248 YARD AND GARDEN 



Some beginners probably will find it difficult 

 to distinguish between shrubs and small trees. 

 But this need not discourage them ; expe- 

 rienced planters are similarly perplexed. What 

 one calls a small tree another may call a shrub, 

 the distinction being often difficult. Shrubs, 

 as a rule, have a number of stems springing 

 from the ground whereas a tree possesses but 

 a single trunk. Still this is not true in all 

 cases. 



The wide variety in habit of growth, foliage, 

 fruit and flower makes the worth of shrubs. 

 They can be had for every situation, of vary- 

 ing height, and of varying seasons of bloom. 

 As the leaves differ, so the flowers differ, or 

 the berries in cases where the shrub's chief 

 value is determined by its fruit rather than by 

 its bloom, but if in any of these respects the 

 variation is wide it is no wider than the varia- 

 tion in the uses to which shrubs may be profit- 

 ably put. They serve to conceal foundation 

 walls ; they form backgrounds for plants ; they 

 act as harmonizing agents between lawn and 

 tall-growing trees ; they can be used as a cov- 

 ering for ground which on account of its slope, 

 exposure or other adverse conditions will not 

 support grass, and they are valuable as mate- 



