Home Gardening in a Warm Climate—sy Anita M. Miller, 
Austin 
FRUIT FROM MARCH TO DECEMBER, AND FLOWERS THE YEAR ROUND OUTDOORS—WHERE 
PRIVET IS EVERGREEN, CANNAS ARE HARDY, AND SAN JOSE SCALE AND ROSE BUG UNKNOWN 
[Evitor’s Note—We will gladly publish articles from any part of the country that are as good as this, but they must be practical for people in the section described and interesting to 
others. 
N a state so new as ours it is hard to find 
anyone who can tell you what can be 
successfully grown, or even to predict what 
vagaries may be expected from the climate. 
Every now and then some one stumbles on 
the fact that some fruit, vegetable, or grain is 
perfectly adapted to sections where it had 
heretofore been considered impossible, and 
the price of land goesup witha bound. Then 
the state is so large and of such varied climate 
that fruits and flowers which flourish in one 
section may not grow at all in another. 
Austin is in the same latitude as Talahas- 
see, Florida, but has a different climate. 
Cold weather, when we have it, comes in the 
form of sudden, winds from the north, or 
“northers’’ as we callthem. They may be dry 
or accompanied by rain and in rare instances 
by sleet. The first frost may be expected 
the latter part of November, while in the 
spring it is usually safe to set out tomato 
plants by March 15th. The yearly rainfall 
varies from eighteen to forty inches. In 
planning a garden preference must be given 
to plants which will stand considerable 
drought. 
The seasons when most rain may 
ae ho Die a area, PS 
Climbing roses make brilliant screens 
be expected are late spring — March and 
April—and early fall—September and 
October, with corresponding summer and 
winter seasons of drought. But I wish to 
emphasize may be expected, as on this point 
the gardener is sometimes doomed to dis- 
appointment. 
We selected for our suburban home a lot 
160 x 242 ft.—not quite an acre. It was 
virgin wilderness. We had to cut a path 
through prickly pear and mesquite brush 
from the front door to the street car track, 
and whenever the baby and her Mexican 
nurse ventured out of doors the little one 
returned with her frock all torn by brambles. 
The only reason “why we do not print more Southern articles,” 1s that we do not know how to get any as good as this.] 
Our first work was therefore to construct 
walks and to make a Jawn. A near-by bed 
of natural gravel made the walks an easy 
matter. 
The grass universally used here is the Ber- 
muda. It propagates itself very rapidly by 
runners—indeed, after it is once planted the 
chief care of the gardener is to keep it from 
overrunning the flower beds and walks. The 
roots are planted in furrows about two feet 
apart. A Bermuda lawn can be ‘kept in 
fairly good condition without watering; ours 
has not been watered for years. It will turn 
yellow after a prolonged drought but does 
not die out and quickly recovers after a rain. 
Every few years it needs a top dressing of 
good black earth. Nature has sown one 
lawn for us with rain lily, a fragrant, white, 
night-blooming bulb which flowers in three 
days after a rain and was pictured in THE 
GARDEN MAGAZINE of June, 1906, page 273. 
HEDGES 
We tried doing without a fence but found 
it impracticable. Allsorts of people and ani- 
mals, from cowboys on horseback to dogs 
and droves of turkeys, were apt to wander 
across the lawn and flower-beds at any 
moment. So we built a fence and did not 
like it because it was not an old ivy-covered 
brick wall. Then we decided to compromise 
on hedges, and are delighted with the result. 
Around the front lawn, where it seemed that 
some formality was due the public, there is 
a prim hedge of California privet (Ligus- 
trum ovalijolium) relieved by a sturdy Japan 
privet (Ligustrum Japonicum) on each side 
of the front gate. Then on the north of the 
orchard there isa windbreak of Chinese arbor- 
vite, while the side of the orchard next to the 
street is protected and adorned by a hedge of 
pink hybrid Wichuraiana roses eight feet high. 
The vines are carefully trained on poultry 
netting, and in April they are covered with 
small rosy-pink double blossoms, borne in 
clusters. The back yard is surrounded by 
the prettiest “living fence” of all—a hedge 
of Hall’s honeysuckle. ‘The pure white blos- 
soms changing to cream before fading are 
borne in great profusion in March and there- 
after at intervals until frost. They fill the air 
with fragrance and are alive with humming- 
birds and butterflies. All of these hedges are 
evergreen in this climate except the Japanese 
rose, which turns to beautiful autumn tints 
in January and then drops its leaves, putting 
out fresh ones in a few weeks. The privet 
is the only one we have to water. 
SHADE 
In a country of almost perpetual sunshine 
shade trees are a very important consider- 
ation. Our place was blessed with a boun- 
tiful supply —eight post oaks and twenty 
13 
American elms. Every year or so we have 
them cleaned out of mistletoe and moss— 
their only natural enemies so far as we know. 
They are too precious for us to cut down— 
even one —so the problem of finding room 
Prickly pear flowers surprise the Easterner 
for fruit trees, flowers, and vegetables, has 
been a serious one. 
FRUITS 
However, there was an open space just 
north of the house 75 x 125 ft., and we de- 
cided to devote this to a little orchard. Here 
we planted twelve pear trees, fourteen peaches, 
fourteen plums, two apple trees, and two 
Siberian crab-apples, two apricots, two 
Japanese persimmons, and four fig trees. 
There are five rows, eighteen feet apart, the 
trees being set twelve feet intherow. Extra 
space was gained by placing the pear trees 
directly on the line dividing the orchard 
from the lawn and seiting a privet hedge be- 
tween their trunks. : 
Fig trees will grow anywhere, so twelve 
others were stuck around in odd corners about 
the grounds. We have White Ischia, Celes- 
tial, Brunswick, and Magnolia—four trees 
of each kind. The Celestial is the most 
popular. It is a little blue fig that begins 
ripening in June and is very sweet. Person- 
ally, we prefer the White Ischia, a large 
deliciously sweet cream-colored fig, but un- 
fortunately it does not begin ripening until 
August, when we are out of town, continuing 
to ripen in September and October. The 
Brunswick is very late—October, continuing 
until stopped by frost. We have had them 
