AUTUMN GARDENING 



AVERRHOA 



435 



are eastrrn and southern plants. All these species were 

 reported as being green at the Arnold Arboretum as 

 late as November S. The peculiar value of this class 

 is as a substitute for broad-leaved evergreens. Unfor- 

 tunately, the climate of the northeastern United States 

 is not favorable to broad-leaved evergreens, compared 

 with the South or Europe, and the lavish use of them 

 requires a princely income. Consequently, some of 

 these cheaper plants, e.g., California privet, Hall's 

 honeysu('k!e, and Wichuraiana roses, are available 

 even to the poor, while the whole Ust is of special 

 interest to people who have summer homes. 



Ornamental fruits of autumn. 



The e.xtraordinary beauty of shrubs with brightly 

 colored berries was first publicly and sufficiently 

 demonstrated in this country by the Arnold Arboretum. 

 Compared with autumnal colors of foliage, the fruits 

 present fewer, smaller, and more jewel-like masses. 

 Amid the bewOdering variety one may discern three 

 groups. 



First are the short-lived fruits, which drop soon after 

 the killing frost, or present an unattractive appearance 

 owing to decay. Here belong the vast majority of 

 ornamental fruits, including crab apples, dozens of 

 hawthorns. Viburnum. Lnntana, V. alnifolium, V. cas- 

 sinoides, V. Sieboldii. The chief function of this class is 

 to suggest the fecundity and variety of nature in 

 autumn, but attractive thomeries have been designed, 

 and the ornamental fruits of the Rosacese are now used 

 to connect the battle-scarred remnants of old orchards 

 with modem ornamental planting, especially boun- 

 daries. 



The second group comprises all the fruits that 

 remain attractive until Christmas, e.g., the rugosa rose. 



The third and most valuable group comprises those 

 that remain attractive all winter, hke the barberries. 

 This and the second group are classified by color under 

 ^yinler Gardening (Vol. VI.) 



IVIost persons are willing to sacrifice some degree of 

 ornament in order to attract the birds. The following 

 furnish food in autumn, when it is especially desirable 

 to attract the migrants to the South: the flowering 

 dogwood, red osier, and alternate-leaved dogwood, 

 choke-cherry, black and sweet elder, arrow-wood, 

 sassafras, kinnikinnick, crab-apple, hawthorn, fire- 

 thorn, cotoneaster, buffalo berry, tupelo, and moun- 

 tain ash. 



Landscape forestry in autumn. 



Private and pubUc woodlands in the East are more 

 beautiful than a decade ago, in spite of the destruction 

 of magnificent chestnut trees, and this is true, although 

 probably to a lesser extent, in other parts of the coun- 

 try. The sudden spread of the chestnut disease has 

 brought certain compensations. For example, the 

 flowering dogwood, which was formerly kept down, has 

 prospered mightily, making the woods showier both 

 in May and September; and other vegetation changes 

 are following. 



There is arising a general interest in pleasure woods, 

 as witness the tenn "landscape forestry," which was 

 unknown ten years ago. We are beginning to make 

 personal use of woods. Judged by English standards, 

 American woods are too crowded by crooked antl 

 spindling trees for comfort, and the general lack of 

 evergreens robs them of mystery and charm. Our most 

 urgent needs, therefore, are thinning, drives, paths, and 

 the restoration of evergreens, all of which are especially 

 enjoyable during the autumn and nutting season. Mis- 

 taken zeal has denuded many woods of undergrowth, 

 which should quickly be restored along drives and 

 paths. To glorify the woods on dark autumnal days, 

 it is well to use mas.ses of witch hazel, the foliage of 

 which furnishes one of the cheapest and quickest ways 

 of getting great sheets of sunny color. 



Unfortunately the eastern mountains have been 

 devastated so often by fires and lumbermen that there 

 is comparatively little variety, the chief masses of color 

 being furnished by quick, short-lived species, like 

 poplars, birch and balsam, which are mere weeds com- 

 pared with the more enduring and valuable oaks and 

 pines. Our greatest problems are the restoration of 

 variety and of long-lived species. In such work the 

 fasliionable colonies in the Berkshires ought to take the 

 lead, since the social season reaches its height at Lenox 

 in September. The Arnold Arboretum presents one of 

 the most artistic, and probably the most varied, 

 autumn landscapes made by man. 



WiLHELM Miller. 



AVENA (the old Latin name). Graminese. Oats-. 

 Mostly annuals with open panicle and large spikelets. 



Spikelcts 2-6-f!d.; rachilla bearded below the florets; 

 glumes about equal, large and membranaceous, many- 

 nerved, usually as long as the spikelet; lemmas indu- 

 rated, bidentate at apex, bearing a stout twisted awn on 

 the back (this often straight or wanting in the culti- 

 vated oat). — Species about 50, of the temperate or 

 cooler regions of the world. Scarcely grown as orna- 

 mental subjects. 



fatua, Linn. Wild Oats. Resembles the cultivated 

 oat, but differs in having long, brown hairs on the 

 lemmas: spikelets usually .3-fld.; glumes 1 in. long; 

 awns of lemmas about an inch long. Dept. Agric, Div. 

 of Agrost. 20:94, — Intro, from Eu., especially on the 

 Pacific coast, where it is a troublesome weed. In the 

 latter region the spontaneous growth 

 is frequently used for hay. 



sativa, Linn. Cultivated Oats. 

 Spikelets usually 2-fld.; lemmas 

 glabrous, awns usually straight or 

 wanting. See Cyclo. Agric. I. 



sterilis, Linn. Animated Oats. 

 Resembles A. /a<ita but the spikelets 

 larger, the glumes about 13-2 in.; 

 awns 2-3 in. — Occasionally cult, as 

 a curiosity, the florets when moist- 

 ened presenting spontaneous move- 

 ments due to the twisting and un- 

 twisting of the awns as they absorb 

 or give off moisture. 



.4. eM/ior=Arrhenatherum elatius. 



A. S. Hitchcock. 



444. Averrhoa 

 Carambola. ( X H) 



AVERRHOA (after Averrhoes, the Arabian physi- 

 cian). Oxalidacex. Tropical fruit trees, cultivated in 

 India and China, and sometimes grown under glass for 

 ornament. 



Leaves alternate, odd-pinnate; Ifts. alternate, ovate- 

 acuminate, entire, stalked, sensitive: fls. borne on the 

 naked sts. and branches, minute, fragrant, rose-colored 

 to reddish purple in axillary or lateral cymes which 

 are often panicle-like: calvx rod; corolla campanulate; 

 petals 5. See N. Amer. Fl'. 2.5:.57 (1907). 



Carambola, Linn. Carambola, Fig. 444. Height 

 1.5-30 ft.: Ifts. .5-10: fls. rosy purple borne in the If.- 

 axils: fr. varying in size from a hen's egg to a large 

 orange, ovate, acutely 5-angled, yellow, fragrant, the 

 pulp acid. P.M. 15, p. 231. Rheede, Hort. Ural. 3. pi. 

 43, 44. Cav. Di.ss. pi. 202.— Cult, sparingly in S. Calif., 

 and frequent in W. Indies. The half-grown fr. used as 

 pickles; the ripe fr. for preserves. There are said to 

 be two varieties, the sweet and sour, the former being 

 eaten. Said to produce 3 crops a year. Leaves respond- 

 ing to the touch. 



.4. ZJi7(m).i, Linn. CcccmberTree. Bilimbi. Height 20-60 ft.: 

 Ifts. u.'juaMy .31-4.5 pairs; fls. red, in longer clusters than the above 

 and home on branchlets from the hard wood: fr. smaller than the 

 carambola, cucumber-shaped, smooth, green rind, and acid pulp. 

 Extensively cult, in .S..'\mer. P.M. 15, p. 231. Rheede, Hort. Mai. 3, 

 pi. 45:46. Lam. Eneyc, pi. 385. i,t X a vt OR t 



