PARK ADMINISTRATION 



their purpose, and confine their selection only in matters of hardiness 

 and character of growth. 



Finally, there is often imposed the restrictions that no plant be 

 used in the design which is not self-maintaining. There is no doubt 

 but that it is best in towns and small communities to select material for 

 park planting that will be comparatively easy of culture ; also, even in 

 cities with well organised planting departments, to use no plants which 

 are so delicate in constitution as to require pampering. On the other 

 hand, a plant which is subject merely to a well-known scale which may 

 be eradicated by occasional spraying, or susceptible merely to a com- 

 mon disease easily remedied, should not be tabooed for that reason 

 alone. A general policy of eliminating all plants requiring care, taken 

 in conjunction with a policy of eradicating all specimens difficult to 

 transplant, soon reduces park planting to the character of scrub growth, 

 exhibiting merely the survival of the fittest. It will automatically so 

 reduce the vocabulary of the plant designer that he will be obliged to 

 express himself in words of one syllable. Liberal range of material 

 in the case of a competent designer will not result in extravagant or 

 chaotic display but in simple and well-expressed design. Large plant- 

 ing vocabulary permits selection that will give the highest type of 

 planting composition. 



This would seem to be a formidable array of conditions militating 

 against good planting design in parks, but it is not a difficult one to 

 disperse. 



PARK NURSERIES THREATEN DESIGN 



If the economy or extravagance of the public nursery policy is 

 not open to discussion, the making of planting plans to meet exigencies 

 of material may be eliminated by recommending the destruction of 

 stock as it becomes overgrown. The idea of cutting down or destroy- 

 ing plant material which has been paid for out of public moneys is 

 extremely distasteful from the publicity standpoint, but it is a legiti- 



241 



