ACCENT AND SPECIMEN TREES AND SHRUBS

There are two kinds of specimen plants, those which are used assingle specimens, with full space allowed for their normal development,and those which are used as accent plants in masses of border planting,because, as such, on account of their flowering and foliage habits, theylend a definite touch of interest to the plantation.

The various plants included in this group are those which havea normal symmetrical habit of growth, or those which can easily bekept in a neat, symmetrical outline. In order fully to understand thedifference between specimen trees and shrubs, and trees and shrubsfor border plantings in groups, the reader should first know that manyof our trees and shrubs are not adapted to so-called "mass plantings."Under the crowded condition of mass plantings these trees and shrubsdo not produce any of their interesting characteristics of flowers andgeneral outline. Much dead growth becomes evident on account of theexclusion of light and air necessary for their proper development. Itis necessary to examine but a few plantations further to know thatmany trees and shrubs most interesting when used as individualspecimens or as groups of two or three plants make a most uninterest-ing group when massed in quantity.