I have only been studying the problem for the last five or six years, so that I am still decidedly an amateur, but I have kept a faithful record of the time of flowering of each variety I have grown in my garden and have discovered that the time of blooming does not vary more than five days for each plant no matter whether the season be wet or dry.  With this record at hand I can arrange each part of my garden with a view to the succession of bloom throughout the summer.  I can place plants with clashing colors side by side with the calm assurance that they will not clash because their periods of blooming do not overlap.  In this way I can completely change the color of certain parts of my garden during the summer if I so desire.

In studying combinations for the garden we must take into consideration the harmony and contrast of color, texture, form, height and the succession of bloom.  We must also see that plants requiring the same soil and the same care are put together.  In my garden I use both annuals and perennials but am limited in choice to those plants that are perfectly hardy, that will stand infinite neglect, drought, much wind, a stiff soil, that do not require especial protection in the winter, that will be in bloom all summer long and be beautiful.  This, as I have found, is a rather difficult task.

[Illustration:  Perennial border.  Edging of pinks and Shasta daisies, pink canterbury bells and Festiva Maxima peony.  Behind, pyrethrum, uliginosum and hollyhocks.  Blue flowering flax adds depth to the pink and white.]

There is a great diversity of opinion as to how to set out plants.  Some say, “Give each plant plenty of room; let it expand as much as it will.”  Others say, “Each six inches of ground should have its plant; set them so closely that no dirt will show between; in this way each individual plant will be finer than when set out singly and the leaves will form a shade for the ground.”  I have used the latter method, for, since we have no means of watering, the conservation of moisture is an important item.  The chief objection is that there is a constant danger of overcrowding, and it requires a frequent resetting of plants as they increase in size from year to year.

[Illustration:  Yellow iris against the blue of distant hills.]

I have a border on the north side of my garden that is six feet wide and about seventy feet long.  It is my aim to keep this in bloom all through the summer long.  There is a background of purple and white lilacs and cut-leaf spirea.  The first thing that comes in the spring is poet’s narcissus, then groups of Darwin tulips; both of these are naturalized and remain in the ground from year to year.  Next comes the perennial blue flax, a half dozen plants set at intervals down the border, that every morning from mid-April until August are a mass of blue.  Clumps of May-flowering iris and then June-flowering iris and four large peony plants make the border bright