Seaside Gardening Plants

The almost constant enemies of seaside gardening are wind, salt and sand. Frost, however, is neither so prolonged nor so severe on the coast as it is inland, and seaside gardeners have been able to grow many frost-tender plants in the milder climate of their coastal gardens.

Inland gardeners have little idea how powerful is the effect of coastal wind on the growth of plants, and because none or few trees or buildings present a barrier to soften its effect during windy conditions the wind sweeps continuously in from the sea. Wind stunts and it deforms—one has only to observe the fantastic shapes of trees close to the sea to realise this.

Salt can kill outright. It is carried in the spray, and when the wind catches it, it is often deposited many hundreds of yards inland. Few plants are able to withstand the continual battering of sea wind heavily charged with salt, which is heavily scorching to plants.

Sand-blast is often too lightly regarded by newcomers to the coast, though its effect can be quite as damaging as salt’s. Seashore gardens suffer badly from its searing effect when the wind picks up the sand from a nearby beach. Small seedlings are killed and adult foliage is bruised and blackened.

The only answer to the problem of wind, salt and sand is shelter, and it is not possible to create a worthwhile garden in extremely exposed positions on the coast without it, though where a garden has protection a very wide range of plants will thrive which would not succeed in frosty gardens inland. Many plants will grow only when given adequate shelter at the outset, and the planting of newly-made gardens exposed to the full ravages of gales off the sea is rarely successful without the aid of some artificial wind-screen.

Planting of