HEDGES OUT OF THE ORDINARY 



693 



THE FRUIT OF THE EFFORT 



This is a section of a pear hedge which proves the wisdom of 

 training fruit trees to such use. It is at once beautiful and 

 profitable and the luscious fruit speaks for itself. 



the winter and for the exquisite beauty of its fall foliage. 

 By judicious pruning and training, such a hedge can be 

 made to grow mainly in a given plane, like a tree that is 

 grown with its limbs flat against a building. Thus such 

 a hedge need not necessarily occupy nearly as much space 

 as one would expect it to occupy. 



Few people, probably, would care for so many quinces 

 as even a little hedge would yield. Such persons might 

 prefer a hedge of mixed dwarf fruit trees. But there are 

 certain difficulties in making such a mixed planting 

 wholly successful. Unless the various plants grow to 

 about equal size, the hedge will have a ragged, uneven 

 appearance that may be displeasing. Again, the plants 

 in such a hedge should be such as require similar culture. 

 Undoubtedly it would ordinarily be advisable to make 

 such a hedge of one species. 



Where space is not at a premium and productiveness is 

 no inducement, there are unusual kinds of ornamental 

 hedges that one can plant. We ourselves have just com- 

 pleted the planting of such a hedge along one of our fields 

 that borders the public highway. This hedge is made 

 wholly of spireas, with ninebarks and hardbacks set al- 

 ternately. One blooms early, the other late. One makes 

 a rounded, graceful mass of green, with drooping sprays 

 of white flowers. The other is a rather stiflf, up-standing 

 plant, with spikes of pinkish blooms. 



A floral hedge with an even greater variety of plants 

 would be desirable. By planting bushes that bloom in 



succession, one could fashion a hedge that would be in 

 blossom for weeks. Forsythia suspensa, the corchorus, 

 the lilacs, the spireas, the Deutzias, and similar bushes 

 lend themselves well to this sort of planting. If one 

 prefers, a hedge can be made of a single variety. Proba- 

 bly it would be difficult to find anything lovelier than a 

 hedge of forsythia suspensa would be, with its pendant 

 branches laden with golden flowers. 



The fact is that almost any hardy plant of appropriate 

 size can be used for hedge making. In planting, as in 

 other lines of activity, we Americans have gotten into 

 more or less of a rut. We plant privet hedges because 

 our neighbors do. It seems the accepted thing. But 

 when we unexpectedly run into something original, that 

 is as beautiful as it is unusual, we are almost shocked to 

 find that the thing can be so lovely. The gardening of 

 the future will more and more tend to free us from the 

 shackles of convention. And we shall get more satis- 

 faction from our plantings, whether they be of flowers 

 or hedges, when we plant to express our own natures, 

 than we get when we merely follow the beaten track. 

 Some of us may prefer the privet to all other plants. For 

 such a person the privet is the thing above all else. But 

 some of us may really prefer other plants and yet not 

 have considered the possibility of using them in such an 

 uncommon way. And probably few of us have ever 

 really regarded the hedge from the view-point of thrift. 

 It is worth considering. 



WHAT COULD BE MORE BEAUTIFUL THAN THIS 

 BLACKBERRY HEDGE? 



Its many spring blooms will be succeeded in summer by shining 

 l)lack berries, while the bronze red autumn foliage is one of the 

 most artistic of all fall leaf displays. 



