= Reginald_Farrer =

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= Reginald_Farrer =
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Introduction
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Reginald John Farrer (17 February 1880 - 17 October 1920), was a
traveller and plant collector. He published a number of books,
although is best known for 'My Rock Garden'. He travelled to Asia in
search of a variety of plants, many of which he brought back to
England and planted near his home village of Clapham, North Yorkshire.

Life
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Farrer was born in Marylebone, London into a well-to-do family who
resided in Clapham, North Yorkshire. Due to a speech defect and
numerous operations on a cleft palate, he was educated at home. He
developed a passionate and lifelong enthusiasm for high places and the
mountain plants that grow there. By 10 years of age he was a
well-qualified field botanist with a "fair knowledge of plant
anatomy." At 14 years he made his first rock garden in an abandoned
quarry.

He entered Balliol College, Oxford at 17 years of age and graduated
in 1902. During his time there he helped to make the rock garden at St
John's. In 1902 Farrer embarked on the first of his expeditions to
Eastern Asia, visiting China, Korea and, particularly Japan. He was
there for eight months and influenced by Japanese gardening tastes and
traditions, he developed his characteristically strong views on rock
garden design, 'where naturalism superseded formal artificiality, and
where alpine plants were to grow in surroundings which, though ordered
by man, copied as far as possible their original habitats'. These
travels resulted in 'The Garden of Asia' (1904).

Returning to England he attempted to become a novelist and poet. His
first book was well received, but later publications less so. In 1907
he published 'My Rock Garden', which was a very popular and
influential book and was kept continuously in print for more than 40
years. His next publications were 'Alpines and Bog Plants' (1908), 'In
a Yorkshire Garden' (1909) and 'Among the Hills' (1910). In 1913 he
published 'The Dolomites: King Laurin's Garden', which deals with
plant hunting in the Italian Dolomites. In 1913 he wrote 'The English
Rock-Garden: Volumes 1 and 2' (1918), which was very popular with at
least four impressions.

At this time Farrer travelled widely in the mountains of Italy, France
and Switzerland, walking and climbing with gardener friends, including
fellow plantsman E.A. Bowles. He also visited Ceylon in 1908, becoming
a Buddhist there. Later the same year appeared his book, 'In Old
Ceylon'.

Farrer was attracted by the horticultural possibilities of the
introduction of new hardy rock plants to the British gardening public.
With this in mind, he founded the Craven Nursery in Clapham, which
specialised in Asian alpines, an enterprise which foundered in the
economic crisis of the 1920s.

In 1914 Farrer and the Kew-trained William Purdom set out on an
ambitious expedition to Qinghai Tibet and the Province of Kansu
province of North-west China. He and Purdom found there numerous hardy
specimens that today enrich British gardens. Many bear his name,
though the list would have been longer if Farrer had not sometimes
neglected to collect, as well as plants and seeds, the herbarium
specimens necessary for classification and naming. These two years of
exploring and plant collecting are described in Farrer's 'On the Eaves
of the World' (2 vols) (1917), and in the posthumous 'The Rainbow
Bridge' (1921).

Farrer drew many illustrations, often painted in the most
uncomfortable of circumstances, which record, not an exact botanical
resemblance, but Farrer's emotional reaction to the plant and its
habitat. Many of these, and his landscape water-colours of Kansu and
Tibet, were exhibited by the Fine Art Society in 1918.

Farrer's diary conveys the practical difficulties he faced, and
provides a glimpse of his ebullient use of language: "June 2, 1919 ...
I sat down to paint it (the most marvellous and impressive
Rhododendron I've ever seen - a gigantic, excellent, with corrugated
leaves and great white trumpets stained with yellow inside - a thing
alone, by itself WELL worth all the journey up here and everything)
and oddly enough I did not enjoy doing so at first... a first false
start - a second, better, splashed and spoilt, then a mizzle, so that
umbrella had to be screamed for and held up with one hand while I
worked with the other. Then flies and torment and finally a wild dust
storm with rain and thunder came raging over so that everything had
feverishly to be hauled indoors and the Rhododendron fell over and all
the lights and lines etc. were of course quite out of gear. However,
I'd done as much as I could for the day by 5.30 but even then was so
excited that I continued strolling in glorious meditation till dark
and dinner. But one moral is - only paint when fresh or before the
day's toils; as it is I must trench on tomorrow which ought to be
wholly a rush of letters and articles for the next day's data that I
mean to send off. June 3, 1919. The rhododendron gave me such a bad
night... I set to however and satisfactorily finished it though it
took till after 12."

"Farrer's illustrations, together with the field notes, botanical
specimens and seeds which he collected, provided valuable information
to the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh, where the Regius Keeper, Sir
Isaac Bayley Balfour, took a special interest in Sino-Himalayan
plants. Farrer's interest in sending back attractive new plants with
horticultural potential, however, was sometimes at odds with Balfour's
desire for a comprehensive inventory of all the plants of the region.
Farrer's collecting trips are particularly interesting when viewed in
the context of the global plant exchanges which occurred during
British Imperial rule. During this time crops and other plants were
transplanted from then-native habitats to others throughout the Empire
for a variety of economic, medical and scientific reasons. At a
domestic level, too, while Farrer and other plant collectors
introduced new species to British gardens, sentimental colonists took
with them plants, and animals, which reminded them of home."

Farrer brought back plants from Asia that could be grown in a
naturalistic style - not just by the rich who could afford expensive
hothouses and personal gardeners. In the words of Farrer's biographer,
Nicola Shulman, "He brought rock-gardening into the hearts of the
British people."

Farrer himself wrote:

You're on an uncharted mountainside and you have to first of all find
the Plant in the summer on the way up the mountain. Then in the
autumn, you have to find the same plant - if it hasn't been eaten or
trodden on - hope it's set seed and that the seeds haven't fallen yet
- and this is just the start.

Farrer was known as an eccentric and in one famous incident, Farrer
loaded a shotgun with seeds collected on his foreign travels, and
fired them into an inaccessible rock cliff and gorge near the family
home in Yorkshire. They did not root, however.

He was a devotee of the novels of Jane Austen and wrote for July 1917
issue of 'The Quarterly Review' an article in celebration of the
centenary of her birth.

Death
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Farrer's final voyage was to the mountains of Upper Burma. He took as
his companion the mill-owner Euan Hillhouse Methven Cox, who recorded
the trip in 'Farrer's Last Journey, Upper Burma 1919-20' (1926). This
expedition proved less horticulturally successful than Farrer's
earlier trip to Kansu, largely because the climate of the Burmese
mountains had less in common with British conditions than that of
Kansu.

Farrer died in 1920 at Nyitadi in the remote mountains on the
Burmese/Chinese frontier at the early age of 40. Cox states that he
died alone, but he was almost certainly accompanied by indigenous
plant collectors from China and Burma who had been working with him.
Cox also states that the probable cause of his death was diphtheria. A
few years later, however, one of the plant collectors who had worked
for Farrer during his last year told botanist Joseph Rock that he had
died from alcohol poisoning. He was buried at Konglu, Burma.

Legacy
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Farrer's lasting legacy is a spectacular display of plants from the
Himalayas, growing today in a wild display around Ingleborough.
Himalayan rhododendron, bamboo and other unusual plants such as
'Lonicera syringantha' and 'Rodgersia aesculifolia' can be seen among
Farrer's Ingleborough display while in Clapham village itself
'Viburnum farreri' and 'Potentilla fruticosa' flourish.

In 2015 Historic England commissioned a measured survey and analytical
assessment of the fabric, layout and history of Farrer's Clapham
garden to inform the future repair and management of the site.

According to comedian Stewart Lee, Reginald Farrer rhymes with the
phrase 'Knowledge is Power'.

Selected publications
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* 'The Garden of Asia' (1904)
* 'My Rock Garden' (1907)
*
* 'In Old Ceylon' (1908)
* 'Alpines and Bog Plants' (1908)
* 'In a Yorkshire Garden' (1909)
* 'Among the Hills' (1910)
* 'The Dolomites: King Laurin's Garden' (1913)
* 'On the Eaves of the World' (1917)
*
* 'The Rainbow Bridge' (1921)
* 'Mimpish Squinnies' (2007)
* Shulman, Nicola. 'A Rage for Rock Gardening'. Boston: David R.
Godine, 2004.

Plants named after Farrer
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A number of plants are named after Farrer, Cox's book 'The Plant
Introductions of Reginald Farrer', published in 1930 describes
Farrer's legacy of plants cultivated from seed collected by him.
* 'Allium farreri' Stearn
* 'Amitostigma farreri'
* 'Buddleja farreri'
* 'Bulbophyllum farreri'
* 'Codonopsis farreri'
* 'Cypripedium farreri'
* 'Gentiana farreri'
* 'Geranium farreri'
* 'Picea farreri'
* 'Rosa farreri'
* 'Viburnum farreri'

External links
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*
*
[http://www.rbge.org.uk/assets/files/science/Library%20-Archives/GB235RJF_ReginaldJFarrer.pdf
Catalogue of the Reginald J. Farrer Collection at the Royal Botanic
Garden Edinburgh ]
*
[https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-58780;jsessionid=60B547896CD941CA580168AC128339C1
Farrer, Reginald John (1880-1920)] at ODNB

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Original Article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reginald_Farrer