Three New Shrubs of Exceptional Merit 
J. HORACE MCFARLAND 
Author of “Getting Acquainted with the Trees,” “My Growing Garden,” etc. 
TELLIXG'PERSONAL EXPERIENCES WITH THREE OF E. H. WILSON’S RECENT INT'RODUCTIONS 
T WO recent trips made through the 
fair and fertile centre of the great 
state of Pennsylvania have given 
me much joy in the sight of scenery 
both lovely and magnificent, and much sorrow 
in the sight of home planting both monotonous 
and tiresome. 
On one trip of one hundred and fifty miles, 
most of it over the Lincoln Highway, I paid 
particular attention to the shrubs and plants 
visible not only near the better homes in the 
half-dozen pleasant towns through which we 
passed, but about the farmhouses seen in four 
rich valleys. There was a scant dozen plants 
predominating in all 
this inspection, and I 
hardly need name the 
list, which included, 
of course. Lilacs, 
Hydrangea “p. g.” 
Spiraea Van Houttei, 
Weigela rosea, and an 
occasional Honey- 
suckle. In at least 
seventy per cent, of 
the inspected plant- 
ings the sorts I have 
named above pre- 
dominated, and there 
were few others any- 
where. 
This, too, in a state 
and along a route 
once rich with superb 
native shrubs, and 
favored with soil of 
varying qualities, in 
which now might be 
found favorable grow- 
ing conditions for 
scores, if not hun- 
dreds, of the best 
ornamental shrubs of 
the world. 
The other trip, 
through a much wilder 
country, the fertility This summer flowering shrub 
of which was potential 
rather than actual, showed glorious native 
shrubbery and still less planting in the towns 
and about the farms. Here the monotony of 
the herbaceous planting struck me forcibly. I 
saw about a million plants of a dirty magenta- 
colored Phlox, and I saw vast masses of Tiger 
Lily. It was exceptional to find anything else 
in bloom, at a time when many other shrubs 
should have been seen. 
Now I know that I will be met with the 
statement that the shrubs I have thus seen are 
the survivals of man\'^ trials, and that they 
are thus fou^id about the homes and farms be- 
cause they are the best adapted to meet the 
conditions. If the country I am discussing 
was really a “hard luck’’ country, and if its 
agriculture reflected the surroundings found 
in sterile neighborhoods, there would be truth 
in this assumed reply. On the contrary, the 
valleys I have traversed on these motor trips 
are agriculturally advanced. One of them is 
growing wonderful apples. Another can grow 
wonderful apples whenever the lazy natives 
open their eyes and get out their spray guns to 
shoot the codlin-moth. Through at least half 
the traversed territory the superb native 
Laurel and Rhododendron are notably present 
where man has not “civilized” the surround- 
ings with Hydrangea “p. g.” and Spiraea 
“V. H.” 
It has occurred to me that it might be worth 
whde to set forth to the readers of The Garden 
Magazine the merits of three vigorous shrubs 
which ought to be tried out and availed of over 
a wide territory, with the idea of improving 
variety in home planting. These shrubs, I 
think, are exceptional, and that is why I will 
describe them; but they could be supplemented 
by a hundred others which it is as yet hope- 
less to mention. 
That prince of plantsmen, E. H. Wilson, has. 
is especially welcome, for its white sprays appear from June to 
in The Garden Magazine, described most 
modestly his finds in Western China, some of 
which are now scantily available in the United 
States to those who care. The shrubs I want 
to describe were among a lot Mr. Wilson 
selected and sent me some three years ago. 
The plants received, including more than sixty 
in all, were strong, and quite uniform in size. 
I knew nothing whatever as to what would 
happen with them, and I planted them, there- 
fore, somewhat uniformly in what I call the 
“Arboretum bed” at my Breeze Hill home. 
I expected this bed of shrubs to show forth a 
little of what the Arnold .Arboretum was doing 
for the plant ornamentation of .America. 
The result has been not onl\’ pleasing but 
amusing. 1 hree plants of the Lonicera or 
Honevsuckle family were associated closely in 
this bed. I did not know that one of them 
would be a trailer, and that the other one 
aspired to I leaven, but I found it out as growth 
ensued; and I have been year after year mov- 
ing away the less vigorous and upstanding 
shrubs to give room for the three that are here- 
with illustrated. 
Two of these plants are Bush Honeysuckles, 
though they are wholly unlike each other so 
far as the eye of the layman goes. Both of 
them have portentous and awe-inspiring 
names, which can be relied upon, I fear, to 
keep them in the backwoods of horticulture 
unless some one proposes fortuitous and 
euphonious common names. 
A QUICK GROWING BUSH HONEYSUCKLE 
Lonicera Maackii var. podocarpa is the 
most upstanding of these shrubs. I find in 
Professor Sargent’s later descriptions that it is 
expected to reach a height of fifteen feet and a 
similar diameter, but I believe the Professor 
is rather underestimating the growing possi- 
bilities of this noble 
and vigorous shrub. 
1 he picture will show 
it in bloom, and it is 
well worth while look- 
ing at while in bloom. 
Yet it is also just as 
worth while all the 
rest of the season, for 
the tips of its vigorous 
shoots are a curious 
light bronze color be- 
fore they mature into 
the deep, rich green, 
sharply-pointed 
leaves that endure on 
the plant almost to 
Christmas, making it 
a green spot until 
Jack Frost hits it hard 
enough to jar off its 
beautiful foliage. 
Meanwhile, the 
axils of the leaves are 
set with groups of 
round berries. In 
August, as I write, 
these are as green as 
the leaves, with here 
and there a suspicion 
of the turn to bril- 
liant scarlet which is 
September (Sorbaria arboreaj happen a little 
later, and which gives 
to the plant its charming second “bloom” 
of fruit. 
Here, then, is a shrub which can make a 
noble object in a corner or a large space, and 
which will be beautiful from the verj’ first start 
of its foliage in spring until the very last day 
that it is possible for any deciduous foliage 
to stand against a hard frost. 
I have said that it is a shrub requiring room. 
I emphasize this. It is no “two by four” 
proposition, to plant eighteen inches from 
something else because the plant is small when 
received. Provide that it may have a diam- 
eter of not less than ten to fifteen feet, and it 
will become a unique ornament in any ground. 
A HONEYSUCKLE WITH BLUE GRAY LEAVES 
,A sister in the same family, but as unlike as 
sisters sometimes are, is Lonicera Korolkovii 
var. floribunda. 1 his is a scandalously ugly 
name for a shrub of peculiar elegance. As 
visitors go through my garden I have been 
quite interested to note their comments on 
coming to this Bush Honeysuckle. I he aver- 
age of the expressions has always been toward 
emphasizing the elegance of the plant, for it 
makes just that impression. 
98 
I 
I 
I 
I 
[, 
