THE CONFERENCE OF HORTICULTURAL SOCIETIES 



ONE of the wise steps in advance, intro- 

 duced by our worthy secretary, has 

 been the division of our annual meeting into 

 sections, so that delegates could attend to 

 those sections most in line with their work. 

 We have now a fruit section and a flower 

 section; by and by we may have a forestry 

 section and a domestic science section, all 

 coming together for a union session each 

 evening. 



The chairman of the flower section was 

 Mr. T. H. Race, of Mitchell, so well known 

 to our societies by his talks on Rose Culture. 

 One of the most valuable papers was the 

 following, given by Prof. H. L. Hutt, of the 

 O. A. C, Guelph, on 



BEAUTIFYING HOME GROUNDS. 



THE sturdy pioneers who first settled 

 this country came with a determina- 

 tion to subdue the forests and to hew 

 out for themselves homes in the 

 wilderness. Their first aim was to 

 clear the land for the growing of crops, and this 

 usually kept them so busy that they had little 

 or no time for leveling of lawns or planting of 

 shade trees and ornamental bushes. But we 

 have now reached a period in the country's his- 

 tory when comfortable homes are thickly dottei 

 throughout the land, and more attention is be- 

 ing given to the beautifying of the home sur- 

 roundings. Not only is the skill of the land- 

 scape architect more and more in demand, but 

 there is a call for information on the subject by 

 which those who have not the means to employ 

 a professional gardener. In this paper we shall 

 call attention to some of the leading principles 

 which should guide in laying out and beautify- 

 ing the surroundings of a country home. 



In the first place it must be understood that 

 the most beautiful scenes are, as a rule, more or 

 less natural. "We should, therefore, accept na- 

 ture as our teacher, and study the materials an'l 

 combinations which go to make up natural 

 beauties. 



The materials with which the landscape gar- 

 dener has to deal may be classified as natural 

 and artificial. The natural materials are the 

 ground, grass, trees, shrubs, vines, herbaceous 

 plants and annuals, and in some cases rocks and 

 bodies of water. The artificial materials are 

 trees and shrubs clipped into unnatural shapes, 

 geometrical beds of improved fiowers, terraces, 

 walks, drives, buildings, fountains, statuary, etc. 

 The skill of the landscape gardener in producing 



beautiful effects depends upon the judicious use 

 of these materials. We shall now treat of some 

 of these in detail. 



The Ground. — One of the most important fea- 

 tures in the ground surrounding a home is the 

 contour of its surface. This is what gives 

 character to a place. A low lying lawn with 

 something of a depression in the centre, has an 

 altogether tame appearance, while an other- 

 wise similar lawn, with but a slight cov- 

 ering in the centre, has an altogether differ- 

 ent appearance. Sometimes a perfectly 

 straight surface line is pleasing, and the 

 level lawn is more in keeping with the place 

 and its surroundings than any other could be, 

 but as a rule some variation from the straight 

 line is preferable. In nature we take more de- 

 light in bold outlines of hills and valleys than 

 we do in level stretches of country. This is be- 

 cause we love the variety which hill and hollow 

 affords, and this suggests the desirability of in- 

 troducing undulations in landscape gardening 

 whenever the size of the grounds and other cir- 

 cumstances will permit. 



The buildings should, of course, be on the 

 highest elevation, and the grounds should be 

 made to slope away from them. On a steep 

 hillside the grounds may have to be terraced, 

 which, if well done, adds much to the appear- 

 ance of a place, but likewise adds con- 

 siderably to the cost. Whether the grounds are 

 flat or rolling the small irregularities of the 

 surface should be levelled and smoothed so that 

 the mower may be worked easily. Wherever 

 much grading or filling has to be done due al- 

 lowance must be made for settling, and a few 

 inches of good surface soil should always be left 

 on top. The character of the surface soil is :: 

 matter of great importance, because on it de- 

 pends the luxuriance or poverty of the grass and 

 trees growing over it. 



The Green Sward. — There are two ways of 

 clothing the ground with grass, either by sod- 

 ding or by sowing grass seed. On small plots 

 or steep banks and along borders, sodding is the 

 quickest and most satisfactory method, but on 

 large areas seeding is not only the cheapest but 

 the best. In preparing the ground for seeding 

 it should be plowed, harrowed, rolled and made 

 as fine as possible, and as a final preparation 

 nothing is better than going over it carefully 

 with a garden rake. 



The kind of seed to sow is a matter of im- 

 portance. Coarse grasses, such as timothy, are 

 not suitable for lawn making. Many of the 

 finer and more delicate grasses may be obtained 

 in " lawn grass mixtures," but the most satis- 

 factory mixture we have found is made up of 

 equal parts by weight of Kentucky blue grass, 

 red top grass, and white Dutch clover. All of 

 these are hardy and stand well the extremes of 

 our climate. The seeding should be done on a 

 still day when there is no wind to carry the 

 lighter seeds. Thick seeding should be th.=' 



