A cheap trellis is made by stretching two wires (one near the ground and the other six feet above), and connecting them with stout twine for the vines to run on.

_Beans. Lima_

As these are more tender, they should be planted a couple of weeks later than other beans. They need especially good, rich soil, with plenty of humus or the fine soft earth that is full of decayed vegetable matter.

Allow each plant 6 in. in the row, and make rows 2 ft. apart. Give a good dose of fertilizer about the time they start, and keep well cultivated. Beans are among the easiest of all vegetables to grow, and as they can be dried for winter use, are especially valuable.

_Beets._

Any well-tilled, good garden soil will produce nice beets. Make drills or rows 18 in. apart, and plant the seed about 1 in. deep if earth is light and sandy, but only half an inch if heavy and sticky, as early as the ground can be put in condition. Cultivate often, and thin out the plants to about 3 in. apart. Sow at intervals of two or three weeks for successive crops up to the middle of July. An extra early lot can be had by starting seed in the house in boxes in February or March, and then setting the young plants out at time of first outdoor planting.

_Cabbage._

For early crop, start seed indoors in February or March and transplant, when four leaves appear, to another seed box until you can plant in open ground in May. For later crop sow seeds in rows in open ground during April and May, and transplant during July and August, to 20 in. apart, in rows 3 ft. apart. Cultivate often, to keep moisture in the soil.

Prepare to fight pests, early and late. After the seventy or more remedies suggested by one authority, for maggots alone, the amateur might feel like abandoning cabbage, but at the price this moment of $160.00 a ton, wholesale, in New York City, a person with even a handkerchief bed feels like attempting this luxury.

_Carrots._

Hardy and easily grown, they can be sown in rows that are 12 in. apart, and thinned out to 3 in. apart in the row. They can be started as early as April, and sown for succession up to the middle of July. Cultivate often.

_Cauliflower._

Treat like cabbage, except that you must start as early as possible, to get ahead of the hot weather, and give the plants plenty of water. When the heads are well-formed and firm, bring the outside leaves up and tie together, to shut out the sun and keep the heads white and tender. And don't forget,--plenty of water!