As thousands of homeowners have learned over the years, only a handful of plants are able to survive under salt water conditions, not only wind-blown sprays of ocean water, but seashore air containing good amounts of salt. It’s the sodium in ocean water that ultimately kills plants. Sodium kills plants, but some shrubs, trees and bedding plants planted along the seashore have survived for years in spite of annual exposure to salt water sprays and humidity.

Seashore plantings should be protected when there is heavy exposure to salt water. In late winter, for example, hose down or spray (using a hand-pump sprayer) water on the needles of conifers and evergreens to wash away salt deposits that have accumulated over the winter. Tree branches should also be hosed down to dilute salt deposits. On occasions when there is heavy surf and likelihood of salt deposits on plants, hose down plantings soon after.

Here is a thumbnail summary of plants that survive in seashore locations:

TREES: green ash . . . eastern red cedar . . . Kentucky coffeetree . . . regal elm . . . thornless honeylocust . . . Rocky Mountain juniper . . . cottonwood poplar . . . jack pine . . . black walnut.

SHRUBS: black and red chokeberry . . . cotoneaster . . . winged euonymus . . . common, creeping and Savin juniper . . . Japanese black pine and Swiss mountain pine . . . staghorn sumac.

BEDDING PLANTS: alyssum . . . heartleaf bergenia . . . California poppy . . . candytuft . . . coralbells . . . lanceleaf coreopsis . . . cornflower . . . Shasta daisy . . . daylily . . . dianthus . . . gaillardia . . . geum . . . geranium . . . iris . . . larkspur . . . lavender . . . nasturtium . . . phlox . . . pincushion flower . . . sedum . . . veronica.

ORNAMENTAL GRASSES: cattail . . . prairie dropseed . . . maiden grass . . . switch grass . . . northern sea oats . . . big blue stem.