Shrubs and Shrubbery 69 



the hot, dry weather comes. If the land is well prepared the preceding fall, 

 much will be gained. 



Always prepare to destroy the bugs and leaf-blights. Every place of 

 any size — even a well-planted city lot — should now have a light spraying 

 outfit. A little ammoniacal carbonate of copper can always be kept in 

 stock in bottles, ready to be diluted, and to be used for fungous attacks; 

 and hellebore or other poisons may be kept for the insects. Most shrubs 

 will take care of themselves, to be sure; but this does not prove that good 

 care on your part may not produce still better results. 



II. How TO Prune Shrubs 

 By William Falconer 



We prune shrubs to regulate their growth and make them graceful, 

 pretty bushes, to accentuate their natural character, to invigorate weak 

 growth or check overluxuriance, or to increase the profusion or enhance the 

 equality of their blossoms. W^e prune a privet hedge with a hedge -shears 

 in a closely sheared, straight, artificial line or rounded form; but this sort 

 of pruning in the case of spireas, deutzias, weigelas, mock-oranges and other 

 garden favourites, grown in shrubbery-masses or as isolated specimens for 

 beauty of form or blossoms, would be desecration. 



All kinds of garden shrubs may be pruned between the times when the 

 leaves drop off in late fall and before the buds start to burst into growth 

 in earliest sprmg, but I do not like pruning in very frosty weather. A 

 stout, sharp pocket-knife, as Saynor's pruning-knife, or a pair of seven- 

 inch, eight -inch, or nine-inch spring pruning-shears, are the handiest im- 

 plements for pruning; for cutting out the stoutest shoots and the bigger 

 old wood a parrot-bill is excellent, or a pair of lopping shears with 

 handles three feet long. 



In pruning shrubs of any kind, have an eye to regulate the growth of 

 the plant, and give it an easy, graceful, natural outline, always trying to 

 keep the branches well down to the ground. Thin out old and gnarly stems 

 and stunted or enfeebled wood, and endeavour to preserve a fair fullness 

 of healthy shoots with plenty of firm, well-ripened spray twigs for flowers. 

 In pruning twigs, always cut back close to an eye or joint, and in pruning 

 branches, large or small, always cut close back to a joint or stem. Never 



