974 PBACTIGAL GUIDE TO QABDEN PLANTS 



bleak winds of the north and east. Screens of other hardy trees or shrubs 

 should protect the more tender — which are usually the most beautiful — 

 Conifers on these two sides, especially if the land happens to be flat and 

 unprotected by any natural risings or undulations. 



Planting. — Upon the proper planting of Conifers, as with most other trees, 

 a good deal of ultimate success depends. Only Conifers with masses of 

 fibrous roots radiating from the base of the stem should be planted. Those 

 grown in pots, and there are not many now, are quite unsuitable or rather 

 unlikely to make fine healthy trees. The roots which have become cramped 

 in the limited space of a pot and coiled round and round are unable to stretch 

 themselves and their fibrils out naturally in search of food. They are huddled 

 up in a mass like a ball, and can neither develop nor perform properly their 

 natural duty. Where such plants must be used, it is a safe plan to com- 

 pletely wash all the soil away from the ball of roots. The latter can then be 

 spread out as far as possible, and if not too tough or brittle pegged down. 

 This will allow the soil to settle between them and induce the development 

 of the important fibrous roots from the tips. Any time from November to 

 March, always providing the weather be mild and the soil not too wet and 

 sticky, is suitable for planting Conifers. 



Propagation. — Conifers are multiplied by seeds, cuttings, layers, and 

 grafting. Most of them are best obtained by seeds, but many of the non- 

 fruiting kinds, like some of the Eetinosporas, are usually obtained from cuttings, 

 and others from layers. Grafting is practised in some instances, and there 

 are naany fine specimens of grafted Conifers in the country ; but as a general 

 rule grafted Conifers are not likely to attain the age or stand our climate Hke 

 those on their own roots — whether obtained by seeds, layers, or cuttings. Per- 

 haps if the proper relationship between the different species used for stock and 

 scion were better understood, or as well understood as it is in connection with 

 fruit trees, there would be no great harm in having grafted Conifers, but the 

 chances are that all the finest species would be ' worked ' or grafted on the 

 commonest or most easily obtained stock, whether suitable or unsuitable. 

 The planting of grafted Conifers, therefore, on the whole is not to be 

 recommended. 



Nomenclature. — There are few famihes of plants which have been so 

 fearfully mismanaged at the hands of botanists as the Conifers. It is nothing 

 unusual to find one plant with half a dozen or more different names, and there 

 is scarcely one without at least one synonym, so that the greatest confusion 

 has been brought about. One can understand species becoming a little 

 mixed occasionally, but when genera like Picea, Abies, Pinus &c. get 

 entangled, it is surely an indication that the dividing lines between them were 

 not drawn with great rigidity. Thus what are called Abies in some parts 

 of the country are called Picea in another part, and sometimes even Pinus. 

 It is admittedly difficult to draw a botanical line between Abies and Picea, 

 but the latter name is now usually taken as the generic title of the ' Spruces,' 

 and the former for the ' Silver Firs.' 



