How To Make A Flower Garden | by Wilhelm Miller
A manual of practical information and suggestions illustrated.
| Title | How To Make A Flower Garden |
| Author | Wilhelm Miller |
| Publisher | Doubleday, Page & Company |
| Year | 1903 |
| Copyright | 1903, Doubleday, Page & Company |
| Amazon | The Well-Tended Perennial Garden: Planting and Pruning Techniques |
An old-fashioned border of hardy perennials.
Introduction. The Spirit Of The Home Garden- Simple Desires, with every Desire well planned and well carried out, result in the best gardens. The garden must be pours; if it is another's it is not worth the while to you, a good garden is the one...
- The Spirit Of The Home Garden. Continued
- There should be no fence unless there is a reason for it. Some persons seem to want fences just for the purpose of having them. Of themselves, open fences are rarely ornamental or desirable. They are ...
- Chapter I. Annuals. I. The Best Kinds And How To Grow Them
- ANNUAL plants are those that you must sow every year. From seed to seed is only a year or less. Annual plants probably comprise half the flowering plants of the world. They quickly take advantage of t...
- Annuals. The Best Kinds And How To Grow Them. Continued
- Watering is an exacting labor, and yet half of it is usually unnecessary. The reasons why it is unnecessary are two: the soil is so shallowly prepared that the roots do not strike deep enough; we wast...
- How To Get Early Flowers
- Several years ago I found myself too much of an invalid to be out in the garden sowing seeds, and with no one at my service who, in my opinion, could be trusted to do it for me. A summer without flowe...
- Chapter II. Perennials. I. Some Lessons From The Pan-American Exposition
- A HERB is a plant that dies to the ground in winter, and a border is a strip of planting skirting the boundaries of a place or lying along the walks or drives. We grow herbs because we like them. We m...
- II. How To Make A Border
- Plant thickly enough to form eventually a mass of foliage sufficiently dense to completely hide the ground. Scattered plants about a newly raked bed may look neat, but so would perfect rows of painted...
- III. Hardy Perennials From Seed
- Two years ago, in the spring, I had a plot of ground running parallel with a fence plowed for a hardy border. It was dressed with barnyard manure, and harrowed and worked occasionally, so that last su...
- IV. Our Hardy Flowers
- Roses, lilies, daffydowndillies, and all the rest of the loved company of old-fashioned flowers, we count as our very good friends. Distinguished friends, too, are these of the hardy border, tracing t...
- IV. Our Hardy Flowers. Continued
- They make the north side of the barn sunny with generous yellow bloom, and they add much to the background of the border. That they add too much is all that lessens our gratitude. The strenuous life i...
- V. Scattered Planting Vs. Masses
- The first of the accompanying illustrations shows one of the fundamental conceptions in landscape gardening, namely, mass planting as opposed to the indiscriminate scattering of individual plants. In ...
- Chapter III. Shrubs And Shrubbery. I. Shrubs And Where To Put Them
- THE growth of the appreciation of shrubbery is one of the significant notes of the time. Every one likes trees and is willing to plant them, but the regard for shrubs seems to be a later development. ...
- Shrubs And Where To Put Them. Continued
- This is one of the things that parks are for - to afford information to the intending planter, as well as to be things of beauty in themselves. My own predilections are for the native shrubs - for ...
- II. How To Prune Shrubs
- We prune shrubs to regulate their growth and make them graceful, pretty bushes, to accentuate their natural character, to invigorate weak growth or check overluxuriance, or to increase the profusion o...
- III. Home Propagation Of Shrubbery
- Quite a number of years ago my father bought from an agent a Hydrangea paniculata grandiflora, one of the finest of flowering shrubs. We did not know very much about shrubs at that time, but we liked ...
- Chapter IV. Trees For The Home Grounds. I. Flowering And Ornamental Trees
- N0 BOOK on floriculture can be complete without a chapter on trees. Some of the showiest flowers are borne on small trees which are suitable for gardens of moderate size. The foliage of trees and shru...
- Flowering And Ornamental Trees. Continued
- If the soil is light or sandy, a stream of water from a garden hose will sometimes be useful in settling and packing it. It is also usually well to cut off say two-thirds of the last year's growth of ...
- II. Some Weeping Trees
- While weeping trees have their proper place in arboriculture, they never possess the stateliness and grandeur of their upright progenitors. Being abnormal forms, we do not look for such attributes, an...
- Chapter V. Vines And Creepers. I. Select List Of Vines
- THERE are so many kinds of vines excellent in foliage, flower, and berry, and so many effective ways of growing them, that one is often at a loss what to choose and how to proceed. My first choice for...
- II. A Convenient Classification Of Vines
- What vines shall we grow? This will depend chiefly on location and aspect, but to a considerable extent also on the character of the object to be covered, whether of brick, stone or wood. Vines may be...
- III. Some Pumpkins
- Having experienced in former years the advantage of training pumpkins on poles and trees, I determined last spring to build a trellis over the kitchen door, on the south side of the house, for shade, ...
- IV. Annual Vines To Conceal Rubbish
- There is nothing that will improve a place more than having the garbage, ashes and trash out of sight, especially if the place be small and in the suburbs. When we moved just out of New York City, ear...
- V. Pergolas - A Suggestion
- The word pergola is in common use to-day, yet you will not find it in the International Dictionary, unless in some very recent edition. A pergola might be defined as a sort of glorified grape arbour...
- VI. A Bit Of Nature's Gardening
- The picture below shows an old, long-abandoned flour-mill in the beautiful valley of St. Helena, Napa County, California. At certain times of the year the mill is almost covered by vines. This is a fa...
- Chapter VI. Native Ferns For Shady Places
- SIDE yards that revel in sunshine are few and far between on many city streets, and as a natural consequence flowering plants in shady corners often turn out to be miserable failures. Nevertheless, th...
- Chapter VII. Bulbs. I. Hardy Bulbs For Fall Planting
- THE time to prepare for the spirng feast of flowers is in the fall. Too often people forget all about it until they see the tulips in the parks or in their neighbours' gardens, and then they hie to th...
- Hardy Bulbs For Fall Planting. Part 2
- Bulbs may be introduced with effect along the confines of grounds and in out-of-the-way places, just on the borderland of the cultivated and the uncultivated, in the shade of trees, along winding path...
- Hardy Bulbs For Fall Planting. Part 3
- The jonquils, being much smaller bulbs than the general variety of daffodils, should be planted only two inches under the surface. The foliage should be allowed to ripen thoroughly before being remove...
- II. Practical Directions For Bulb Culture
- Canning fall bulbs are so called because they are received and planted in the fall of the year; also in contradistinction to summer bulbs, which are planted in spring. They are nearly all imported fro...
- Chapter VIII. The Water Garden And The Mosquito Problem
- SOME years ago, in a low-lying meadow near my house, in Belmont, Massachusetts, I made an artificial pond in which to grow water-lilies - a modest affair seventy feet in length, and varying in width f...
- Chapter IX. Water-Lilies And Other Aquatic Plants
- ANY one who is planning to grow water-lilies will do well to study the conditions under which they thrive in nature. Water-lilies do not grow in every pond; they flourish only in places that are expos...
- Water-Lilies And Other Aquatic Plants. Part 2
- Before anything is done in the way of construction, the water-supply must be assured, especially if there is danger of prolonged drought. Provision must also be made against a freshet after heavy rain...
- Water-Lilies And Other Aquatic Plants. Part 3
- As tub plants the tender nymphæas are disappointing, because they are such rampant growers and feeders that, when confined to the limits of an ordinary tub or half-barrel, they are soon starved almost...
- Chapter X. Rock Gardens And Alpine Plants
- SOME of the most exquisite gems in the vegetable kingdom grow above the tree-line on mountains. These alpine plants are of low and compact growth, herbaceous or succulent in character, and produce flo...
- Rock Gardens And Alpine Plants. Continued
- Spring-blooming bulbs may be planted in masses among the plants, such as narcissus, scillas, snowdrops, chionodoxas, grape hyacinths, and crocuses. These blossom early and do not interfere with the re...
- Chapter XI. The Home Window Garden
- WE HAVE had only three years' experience in window gardening, and have made no special study of the subject. When my husband and I first became interested, we found great difficulty in getting advice ...
- The Home Window Garden. Continued
- And this was the order and duration of their bloom: Giant and Paper White narcissi, December 10th, for four weeks; white hyacinths, December 20th, for three weeks; cyclamen, January 1st to May 15th; f...
- Chapter XII. Coldframes For Wintering Plants. I. Coldframes For The Country Home
- ABOUT coldframes I have always had varying opinions, sometimes considering seriously the arrangement of all borders so that they could be covered, and then again loathing the sight of sash. It is not ...
- II. An Amateur's Experience
- Coldprames are not sufficiently appreciated by the general horticultural public. Under proper management so much can be done with them to lengthen the outdoor season of flowers and vegetables, in both...
- III. Advice Of A Market Gardener
- A necessary adjunct to the flower and vegetable garden is a coldframe. In it the early plantings of cabbage, cauliflower and lettuce (raised from seed sown in the fall) are kept over during the winter...
- IV. Inexpensive Pits For The South
- We who live in the southern or south central States can keep our pets through the winter months with much less trouble and expense than our northern neighbours. Pits are inexpensive, and in this latit...
- V. Violets In Coldframes
- One is often told that it is not practical to raise violets in New England in coldframes, but from experience I can affirm the contrary. I bought six ready-made coldframes, and they are so well made a...
- VI. Pansies, Forget-Me-Nots, And Wallflowers
- From a coldframe may be had violets, wallflowers, forget-me-nots and pansies in March, hepaticas and trailing arbutus in April, together with wood-violets, wood-anemones, and the many other wild flo...
- Chapter XIII. Hotbeds For Early Flowers. I. How To Manage Hotbeds
- HOTBEDS are most excellent things for those who appreciate early vegetables. They are also useful for flowers, especially tender annuals, and enable the horticulturist, whether amateur or commercial, ...
- II. How To Make A Hotbed
- Choose a sunny position protected from the prevailing spring winds by a fence, building, or hedge, where the surface drainage will be away from the site of the hotbed. Have the lower side face south, ...
- Chapter XIV. The Pleasures Of A Small Greenhouse. I. The Greenhouse In The Snow
- IT IS in the dead of winter that the greenhouse is at its best, for then is the contrast of life and death the greatest. Just beyond the living tender leaf - separated only by the slender film of the ...
- II. The Fun Of Having A Greenhouse
- A physician who takes time for a greenhouse gives some useful warnings. To any lover of the garden the frost brings a feeling that the world in which he lives has lost half its beauty for him, and ...
- III. Grow The Easy Things
- Advice of a Canadian amateur who owns a fifteen-by-twenty greenhouse costing one hundred dollars. I have a small garden in which I grow many flowers and vegetables. Some years ago I decided to buil...
- IV. A Suburban Experience
- An amateur can readily dispense with most tools rather than with a greenhouse. If his taste for growing things is catholic, it becomes a necessity; and if he collects only so-called hardy*' plants, i...
- V. A Rose-Fancier's Hobby
- Eight hundred roses per season in a house ten and one-half by fifteen and one-half feet. My little greenhouse is built directly from, and includes a part of, the piazza on the south side of the hou...
- VI. A General Collection Of Plants
- A nine by twelve-foot house containing something besides the easiest things. Few things have given me greater pleasure than my little greenhouse, though it is but nine by twelve feet in size - ju...
- VII. A Greenhouse Near Cincinnat
- My greenhouse is built on the east side of the house, and is connected with the dining-room by two doors, which were formerly windows. A window from the kitchen also looks into it. Altogether, it is t...
- VIII. The Cost Of A Greenhouse
- A case where it paid to add a conservatory to a rented house. A little more than a year ago, as we stood gazing out on our first garden, the thought of the chilly winds and frosts of winter sweepin...
- Chapter XV. How To Make A Formal Garden At A Moderate Cost
- IT is the small home grounds of villages that offer the most favourable opportunities for a marked advance in civic improvement and in the broadening of the home life, this to be brought about by ...
- How To Make A Formal Garden At A Moderate Cost. Continued
- Above all, avoid the curious and the grotesque unless you are ready frankly to accept the idea that the garden is to be a museum - a place for the display of freaks. When you do this, do not inflict i...
- Chapter XVI. Japanese Gardening For Small Areas. I. A Japanese Garden In An American Yard
- BORN and brought up in Japan, my natural playground was the Japanese garden. I was happy when I drowsed away a hot afternoon under a distorted pine, on the shady side of a child mountain, with a book ...
- II. The Japanese Garden In Golden Gate Park
- There is probably no scheme of gardening which offers greater possibilities for diversified arrangement within a limited space than that followed by the Japanese. It is essentially landscape gardening...
- The Japanese Garden In Golden Gate Park. Continued
- A friend with whom we drank tea in the San Francisco garden has written this: I have a Japanese garden growing in my mind. Some day the painted wooden steps leading up past the side of the house into...
- Chapter XVII. Wild Gardens. I. Wild Gardening In A Small Area
- I CANNOT remember ever to have seen the gentle art of wild gardening numbered among the kingly sports, yet of them all there is perhaps none more worthy of the name. When we read in Mr. Robinson's ent...
- Wild Gardening In A Small Area. Part 2
- The flowers were found in a distant field, where they grew in great irregular masses, like a lake of lavender in a sea of green. With great labour I brought a quantity of the roots home. All about the...
- Wild Gardening In A Small Area. Part 3
- In the wet ground were planted the early spring cress, the painted cup, and a little later on the pitcher plant, the purple-fringed orchis, and a dozen or more specimens of the pogonia and the calopog...
- II. California Wild Flowers For American Gardens
- The beauty of many of our California wild flowers and their suitability for garden culture are not as well recognised by the horticulturist and garden-lovers of our own country as by those of other la...
- Chapter XVIII. Roses. I. Where Shall We Plant Roses?
- THAT depends on what you want them for. If you want them primarily for fine flowers, plant them in an area by themselves, where they can have good care. Roses are highly bred plants. They cannot shift...
- II. The Modern Tendency In Roses
- Notwithstanding the nominal position that the rose has held, from time immemorial, as the queen of flowers,' it is not to be gainsaid that the rose as a garden plant has been relegated of late years ...
- III. Outdoor Roses For The South
- Out of the hundreds of roses described in floral catalogues, it is sometimes exceedingly difficult to select such varieties as are best suited for open-ground growing in the South. The trouble is that...
- IV. Hardy Roses Near Chicago
- The vicinity of Chicago, especially that of the bluff lands to the north and lying close to the lake, is not an ideal home for roses, but with a proper selection of varieties and a suitable winter pro...
- V. Pruning Roses
- In Bailey's Cyclopedia of American Horticulture some fifty species of roses are enumerated as common in cultivation. From these species innumerable varieties have sprung. It seems impossible, in a g...
- VI. A Rose Bank
- Concealing an unsightly bank by transforming it into a rose garden accomplishes several desirable objects. It makes the waste places to blossom as the rose, and also affords the plants abundant ligh...
- Chapter XIX. How I Built My Country Home. A Concrete Example Of Landscape Gardening
- I AM garden-bred, for in the early fifties my father's garden was one of the show-places in Chicago; but I have no recollection of a fondness for gardening during my youth. A strenuous business life o...
- How I Built My Country Home. A Concrete Example Of Landscape Gardening. Continued
- In my later plantings I had combined the hardy perennials with the shrubs, planting the former in masses, and not repeating the same perennial at any one point of view. Each shrubbery bed is so plante...
- Flowers For Special Purposes
- Suggestive lists based upon the colour and season of bloom; the height of the plant; the kind of soil, whether light or heavy, moist or dry; the conditions of shade or sunshine; resistance to frost, a...
- Annuals (See Chapter 1)
- Ten of the most popular annuals: Balsam, Impatiens Balsamina. China Aster, Callistephus hortensis. Marigold, Tagetes spp. Mignonette, Reseda spp. Morning-glory, I poma purpurea. Nasturtium, Trop...
- Perennials (See Chapter II)
- Ten of the most popular perennials: Anemone spp. Columbine, Aquilegia spp. Coneflower, Rudbeckia spp. Hollyhock, Althaa rosea. Most popular perennials - Continued Iris spp. Larkspur, Delphinium ...
- Shrubs (See Chapter III)
- Ten of the most popular shrubs: Barberry, Berberis vulgaris. Currant, Golden, Ribes aureum. Deuizia gracilis. Hydrangea paniculata grandiflora. Lilac, Syringa vulgaris. Rhododendron Catawbiense. Sn...
- Trees (See Chapter IV)
- Ten of the most popular trees: Bass wood, Cilia Americana. Button wood, Platanus occidentalis. Most popular trees - Continued Chestnut, Castanea Americana. Elm, American, Ulmus Americana. Horse-che...
- Vines (See Chapter V)
- Ten of the most popular vines: Actinidia arguta. Boston Ivy, Ampelopsis tricuspidata. Clematis spp. Most popular vines - Continued Cobaa scandens. Dutchman's Pipe, Aristolochia macrophylla. H...
- Ferns (See Chapter VI)
- Six of the most popular hardy ferns: Christmas Fern, Polystichum acrostichoides. Eagle Fern, Pteris aquilina. Maidenhair, Adiantum pedatum. Ostrich Fern, Matteuccia Struthiopteris. Polypody, Poly p...
- Bulbs (See Chapter VII)
- Ten of the most popular hardy bulbs: Crocus spp. Daffodil, Narcissus Pseudo-Narcissus. Gladiolus spp. Hyacinth, Hyacinthus spp. Jonquil, Narcissus Jonquilla. Lily, Lilium spp. Narcissus, Poet's,...
- Aquatic And Bog Plants (See Chapters VIII And IX)
- Ten of the most popular aquatics (excluding water-lilies): Arrowhead, Sagittaria spp. Arum, Water, Calla spp. Cardinal Flower, Lobelia cardinalis. Flag, Blue, Iris spp. Floating-heart, Limnanthemum...
- Alpine Plants And Rock Gardens (See Chapter X)
- Ten of the most popular rock plants: Baby's Breath, Gypsophila re pens. Bluebells, Campanula rotundifolia. Columbine, Common, Aquilegia Canadensis. Daphne Cneorum. Foxglove, Digitalis purpurea. Gas-pl...
- Window-Garden Plants (See Chapter XI)
- Ten of the most popular window-garden plants: Abutilon spp. Begonia spp. Calla, Richardia A fricana. Cyclamen Persicum. Fuchsia spp. Geranium, Pelargonium spp. Heliotrope, Heliotropium spp. Oxal...
- Greenhouse Plants (See Chapter XII)
- Ten flowering greenhouse plants: Azalea Inaica. Bouvardia spp. Cereus grancRflorus. Erica spp. Hibiscus, Chinese, Hibiscus Rosa-Sinensis. Hydrangea hortensis. Ipomæa Horsfallia. Olive, Fragrant,...
- Plants For Formal Gardening (See Chapter XV)
- Ten bedding plants for subtropical effects: Acalypna marginata. Arundo Donax. Canna spp. Castor-bean, Ricinus communis. Croton (Codium) spp. Elephant's Ear, Colocasia antiquorum. Grewllea rob...
- Plants From Japan (See Chapter XVI)
- Comparatively few people can afford a Japanese garden, but no one need deprive himself of a Japanese corner or Japanese border in which the most interesting plants of Japan may be grown by thems...
- Wild Gardens (See Chapter XVII)
- Six choice wild flowers and ferns: These plants should not be taken from the wild even for garden purposes. If ordered from dealers, be sure they are nursery-grown, not collected. All native orchid...
- How To Grow Flowers
- Brief directions for cultivating one hundred and fifty of the commonest and most desirable flowers, mostly annuals and perennials. Abutilon See Flowering Maple. Winter Aconite Plant the bu...
- How To Grow Flowers. Part 2
- Begonia (Shrubby Or Fibrous-Rooted Kinds) Easily grown from cuttings of firm green wood, which, when rooted, may be planted in ordinary potting soil. Frequent changes of pots and additions of f...
- How To Grow Flowers. Part 3
- Chrysanthemum (C. Coronarium) Sow the seed in a hotbed in early spring, and when a few inches tall transplant, about twelve inches apart in ordinary soil. A later sowing may be made where the plant...
- How To Grow Flowers. Part 4
- Virginia Cowslip See Bluebells. Crambb (C. Cordifolia) Sow seeds in ordinary soil where the plants are to remain or in a separate bed from which to be transplanted. Allow three or more fe...
- How To Grow Flowers. Part 5
- Fairy Lily See Zephyranthes. Flag See Iris. Flameflower (Kniphofia Or Tritotna) Plant roots in spring in warm, well-drained soil protected from the wind. Allow two feet or more between ...
- How To Grow Flowers. Part 6
- Globeflower (Trollius) Sow in a mild hotbed or greenhouse in early spring; transplant to small pots or flats when about two inches tall, and when the weather becomes settled set in ordinary garden ...
- How To Grow Flowers. Part 7
- Star Hyacinth See Aconite, Winter. Summer Hyacinth (Galtonia) In spring plant the bulbs four or more inches deep in rich, moist, but well-drained soil. In the North dig the bulbs after the to...
- How To Grow Flowers. Part 8
- Meadow Saffron See Colchicum. Mentzblia See Poppy, Mexican. Mertensia See Bluebells. Mesembryanthemum See Iceplant. Mignonette (Reseda) Sow seeds in a mild hotbed in early s...
- How To Grow Flowers. Part 9
- Peony Plant the crowns two inches deep in rich, moist garden soil, first having shaken off any old soil. When well established and well fed they should produce blossoms abundantly for a quarter of ...
- How To Grow Flowers. Part 10
- Prince's-Feather (Amarantus) Sow seeds in poor soil well exposed to the sun as soon as the ground becomes warm. Thin the seedlings to stand eighteen or more inches apart. Dwarf varieties should sta...
- How To Grow Flowers. Part 11
- Snowdrop (Galanthus) Plant the bulbs about three inches deep in any good soil, upon the lawn or in beds, in clumps or chains. They need not be removed from the beds for years. If desired to dig the...
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