THE NEW ROCK GARDENING 83 



hand a supply of material for special pockets peat, 

 mixed grit, granite chippings wherewith to meet the 

 requirements of those fastidious plants of which note is 

 taken in the following chapter. 



The grower of Alpine plants in rock beds may spring 

 almost at a bound into active enjoyment of the delightful 

 phase of flower-gardening which he or she has taken up. 

 It is the rule of nurserymen to grow most of their stock 

 in small pots, in order to be able to execute orders what- 

 ever the weather may be. The stock is often kept in 

 unheated frames, from which the sashes are removed for 

 the greater part of the year, in order that the plants may 

 not be made tender by protection. The early bloomers 

 open their flowers in these pots before the winter has 

 passed away. With the plants ordered hot upon the 

 completion of the soil preparation and the arrival of the 

 rock, a considerable area of ground may be furnished 

 with stones and planted in the course of a nine-hours' 

 day in early spring. And in their comfortable pockets, 

 which at dawn did not exist, a score of plants may be 

 flowering cheerfully before nightfall. Thereafter fresh 

 flowers will open week by week, and for long months 

 there will be a lovely display of charming blossoms. 

 Thus with a spring start the joy of Alpine gardening 

 will be upon the flower-lover before the buds on the trees 

 have broken into leaf. 



The hardiness of the plants is so complete that they 

 will endure rigours to which many nominally hardy 

 plants would succumb. A consignment of Alpines was 

 received by a flower-lover towards the end of an April 

 day in the large, shallow boxes which nurserymen often 

 use for transplanting such small things. A good many 

 were in pots, but others were in ground clumps. Looking 

 (hy, they were watered and set in a summer-house. 



