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April Î5, 1950
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A well landscaped farm home in Lewis and Clark county«
For Beauty and Utility
efore You Plant
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By LEONARD A . YAGER f Assistant Extension Horticulturalist
LANDSCAPING of our farm home
grounds can be useful as well as beautiful.
Properly placed hedges or windbreaks
can hold snow off our drives; large trees
provide much needed shade around the
farm house and in other areas of our prop
erty. Our plantings around the home can
also make outdoor living more enjoyable
and pleasant during the summer months.
Common Errors
Some of the common mistakes in plant
ings often seen are these:
Plantings, such as flower beds, rock gar
dens or specimen shrubs, that are scattered
all through the yard area, making lawn
mowing a complicated task.
Overuse of certain plant materials, such
as too many trees, overcrowding of shrubs
or too many artificial garden ornaments.
Landscaping too large an area, making
• upkeep difficult.
Lack of relation between various plant
elements—flowers, shrubs, trees, vines. A
well designed place has all of these ele
ments related to one another and each a
part of the whole design.
Changing, Growing Pictures
Landscape designing is an art much like
painting pictures or composing music, and
all of these arts have things in common.
Unlike the painted picture, the landscape
picture that we create is ever changing
with the season and the passing years.
To produce good design one must be thor
oughly acquainted with plant materials,
RS MONTANA AND NORTHERN WYOMING
their availability
and adaptability.
The designer must
also have an artis- ,
tic sense to ar
range plants in
pleasing designs,
keeping in mind
seasonal changes
and the fact that
many of these ma
terials will be in
creasing in size as
they approach
maturity.
In the eastern
part of Montana
and in much of
Wyoming one of
the essential needs
before a landscap
ing program is be
gun is a well
planned shelter
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This attractive area in a Ravalli county farm home yard was developed by me
daughter of the family as a 4-H project, For a before and after view and the
story see page 38.
belt. In fact, as it
develops it should be considered as part of
the landscape picture on the farm. In a
sense, it will form the framework or back
ground.
The shelterbelt will consist of an outside
shrub row with several inner rows of taller
trees. In some instances the planter may
wish to plant the very inner row with an
evergreen to increase the protection during
the winter and add year round beauty to
the planting.
It is desirable to establish this shelterbelt
before much of the landscaping is done, a* .
it will be an important factor in the protec
tion of the landscape plants that are put
in later. In fact with good shelterbelt plant
ing one may be able to grow more tender
shrubs and plants than he could without
this protection.
Size of Area
The size of the area to be landscaped de
pends on various factors. One of the im
p or fant considerations is the amount of
time the farm family will be able to spend
in taking care of the grounds. This in turn
depends on the equipment available for
maintenance of the grounds. A larger farm
home looks better on more expansive
grounds than the smaller one.
One of the mistakes often seen is the
farm home built too close to the main road.
There are obvious advantages for keeping
it at reasonable distance from the road be
cause of dust, noise, etc. But a good sweep
of lawn in front of a farm home also pro
vides a beautiful setting for that home al
though there may be more grass to mow.
Distances from 60 to 100 feet from the -road
are considered desirable.
Of course, if the home is already built
too close to the road, there is little one can
do about changing things.
Three Areas
Three areas should be considered in plan
ning the yard immediately about the farm
home. Briefly, these are called the public,
private and service areas.
Normally the area immediately in front
of the farm house is considered the public
area. Usually this area gives a view of the
farm home from a public road. It is land
scaped in such a manner that it forms a
picture as seen by those who pass on the
road. It should be landscaped with the
farm dwelling as the center of interest.
The service area includes the drive or
approach to the house, the clothes line and
drying yard, etc.
The private area is being considered
more and more by farm people. It is land
scaped in a manner to enclose it with
shrubs and trees. (Please turn to cage 4.)