Beautiful Flowering Shrubs 



Again, Olearia chathamica suggests itself as a most 

 desirable shrub that the near future will find in our 

 gardens ; though only introduced here in 1908 by 

 Captain A. Dorrien Smith, it has already shown that 

 it can stand 18 degrees of frost unimpaired. Its aster- 

 like blooms, the size of those of O. insignis, have pale 

 lavender rays and purple centres, and its leaves, four to 

 six inches long and two inches broad, have saw-like 

 margins to their leathery blades. 



Soil and Cultivation. The Olearias do not like 

 lime in the soil, and should be planted in light loam 

 with a little peat. O. Haastii will thrive in most 

 places. The beautiful O. chathamica is reported also 

 as hardier than O. macrodonta and O. stellulata, but is 

 yet too new to have been really tested. 



After flowering the little brown feather heads of 

 seeds, which persist through the winter, give these 

 shrubs rather an untidy appearance, but they can easily 

 be snipped off. The Olearias should be pruned, but 

 only if actual necessity arises, in the early spring. 

 They are propagated by cuttings of ripened wood taken 

 about the end of September or in October and placed 

 in cold frames. 



204 



