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A FEW GOOD CLIMBERS AND CREEPERS. 



not try to do too much of this at once : let us rather 

 allow something of it to remain to be done each 

 year, that we may have each season some new in- 

 terest to attract us out-of-doors. 



W-e have already suggested the value of reading 

 and study as an aid in the work which we have un- 

 dertaken. But the studying must not all be within 

 doors. The things that we learn from books can 

 benefit us most only when we try their practical ap- 

 plication to every-day life. Our garden should be 

 an experiment station in which to test varieties, and 



fertilizers and methods of cultivation. A note-book 

 should be our constant companion, and not only 

 should dates be put therein, but every seem- 

 ingly trival circumstance connedted with our work. 

 If we fail, this note-book book should show us why ; 

 if we have any special success, it should show the 

 reason for that as well, and be our guide in the 

 future. Nothing should be left to chance, and no 

 result should be achieved without our being able to 

 recall the processes and repeat the same conditions, 

 or vary them, as may seem most needed. 



A FEW GOOD CLIMBERS AND CREEPERS. 



jHE CLIMBING plants 

 have a place of their 

 own in garden decora- 

 tion, a place that can- 

 not at all be filled by 

 any other plants. 

 Screens are necessary 

 for the veranda or for 

 covering out-buildings, 

 and when wanted 

 something of an orna- 

 mental charaifter is desirable. It is a well known 

 fact that the plant foliage is the most cooling shade 

 that can be devised, and it also furnishes a rest to 

 the eye and mind. An awning will keep the sun 

 from our rooms or from the veranda, but it does 

 not furnish a cooling, refreshing shade, as does the 

 foliage of our climbing plants. 



Nature seems to have provided climbing plants for 

 this very purpose, and in the greatest profusion 

 where they are the most needed. The most vigorous 

 and beautiful in the world are indigenous in the 

 woods of nearly all our states, growing to the sum- 

 mits of lofty trees, covering walls and fences in the 

 most artistic manner, and creeping over and among 

 rocks where but little other vegetation will thrive. 

 The different sorts of vines may be distinguished as 

 creepers, twiners, climbers and trailers. The creep- 

 ers are those that throw out adventitious roots from 

 their stems as they climb, by which they attach 

 themselves to the bark of trees and rough walls, 

 like the Virginia creeper and English ivy. Twiners, 

 of which the honeysuckle is the best example, rise 

 by winding round and round objects with which they 

 come in contact. Climbers rise by their tendrils 

 lajdng hold of twigs of trees, or fixing themselves in 

 crevices and supporting the vine till its large arms 

 have wreathed themselves upon some other support 

 — a grajDe vine, for instance, or if they are without 



tendrils, they rise by the mere force of their growth 

 overlaying the branches of trees, and finding sup- 

 port by hanging over them, like the wild roses. 

 Trailers, are those that prefer to creep upon the 

 ground, like the low vine blackberry. Prominent 

 among our native creepers is the well known 



Virginia Creeper {Ainpelopsis qumquefolia) , 

 often callled the American ivy, though it has but 

 little resemblance to the true ivy, except in its power 

 of adhesion to the bark of trees and to walls, and 

 in the facft that it forms an equally luxuriant mass 

 of foliage upon them. In a deep, rich soil this plant 

 is of very rapid growth, attaching itself firmly to 

 wood or stone buildings, or to the trunks of old 

 trees, and it soon covers these objects with a fine 

 mantle of rich foliage. In very rich soil, where 

 there is sufficient moisture, it has but little resemb- 

 ance to the plant we are accustomed to see. In 

 such a situation the leaves are very large and of a 

 deep glossy green, and of very great substance. 

 Nothing can be more admirably adapted for con- 

 cealing out-buildings and disguising the unsightly 

 stone-fences which are so common and so great a 

 deformity in many parts of the country. Its great 

 beauty is in autumn, when its scarlet and orange 

 foliage is so brilliant and contrasts so finely with 

 the cedar on which it naturally climbs. 



A. tricuspidata, known to the trade as Ampelopsis 

 VeitcJiii, and popularly as Boston ivy, a native of 

 Japan, is a very beautiful species, more compact in . 

 habit than the foregoing, and with very bright, dark 

 foliage, flushed with red in summer, changing to 

 brilliant crimson in autumn. It is an elegant 

 miniature creeper, and, like our native species, will 

 endure and thrive well in the smoke and dust so 

 common in many of our cities. It clings so closely 

 by its suckers that when once started against a wall 

 no further attention will be required to keep it in 

 position ; and left to itself, it will cover any surface 



