182 MY GROWING GARDEN 



or buttercup, or crowfoot — Ranunculus repens. 

 Grass is impossible for this spot, but I have an 

 idea that the creeping buttercup may find the 

 place endurable, if not congenial. If it does grow 

 there, it is certainly no weed, for it will be very 

 much a plant in place, and not out of place. Yet 

 an authority on weeds — Harold C. Long — classes 

 this as "one of the worst weeds of arable lands!" 



One formerly weedy corner of sterile ground I 

 have filled with Bocconia cordata, a perennial 

 growing to four or five feet, and with good foliage, 

 flowers and seed-pods. It is not a proper thing to 

 plant in a small garden, unless the roots are fenced 

 in by concrete or slate; for they spread rapidly, 

 and each little yellow rootlet that breaks off is 

 another plant in a hurry. It takes care now of 

 the weeds. 



A fine yellow evening primrose that blooms all 

 day, making for several weeks a sheet of clear 

 lemon-yellow, is another chosen weed. It spreads 

 by creeping roots, and will overrun any location; 

 but it is easily "weeded out" when it gets too far, 

 and it will crowd out all ordinary sunshine weeds. 

 1 am trying a half-dozen locations for it. 



Sweet william will seed itself and keep on, and 

 it is another of the pervasive plants that I am 

 naturalizing in spots. (By the way, does Mrs. 



