The Livable House 



ing new ones it presents a discouragingly dead appearance. In 

 fact it is just at this stage of things that most new gardeners lose 

 heart — when they see the thrifty looking bushes and trees they 

 bought from the nurseryman, or had moved from some flourish- 

 ing hedgerow, looking like so many dead sticks. Probably no 

 other art exacts so much in the way of patience and faith from its 

 followers for the first few difficult years, as gardening. Moving 

 stock, especially stock which has attained any size at all, involves 

 a shock to the plant from which it requires time and demands in- 

 telligent care to recover, and everything which can be done to 

 help it establish itself is worth doing. Just sticking it in the 

 ground and leaving it to its own devices will sometimes work all 

 right, where the ground is exceptionally good, and moisture is 

 plentiful, and the plant has a good root system with which to 

 start. But it is very seldom that any plant is started under such 

 a set of circumstances, and to "insure good results" it must be 

 watered, and mulched, and sprayed where insect pests are trou- 

 blesome, and this done not once, but recurrently throughout the 

 first year or two, after transplanting, or until it has had time to 

 adapt itself to new conditions. 



These conditions are made more difficult by untimely planting, 

 which entails a proportionate amount of extra care if the plants 

 are to live. Moved after the leaves are out when the hot suns of 

 June have come and the reviving rains of spring have gone, they 

 can hardly be expected to bloom and flourish. The best they can 

 do is to struggle along against the odds of their first year and hope 

 for a second spring to give them a new lease on life. 



[126] 



