GARDENING NOTES

Ladies' Mirror, Volume 2, Issue 8, 1 February 1924, Page 49

GARDENING NOTES

Out of the Sun

could make a much longer list of sun-loving flowers than of shadeloving flowers; but there is, a considerable number of herbaceous plants which will- flower and thrive with only a moderate amount of sun, and even on borders looking south and south-east, provided they are not exposed to biting winds and are otherwise well treated. Except, in very damp, heavy soils or exceedingly exposed situations autumn planting is preferable to spring planting for most herbaceous perennials. For those who are quite unfamiliar with gardening' it may be necessary to explain that a perennial plant is one that lives on from year to year, and the herbaceous kinds of perennials are those whose foliage dies down in the winter. Bulbous and tuberous plants, although strictly herbaceous perennials, are generally treated in a category apart. Daffodils, cyclamen, hardy orchids, lilies, all belong to this category. Some of us who have shady gardens which are also dry have perhaps the most difficult of all problems in finding suitable plants, for nearly all shade-lovers are moisture-lovers too. The best we can do is to be generous with stable manure, with leaf mould and peat, and, of course, as much good, heavy loam as we can get to replace the dry, sandy soil. If our soil is very heavy and clayey it should be lightened with coarse sand, vegetable refuse of all sorts, and horse manure. The many beautiful varieties of perennial phlox will infinitely respond to partial shading. The blooms will be larger, and the colours more vivid, Ihe foliage, also, will be richer in colour, and the period of flowering longer. When dividing spring flowering plants such as the polyanthuses, primulas, and primrose, remember that though they will survive under bad or indifferent conditions, they repay consideration. Auriculas like half-shade the many-coloured Sieboldii primulas like shade and light, rich vegetable soil; there is a bewildering variety of Japanese tier-on-tier varieties, hybrids of Japonica and Bulleyana and Beesiana and Cockburniana, and many another glorious species. All these like very moist soil, and some even can do with their feet in water. There are several lovely blues in early spring to be found in the forget-me-nots, in the Omphalodes, and in the Pulmonaria, which can also be had a good pink. The Hydrangeas grown in partial shade will hardly be recognised as the same plant as the sad bluish-white mass of small, sun-bleached petals seen so often in gardens. If you are fortunate enough to possess bush, even a small cluster of bush, in a hollow where moisture collects, you have an ideal position for this plant. To see slender stems, five or six feet long, reaching up to the light against a background of punga fronds, crowned at the summit with a mass of exquisite blossoms, in deepest, blue, lavender, rose or pale pink, is a sight not easily forgotten, and you would never be content again with the usual method of placing. Many of the Japanese flowering fruit trees, too, are infinitely more delicate, and yet fuller in colour when grown in partial shade, so long as they have plenty of air round them. The blooms will be larger, and the petals more delicate, and the sun will not steal the colour so soon. One’s artistic sense, too, is feasted at the sight of pendulous rose blossoms against the cool greens of a foliage background. And so with many other favourites. Though all plants need sun and plenty of air space, yet do many appreciate partial shading from the fiercest rays of the summer sun—their beauty is enhanced, and their life prolonged by a screened sun.