The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1872-05-21
The Death Of tie Eyergreens.

The last winter has been fatal one z
the eyergreens. Ali along the Atlantic
coast above Virginia, and inland TO the
Rocky Mountains, there has been 0 sad
mortality among this fayorite and useful
sylvia. In our own immediate neighbor'
hood, trees which had wlthstood for year.
the summer heats and the winters cold
have OF last succumbed. The loss ID
dollars % great, but the worst OF the
feature Is the fact that those treee we have
90 much depended upon for shade and
shelter, for beauty aud security, have
failed Us. The Norway spruce, pines
arbor vita, and OF course the leSs hardy
rhododendrons, and even the transplanted
laurels Of our New England hills have
yielded To the intense cold and the blast.
Ing winds, and are for the great part no
more In our lawns and gardens. tits
said that Long Island has suffered severe,
", and that the loss amounts ID
hundreds Of thousands Of, dollars. we
have heard Of the utter destruction oil
hedges and standard trees in our own
State, and have had TO beWail the destruc.
ton Of some choice specimens Of our own
which we had supposed sufficiently pro.
tected for allpnrposes, Its hardly posi-.
BILE to account for the death Of some Of
these evergreens, and the immunity Of
others In the immediate vicinity. In Ger.
tain places the loss has been, SO to speak,
in spots, o tree here and 0 tree there, In
the Central Park, New York, and. Id
Prospect Park, Brooklyn, the disaster, has
been heavy II not irreparable. Wenotice
that the plants In Brooklyn, on the north
and east side Of the houses, have suffer.
cd most. Our rhododendrons and laurels
were set out on the north side Of the
house to protect them from the winters
sun, but they are all gone. In New Jer,
seY the plants thus shaded have partially
escaped. But our northeast and north.
west winds have been the bane Of their
lives. From Boston, from Rochester and
even from the valley Of the Ohio, the It'd.
ings come, "our evergreens are dead,p
1t Is said that the warm days In Febru.
airy gave the plants start, and then the
freezing March winds killed them. That
was not the case with US. The leaves Of
the rhododendTons and laurel wereindica-
tive OF death before February, although
the destruction was made complete later.
In TACT February lgaye no such start to
our plants as to endanger them, had they
been vigorous atthattfme. Another, and
we think substantially, the true view Is
that the plants were killed early In the
winter. II will be recollected that we
had early and continuous cold weather
last fall. The wood had not the ordinary
time to harden up, and when so cold !
winter supervened, II killed the vital force.
We noticed the gradual fading Of the
green ofthe leaf Of our eyergreens quite
early in the winter, and those who re.
member our THANKSGIVING day winds and
the low temperature which followed until
February will have no difficulty. in assign.
ing reason for this deplor66le disap.
pointment in the resisting power Of the
trees and plants, upon which we had built
80 many hopes. -. -
There Is another point which we have
not seen noticed. For o year or two our
most thrifty spruces had been split open
to a considerable degree by the cold.
They did not die, but they languished.
May It not be that those which were so
obviously affected, were yet injured in the
part and so unable towithstand the Sc.
verify Of last winter? At any rate we
have lost that confidence in some of the
most desirable trees and plants, which, in
our climate, was 80 great reliet and en-.
couragement.-f rortdenee journal.