HERBACEOUS PLANTS, AND 

 PLANTING THEM FOR NEXT YEAR'S BLOOM 



With a Consideration of Their Proper Use in Relation to 

 Other Features of the Garden, and Some Selected Plant Lists 



GRACE TABOR 



Mil DIFFICUL1 PLACE 



Naturalistic ground cover of J 



I ROM the garden point 

 of view, all garden ma- 

 terial is indispensable; 

 and it is not perhaps 

 true that any one 

 thing is of greater consequence 

 than another. Yet it is un- 

 doubtedly a fact that her- 

 baceous material is more gen- 

 erally used than any other one 

 class of plants, and that its 

 appeal is therefore broader than 

 any other. It not only furnishes 

 the bulk of the flower garden 

 planting, but it supplements 

 heavier growth and often sup- 

 plies, in certain of its great fam- 

 ilies such as the Peony or Iris, 

 the motif for a garden scheme- 



The mixed border is the most familiar of all arrangements, 

 and the most generally practical one in that it adapts itself 

 to all kinds of places and exposures — as well as to all kinds 

 of gardeners, which is an important factor! Never-the-less 

 it is well to realize that the herbaceous border does not 

 have to be a mixture by any means; and that some of the 

 most sumptuous effects are obtainable only through the use 

 of great masses of one or two kinds of plants. Which brings 

 us at once to the two ideals that are always before us, and 

 between which we must choose. They differ utterly, and 

 choice is not always easy. 



Something Always in Bloom 



ONE ideal is of flowers somewhere in the border through- 

 out the season — something always in bloom. The 

 other is an imposing display of some particular beauty over 

 as long a period as may be. Obviously it is impossible to 

 have both in the one border, since a mixture arranged for 

 succession of bloom will not contain a really imposing mass of 

 any one thing. Select which one may, there are bound to be 

 longings for the other occasionally; so my practice is to decide 

 which will be regretted least, and then to put it behind me 

 with the ancient admonition to temptation and proceed with 

 the other with singleness of heart. 



So much that is doubtful, if it is not worse, has been said 

 and written about garden design, and the subject is one that 

 is so largely over-emphasized sometimes — though it is a 

 subject of the very greatest moment and vital to the success 

 of a garden — that I rather shrink from becoming entangled 



racea) and Mai.inthemum in the shadow of a Norway Spruce 



in it here. But there are broad 

 principles which govern it, 

 under all circumstances, which 

 it seems well to point out. 

 And one of these is the concep- 

 tion of flowers as the garden's 

 trimming. This is a homely 

 phrase, but there seems to be 

 not hing else thatquite expresses 

 what 1 mean. Flowers are of 

 course often the garden's motif; 

 and yet even here, they are a 

 " trimming" — a decoration ap- 

 plied to the plain facts of trees 

 and shrubs and grass and walks 

 and drives. Or they should be. 

 When they are not, something 

 is wrong in the garden's atmos- 

 phere; and everyone feels it 

 though no one may be able to analyze it and locate it. 



\l I III FOOl OF A I Kl 

 ill-over-the-ground (Nepeta hede 



Flowers as "Trimmings" 



IF YOU will always regard flowers as trimming, however, 

 they will never get into the wrong places; they will never 

 be introduced arbitrarily and haphazard, and however lav- 

 ishly they are used, nothing will be overdone. They are, 

 properly, attributes of design, exactly as color is an attribute 

 of line in painting (it is impossible to lay color on without 

 at the same instant laying down a line) therefore, the design 

 must come first, and must supply opportunity for them. 

 And the garden must be developed from design to flowers 

 rather than from flowers to design. 



No End to the List of Plants 



OF PLANTS themselves — the herbaceous material es- 

 pecially — there is almost no end; and without a doubt 

 the highly meritorious kinds are legion. Yet even the most 

 mixed border can entertain comparatively few — and need 

 entertain but few comparatively, to meet the all-season bloom 

 requirement. What to choose, how to arrive at a choice 

 that will bring the very best into each particular garden, is 

 of course the particular problem that each must solve. I 

 find choice simplified by the help of a little score-card whereon 

 the five most important attributes of a plant are assigned a 

 definite standing, by points, so that comparison between 

 kinds is easy and each may be given its rightful place with 

 relation to the others with positive finality. This score-card 

 is as follows: 



57 



mtm 



