HOUSE AND GARDEN 
267 
April, 1915 
in heavy soil, is hardly ever reached. Another advan¬ 
tage is their great dependability. You can count on 
their being in the same spot and blooming at just about 
the same time year after year. They include, of course, 
some of the most beautiful of flowers and kinds which 
are valuable for practically every purpose — gorgeous 
shows in masses, bold and dainty landscape effects, 
cutting for bouquets, use around rock-work and natu¬ 
ralistic effects. But the very fact that perennials are 
long-lived and regular in their season of bloom makes 
it doubly necessary that the greatest care should be 
exercised in selecting them. The results of mistakes 
made are not for a few weeks or a season, but for 
years, unless one wishes to contem¬ 
plate the job of m-making a perennial 
garden, which is much more of a job 
than making it. 
The easiest part of this rather diffi¬ 
cult task of selecting your perennials 
is to find out everything there is to be 
found out about any particular plant. 
You can get this information from any 
good nursery catalogue or find it in 
more complete and convenient form in 
the numerous tables which have been 
made up, listing and classifying these 
data. A complete list of perennials, 
without going into varieties at all, 
would include many scores of plants 
of which there is not room for even a 
brief description here. Some of the 
most dependable and satisfactory are 
described in the accompanying table. 
In selecting perennials, the first thing to decide is when 
you want them to bloom. If your hardy border is on 
a summer place, to which you do not come until mid- 
June, there is no use in wasting good 
money and space on flowers that 
bloom in April and May; and if 
August must see you again packing up 
for the city, those glories of the late 
autumn garden, Japanese anemones 
and the hardy chrysanthemums, will 
not be for your enjoyment. On the 
other hand, if your garden is enjoyed 
during the Spring and Fall, but left 
to its own happy self-contemplation 
during a month or so while you are 
away at the seashore in mid-summer, 
you will miss the delphinium and cam¬ 
panulas in their glory. So, the first 
thing to decide in getting at your per¬ 
ennials is when you want them in 
bloom. Having settled this, you will 
find there is quite a list available. But 
there is another matter to settle in your 
own mind before you go any farther, 
and that is, how much care they are going to get after they 
are set out. This is a very important point. If you ex¬ 
pect to set out your perennials and then let them take care 
of themselves, you will save time and disappointment in 
the first place by setting out only the hardiest and toughest, 
those capable of surviving in the struggle for existence 
which they will have to make. Among these are most of 
the native species, especially those which may be native 
to your own locality, and other particularly robust sorts. 
m 
Beginning to 
bloom in June, 
anemone lasts 
well into Sep¬ 
tember 
April and May see 
the hardy candy¬ 
tuft in bloom 
Rudbeckia lightens up 
the garden in August 
and September 
Through July and Sep¬ 
tember you have the 
hollyhocks 
The 
A few of these are blood-root, trillium, 
acjuilegia, lily-of-the-valley, iris, peony, 
dictimus, yuccas, Cardinal flower, golden 
glow, and, for one of the least appreciated 
varieties of all considering the many beau¬ 
tiful varieties now available — the hardy 
asters and the native hardy lilies. If your 
flowers must be left to shift for them¬ 
selves, your nurseryman will be glad to 
suggest extra hardy sorts for the condi¬ 
tions your garden will have to meet. Such 
conditions should, however, always be 
taken into consideration. The plants that 
are most tenacious, like the lily-of-the-val¬ 
ley, for instance, under the conditions they 
require, may not prove dependable in an 
uncongenial environment. You should 
plan, however, to give your hardy plants, 
as well as your other plants, a reasonable 
amount of attention. 
With these matters settled, you will still 
have a wide field to choose from. So far 
the process has been one of elimina¬ 
tion. Now it will become one of selec¬ 
tion. In solving this problem, you 
should first of all consider your gen¬ 
eral garden scheme. You must picture, 
in your mind—if you do not want to 
take the trouble to do it on paper, al¬ 
though that is the better way—the 
prominent points, the high lights and 
shadows, so to speak, of the general 
plan or scheme of your place. Upon 
your ability to pre-visualize thus a 
planting effect will depend to a very 
great extent the efficiency of your 
efforts to make a beautiful place. 
Among the hardy perennials are to 
be found many of the most striking 
and effective things that can be used, 
and the hardy border itself, particu¬ 
larly on a small or medium-sized place, 
may be the dominant feature of the 
whole planting arrangement. 
Another thing which must be care- 
fully thought out at first is the arrangement of the plants 
n the mixed bed or border the 
taller should be kept in the back¬ 
ground, conflicting colors should be 
avoided, and harmonious colors 
planned, and such a distribution of 
species and varieties that no spot will 
look bare at any season of the year. 
For this reason, a number of different 
plants 
should 
without interspersing others which 
will come into bloom before or after 
them. 
From all this it becomes evident that 
about the last thing you do in plan¬ 
ning your garden of perennials is to 
select your plants. This may seem at 
first paradoxical. You would think 
an architect very strange, when 
(Continued on page 304) 
regard to each other. 
blooming at the same time 
not be placed in proximity 
pink of the Canterbury 
comes in June 
Bell 
