AUTHOR’S NOTE
Naturally, the children’s welfare was the compelling reason for moving our family out of New York and into Connecticut. But we can’t deny that we also had visions of more expansive gardening. So we set out to find an old (meaning dilapidated—not antique), spacious, window-rich house with acres of neglected land where we could indulge our yen for flower borders with delphiniums by the dozens, sweeping green expanses of lawn, even obese bullfrogs on lily pads in a modest lake.
These naïve notions were quickly canceled by the orbital prices of Connecticut real estate. In order to achieve our principal purpose, we had to make concessions to the second. The house we settled for is small; its windows are few and runty; and it has less than an acre of cultivatable land. It is one hundred feet at its widest, nearly six hundred feet long, and less than a hundred feet level in any one expanse. In other words, we got split-level land instead of a split-level house. But it is charming. Neighbors with great expanses of gardens and lawns actually envy us for our “natural setting.”
Actually, my favorite landscape architect, who happens to be my husband, Bob, would be lost if given a perfectly flat piece of land of equal length and width. He would have no contours to follow and would probably go fishing. As it is, both of us have plenty of challenges and the fun of running up and down ridges in our plantings. The acreage is ample for two persons who have little more than so-called “spare” time.
From this quick summation of facts, it is obvious why we gave up our grandiose ideas of immense perennial beds, a half-acre vegetable plot, naturalized bulbs by the thousands. Instead, we’ve learned how to tuck little gardens into odd corners; to compensate for limited space with intimate miniature perfection; to hunt for and find the small plants that are in sympathy and in scale with our small house and landscape. Cramped growing quarters indoors have even led us to collect miniature house plants. And when, some sweet day, we have our own personal greenhouse on the place, it’s bound to be in scale with the rest of it.
Fortunately, we are by no means a minority. More small homes than large are being built today, and on more small lots. Gardeners are intensifying their demands for small plants of all sorts; and hybridists and suppliers are working nobly at filling the need. We now have four-inch ‘Wee Willie’ sweet William, tiny Twinkle Phlox, other dwarf annuals and perennials. Some nurseries are beginning to feature dwarf trees and shrubs. Florists and greenhouses are giving us minuscule house plants such as Sinningia pusilla and orchids with one-inch flowers. The charm and intimacy of the miniature is replacing the magnificence (and oppressive maintenance) of the massive.
There you have the beginning of this book and the reason why it contains many quite new projects. They would be illustrated as “before and after,” except that the “after” is yet to be written. Regardless of how long miniature gardening has been practiced, we feel the greatest developments are yet to come. Small houses and small plots of land force us to this conclusion.
Admittedly many of our personal opinions are based on experience and observations in Northeastern gardens. However, whenever possible we have included reliable information for other climates. You will, of course, make your own interpretations and adaptations. This a reader must always do, no matter where an author lives and gardens. And there is always your county agent to consult or your local garden-supply florist with whom to discuss your particular situation. Always an added pleasure.
PLANTS INCLUDED
As the author, I have used two criteria for including or omitting plants at the time of writing. I am concerned with those that are readily available from florists, nurseries, and the suppliers listed in the Appendix; and those that in my opinion are suitable for miniature gardens.
Except for the specific art of bonsai, I have not included plants that are unnaturally dwarfed by pruning or other means. I have omitted plants that look like miniatures when they are young, grow slowly, but eventually get out of miniature proportions if given time. I have not attempted to differentiate between miniatures and dwarfs, nor have I set up restrictive dimensions. Sizes vary with types of plants. A miniature orchid may be three inches high, a miniature shrub three feet or more.
PLANT NAMES
This book has been written by an amateur gardener for other amateurs; and I have made it as readable and enjoyable as I could. But in the interests of clarity and accuracy, Latin botanical names are used in preference to the vernacular. This is the only way to be sure plants are correctly identified. Popular names are confusing. Kenilworth ivy, grape ivy, and English ivy certainly sound as if they were related in some way; but when you use botanical names (Cymbalaria muralis, Cissus striata, and Hedera helix, you know they are not. By using the botanical names you are more likely to find the ivy you want in a reference book or catalogue.
For most plants, Hortus Second has been used as the authority for identification and spelling of names; but in the interests of readability, the double ii ending has been reduced to a single i. For a number of plants that have become available since Hortus was last revised (1941), I have referred to Exotica II, by A. B. Graf.
Unless a plant name is complete (genus plus species—plus variety, if any), it is neither capitalized nor italicized. (The caladium is a favorite foliage plant.) Complete botanical names are italicized, but only the generic name has an initial capital letter, even when the specific name has been derived from the proper name of some person or place. (The diminutive Caladium humboldti needs humidity.) When you see a plant name in italics, you will know that this is a recognized botanical species or one of its varieties, and not a man-made hybrid.
The names of recognized hybrids, seedlings, and mutations of either or both are not italicized, but are capitalized and enclosed in single quotation marks (caladium ‘Little Rascal’). Common or popular names are set in regular type with initial capital letters only for proper nouns, when they appear in text. In separate listings each word is capitalized.
BOTANICAL TERMS
In order to make a gardening book completely accurate and understandable, it is almost mandatory to use some so-called “scientific” terms which should really be as much a part of a gardener’s vocabulary as “annual” or “evergreen.” The following words are used in their technical sense:
Genus (plural, genera)—A group of plants related to each other by botanical characteristics. The name of the genus is like a human family’s surname, Smith, but it is written first instead of last. Oncidium is a genus of orchids.
Species (plural, species)—A plant that differs from others within a genus, usually occurring in a natural state and capable of reproducing itself in identical form. The name of a species is like a person’s first name, Alice, but is written last. Oncidium pusillum is one of several species in a genus of orchids.
Hybrid—Generally the result of fertilizing the flowers of one plant with the pollen of another; the resulting seedlings are hybrids.
Mutation or sport—A variation in any part of a plant that remains constant when that part is severed and propagated.
The word variety, however—although it has a strict botanical application—has been used more loosely and may often be defined here simply as “variation.”