T HAT the conditions under which a plant is found 
growing in nature — its range, limitations, etc. — are 
ideal for its well being may seem to the casual observer 
a reasonable assumption, and one that might be de- 
fended. The logical deduction from such a premise 
would be that the gardener who exactly repeats the natural 
conditions would be giving the best possible conditions for that 
plant’s growth. Yet gardeners who have the widest experience 
as cultivators do not accept such teachings as absolute, and 
govern themselves by deduction from the behavior of similar 
types under cultivation. 
The fact is, of course, that plants in nature grow where they 
can, not where they most wish. They occupy that place where 
they are most free from enemies of all sorts that equally with 
them are battling for life, not as mere individuals but as parts 
of the biologic cosmos. A gardener gives his subjects certain 
conditions because he “feels” they are right for the plants al- 
though they may be quite different from an imitation of the 
conditions of the plant’s habitat. 
Of course, it may happen and often does, indeed, that the na- 
tural conditions are right, but the reality to be borne in mind is 
that gardening is something bigger than and quite apart from 
slavish copying of nature. So, to cite an extreme case, the Cork- 
wood (Leitneria), a denizen of the swamps of Florida is success- 
fully grown on dry, well-drained land in the north! Again the 
Canadian Pond-weed (Anacharis), taken to Europe ran wild 
in the broadest sense of the word and became a pest of first 
magnitude in pools, water courses, tanks, and reservoirs. And 
all the world knows the story of the Water Hyacinth in the 
South. 
In a lesser degree, the same thing comes before the observant 
gardener in many ways, and while nature may be taken as a 
guide and index, the facts must be interpreted with the skill 
of the technician. So gardening is an art, a craft, of itself, and 
a plant may be grown under control, away from its normal 
enemies to a degree of perfection quite unlike that of the feral 
conditions. 
Gardeners have known or felt these things possibly ever since 
they began to grow plants from regions outside their own, and 
gardening literature records many “surprising discoveries,” 
bearing on the point, but not collated; comes now a big mass 
of scientific evidence to support the gardener in his assertion 
that he can outgrow nature. Dr. D. T. MacDougal, Director 
of the Botanical Research Department of the Carnegie Institute 
has been gathering material for the last fourteen years and 
makes a report from which we condense: 
In these experiments plants from the mountain tops, some from a 
height of close to one and one half miles above sea level, were found to 
grow much more luxuriantly, producing more leaves, flowers, and fruits 
at sea level than they had in their native habitat. These plants were 
not cultivated, protected, or fostered in any way in their new situations. 
Once placed, they were to all intents and purposes wild flowers and had 
to fight their own battles and take chances as before. 
One hundred and thirty-nine plants were used in these experiments, 
embracing forms of such wide divergence as Grasses, Lilies, and Oak 
and Walnut trees, as well as Cacti and other unusual plants. 
While a plant may thrive well in its new situation, it will sometimes 
display a behavior quite at variance with that by which it is ordinarily 
known. Thus, the common Witch Hazel, which is known to bloom 
in the vicinity of New York when the frosts come, when taken to the 
equitable climate of the Pacific Coast reverts to the normal or summer- 
blooming habit. Other species show flower forms, fruits, and leaves 
notably different from those previously displayed by them. 
Aquatic plants of the Cress family were made to grow in soil on the 
mountain tops, where the roots formed small radishes, like their rela- 
tives. The Radish is a Cress. 1 n other words, these plants came back 
to the ancestral habit of forming a radish. 
It was found that rabbits and rodents which inhabit the Oak zone 
at the top of the mountain range acted very effectively as a barrier to 
prevent Cacti and other plants from moving up or down the mountain 
slopes. To verify this a barrage zone was established and the plants, 
protected in screened enclosures which kept off the little nibbling ani- 
mals. The plants thrived and prospered and spread within the en- 
closed section. Out in the open, to either side of the barrage zone 
they rapidly disappeared, being eaten bv the rabbits. This explained 
the mysterious sudden stoppage of some of these plants — not altitude 
nor heat nor cold, but actual destruction through being eaten. 
All of which goes to strengthen the gardener in the course of 
forming his own judgments from observation, and not adhering 
too closely to tradition. 
THE OPEJf^ QOL 
Readers’ I nterchange of Experience and Comment 
' Are Birds Beneficial? 
To the Editor of The Garden Magazine: 
I N THE September number of The Garden Magazine, page 51, is 
an article headed “Birds in the Garden," that interests me mightily. 
Birds give me more trouble in the garden than all the insects. People 
become sentimentally daffy over birds because they are either beauti- 
ful, useful, or musical. Some birds have all these admirable qualities. 
But at times they have habits that make them such a nuisance they 
cannot be tolerated. I have killed the Blackbirds for years because 
they pull up my Corn as soon as it shows above the ground, to get 
the grain. But I have found a new sinner engaged in this work. It 
is nothing less than the Brown Thrasher. A farmer’s daughter first 
told me about it. There are always several nests in or near my garden, 
and this lady told me if I would watch closely 1 would discover that the 
destructive work laid to the Blackbird was mainly the work of the 
Brown Thrasher; and so I have found it. Just this spring 1 counted 
fifty holes these birds had bored in the ground in search of the grain. 
All these holes were in one row. There was a nest in my vineyard with 
four young birds in it, but one day the old house cat found the nest and 
she prevented these youngsters ever pulling my Corn. 
But another word about the birds. As soon as my grapes are ripe, 
Brown Thrashers, Cat-birds, and Robins are more or less constant!) 
335 
