r places
_Kalmias_, _Andromedas_, _Rhododendrons_, _Ledums_, _Pernettyas_, and
_Vacciniums_, with the Candleberry Gale and the native Bog Myrtle, also
Broom and Gorse, especially the Double Gorse. These, which are usually
classed as peat shrubs, will succeed in any sandy soil with the addition
of leaf-mould, and are among the most interesting and beautiful of our
garden shrubs.

Those who garden on poor and dry soils should remember that though their
ground has drawbacks it has also some compensations. Such soils do not
dry in cracks and open fissures in hot weather, and do not present a
surface of soapy slides in wet; they can be worked at all times of the
year, except in hard frost; they are easy to hoe and keep clean of weeds
and are pleasant and easy to work. They correct the tendency of strong
soils to the making of a quantity of coarse rank growth, and they
encourage the production of a quantity of flowers of good colour.

CHAPTER VI

PRUNING FLOWERING TREES AND SHRUBS

The art of pruning properly is one that is acquired by considerable
practice and observation. The first is necessary that the actual work
may be well and cleanly done, and it is only by observing the manner and
times of flowering of the different trees and shrubs which go to
constitute a well-kept pleasure-ground that the proper time to prune can
be thoroughly understood. The manner of pruning varies considerably,
some pinning their faith to a slanting cut towards a bud; some
preferring a straight cut; while others again are content with simply
slashing off the useless wood in the quickest possible manner. The
former is the best method, as it does not present a surface for the
lodgment of water, an important point with those shrubs that are of a
pithy nature in the centre of the wood, as the presence of water will
quickly cause the stems to rot and render the plant unsightly, even if
it escapes serious injury. All stems that are an inch or more in
diameter should be tarred over to keep out the wet, which either rots
them directly or injures them indirectly by making a moist, congenial
home for the various fungoid diseases to which so many of our exotic
trees and shrubs are liable.

Many shrubs which have been in one place for some years, and which have
become stunted or poorly flowered, are often given a new lease of life
by a hard pruning in the winter, cutting away all the old wood entirely,
and shortening the remainder. With a good