48 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. {1 Jan., 1902: 
Horticulture | 
COTTAGE GARDENING—(conrrnuep). 
By W. SOUTTER. | 
Continuing from page 484 of the Journal, I promised to say a word about 
horticulture in the West and North. As before stated, plants that flourish on 
the coast are not a success in the wild West. There are, however, away in the: 
back blocks, hearts that desire the influence of flowers and the presence of 
green verdure ; and although the successful growth of many of our gorgeous 
flowers of the Pacific slope cannot be expected, still there are quite a number: 
of the more humble sorts that are quite companionable, and lend a charm to the 
squatter’s home. cas 
How few of our inland towns can boast of a garden, even of the smallest 
dimensions. The only attempt at gardening is made by the Mongolian, who, as 
all are aware, is not given to the artistic phase of the question I have never: 
yet seen John guilty of planting an ornamental tree or an ornamental flower—he 
is painfully practical, and aims for an article he can turn into cash. No one can 
blame poor old John for this. But round the home of the hardy pioneer of the West 
many of the favourites of the flower garden can be and should be grown. Many, 
of the failures in the past to form gardens out West has arisen from the follow~ 
ing cause: Mrs. Brown comes to town from the station out West to pay a round 
of visits to her friends. She notices in their gardens such plants as the 
Bougainvillea, Allamanda, Acalypha, and other handsome flowering and foliage 
plants. She straight off makes up her mind that she must plant the same in 
her garden away out on the Warrego, Thompson, or liamantina. Needless 
to say, the plants die, and so does her desire for future efforts in the same 
direction. The same result follows her tree-planting, and Mrs. B. comes to the 
conclusion that gardening, as far as she is concerned, is a dead failure; and 
the garden plot is once more relegated to the goat and such weeds as locally 
flourish. This state of matters I can verify, as they have come under my own 
observation several times. 
There can be no hard-and-fast lines laid down as regards the kind of trees. 
which may suit every corner of the inland area of this State, as elevation, 
depression, geological formation, and temperature conditions differ in every 
few miles of country ; but there is always some botanical feature which may 
act as a finger-post to guide the would-be planter even in the far West—in 
brigalow and myall country. Such trees as the acacia, bottle-tree, cypress, 
pepper-tree, plane, oak, poplar, and conifer will succeed; and many of our 
native trees might be planted, as Moreton Bay ash, bloodwood, ironbark, 
grey gum, casuarina, &c.; and here just let me digress for amoment to say that, 
instead of looking around for trees of other countries and climates, if we only 
systematically took in hand the intelligent planting and pruning of our native 
Australian trees, the results would not only be satisfactory from a growth 
standpoint, but the effect from a scenic point of view would be equall 
pleasant ; but the first thing a man does when he buys a piece of land is to kill 
every tree within the confines of his boundary, and then 5 to exercise all his 
energy to get trees to grow again, and before he can rear a tree big enough to: 
afford him shade while he eats his lunch he is across the Styx. Wherever the 
foregoing trees will flourish, the following shrubs and flowers should grow :— 
Ligustrum, Keeria japonica. Spirea, Arbutus canariensis and A. Unedo, 
Buddlea paniculata, Denizia crenata, D. scabra, Dombeyn floribunda, Escalonia 
monteridensis, Gardenea globosa, Hibiscus syriacus, Jasminum fruticans, Laurus 
nobilis, Nandina domestica, Neriumalbum, Phormium tenax, Photinia serrutata, 
