JOURNAL 
OF THE 
EoYAL Horticultural Society. 
Vol. XXV. 1900. 
Parts I. and II. 
A YEAR'S NOTES ON DECIDUOUS AND EVERGREEN 
FLOWERING AND ORNAMENTAL SHRUBS AND TREES. 
By Mr. George Bunyard, V.M.H. 
[Read January 23, 1900.] 
In taking up this subject it is right I should state that I am not working 
on fresh Hnes or unknown subjects, as hardy shrubs have for over forty 
years been of special interest to me as one branch of my business, and I 
cannot give a better reason for bringing them before the notice of the 
R.H.S. than by quoting a cutting from the Gardeners' Magazine which 
appeared after I had decided to attempt to rescue these interesting and 
beautiful flowering shrubs from comparative oblivion. It runs thus : — • 
There is no more vandalistic treatment of pretty shrubs than that 
furnished by clipping, and the gardener who employs shears for shrubs 
should be similarly tortured as a fitting reward. In not a few instances, 
both in private and public gardens, we see what might, under proper 
treatment, be handsome shrubs of many varieties, sheared-over every year, 
thus forming of each one a dumpy round clump, horrible to look upon. 
It is astonishing that any gardener should allow such wanton treatment 
to be bestowed on any vegetable life under his control. Constant clipping 
results in so checking the growth that shrubs (like hedges) become hollow 
and thin because their root action is correspondingly checked." 
I may at once say that, as a rule, shrubs are seldom given a fair chance, 
being too often used as stop-gaps, or as nurses for evergreens or conifers : 
they are mutilated rather than pruned ; crushed, and crowded in such a 
B 
