The Garden Magazine 



How to Make Plans for Later 

 Plantings 



I CANNOT help wondering, days like these, 

 how people who live down South, or out in 

 California, or wherever else the growing 

 season is twelve months long, ever manage 

 to carry out their garden plans. Or, rather, 

 how they ever get time to make any such plans 

 at all! 



For if they can be actively digging and plant- 

 ing, transplanting and pruning any day in the 

 year, when, in the name of goodness do they 

 find opportunity to sit down quietly, ruminate 

 over the past, and create the mental pictures of 

 what they are going to do in the future? Such 

 things can be done best only when the mind is 

 not occupied with other problems of immediate, 

 pressing needs; when the hands must needs be 

 idle; when there is a lull in the physical activities 

 tnat makes room for increased functioning along 

 mental and spiritual lines. 



Consequently now, while for most of us the 

 ground is frozen solid, when the snow is inches 

 deep, or maybe feet, when the steam pipes hiss or 

 the open fire crackles, according to the degree 

 of modernity of our domicile — right now is the 

 time to decide what we are going to make of our 

 gardens next summer. What to grow and how 

 much of it; where to put each item, new or old; 

 with what to precede and follow it; all such de- 

 tails ought to be definitely decided upon before 

 the crocuses kindle the first sparks of the spring- 

 time conflagration that melts the snow and 

 loosens the frost-bound soil. 



Of course one doesn't have to be bound by that 

 first plan as by the Ten Commandments. Half 

 the fun in gardening and a good part of the proof 

 of one's ability and ingenuity lie in modifying, 

 improving, and enlarging upon the original 

 schedule, We don't know what sort ofweather 

 the seasons are going to bring, or how early or 

 late they will be — the old "Farmers' Almanac" 

 to the contrary notwithstanding; seed will go 

 wrong sometimes as to viability or trueness to 

 type — the waiver of responsibility on every seeds- 

 man's package tells us that; and insects, diseases, 

 floods and droughts are all parts of the preor- 

 dained programme that every season tries our 

 mettle and tests our adaptability and power of re- 

 bounding against or in spite of obstacles. 



So the very best of winter made garden plans 

 is but a framework, a preliminary sketch, a 

 hypothetical outline, if you like, upon which later 

 to arrange and execute the details of the actual 

 mobilization drive. And just because it is a 

 foundation, skeleton-like affair it is fundamentally 

 important, no less than the backbone of verte- 

 brates, the shell of a lobster or the bony structure 



of any living creature that is the least bit above 

 the lowest strata of animal life. 



For one thing it insures a good supply of tools, 

 labels, seed, spray mixtures and all the materials 

 wherewith to make the most of every minute 

 when the time for action arrives. No one, you 

 see, could go over in his or her mind the garden 

 work to be done next summer without checking 

 up to see if there were ample supplies on hand of 

 everything that would be needed to do that 

 work. 



Again it enables, indeed it requires one to 

 look back over the past year's experiences and 

 to analyze one's successes and failures; in other 

 words, it gives the garden that is to be a back- 

 ground, a perspective. It calls to mind varieties 

 that were especially satisfactory on a trial basis, 

 of which one wants to grow more next season 

 and which it behooves one to order early before 

 the rush caused by those who act only at the last 

 moment, begins. It suggests a careful survey of 

 the pantry shelves and the root cellar to ascertain 

 whether more tomatoes or fewer beans should 

 be raised for canning, and whether last year's 

 patch of potatoes was really enough to last all 

 winter. In short, it clears away the fog of inde- 

 cision and inaccurate knowledge of what one 

 needs to do and opens up a vista of definite action 

 which can be improved on if necessary or desir- 

 able, but which, just as it stands will get one some- 

 where worth going to. 



The important thing, then, is have you made 

 your particular plan for the 1919 garden? Do 

 you know how many new shrubs you will need 

 to fill that empty corner by the fence, and what 

 they are going to be? Have you settled on what 

 varieties of Roses you are going to start over the 

 pergola that was finished just as the snow came? 

 Have you decided whether to try three varieties 

 of corn that you have heard about or stick to 

 succession plantings of the old reliable Golden 

 Bantam? Have you figured out where you can 

 put the cabbages and cauliflower this year. so as to 

 give them new, clean ground and avoid the danger 

 of club root, without crowding the melons off 

 that light, sandy bit of soil that they love? 



Not a single question of this sort, of planting 

 policy we might call it, should remain unan- 

 swered by the time the next issue of The Garden 

 Magazine appears. Because then there won't 

 be time to sit indoors and ponder over them. 

 Living up to its customary name and to the 

 tradition of the seasons (which, I admit, has been 

 severely strained by the Easter blizzards of the 

 last few years) the March number will be a real 

 planting manual, discussing not the whats and 

 whys and wherefores and whences, but the hows. 

 Then will be the time to really dig and plow, to 

 mulch and trench and begin the actual construc- 



13 



tional tasks in hotbed and outdoors. The lead- 

 ing articles and the departments will tell how, 

 but after a busy day following directions you 

 won't feel very ready to sit down of an evening 

 and work over a garden diagram. You will 

 be doing well about then to jot down in the 

 garden diary the main tasks that you have ac- 

 complished before attending to the new crop 

 of blisters on your palms and stretching out a 

 mildly aching back for a well-earned rest. 



And so, for any one of a number of good rea- 

 sons, get busy over your plans now, so as to be 

 free to tackle the other tasks that, following fast, 

 will soon be claiming most of your time, much of 

 your attention, and all of your concentrated 

 garden .thoughts. 



The Mild Winter 



THE change to peace from war has had 

 the anticipated reaction in the garden 

 and the extremely mild weather of this 

 winter — up to the time this note is 

 written (early January) — is having its effect 

 in the garden. These two things indeed are 

 correlated. An unusual amount of planting 

 weather has been a very practical offset to any 

 shortage of labor. Planting has continued un- 

 interruptedly up to this time; and at this writing 

 is still in effect in many parts of the country 

 which normally are closed up tight at this time 

 of year. 



Of course by the time these notes are being 

 read it is practically certain that there will have 

 been some touch of real winter but what has 

 been gained cannot well be lost. Ground work 

 has had attention, transplanting of trees and 

 shrubs, setting out of fruits and ornamentals 

 have been going on a-pace. The nurserymen 

 report a big volume of business. 



On the other side of the book is the fact that 

 the warmth of the entire fall and early winter 

 has stimulated many plants into undue activity; 

 Lilacs and other early flowering shrubs that 

 should have been dormant have been falsely 

 stimulated into a belief that spring has come. 

 They have pushed out buds; in some cases even 

 flowers have been developed. We hear of Lilacs 

 blooming in Cleveland, and of blackberries ripen- 

 ing fruit out of season. The stimulation of 

 growth in the tender parts of plants is, of course, 

 accompanied with more or less danger to the 

 plants themselves. 



Last year abnormal cold resulted in the killing 

 of the flower buds on many spring blooming 

 shrubs. This year to some extent the spring 

 bloom is being killed by being forced to appear 

 months ahead of its time. In all cases where 

 the early spring flowering shrubs have borne 



