Shrubs Ideas, Tips & Guides

As inextricable from mass festive wares as tinsel and paper hats, the poinsettia blazes red in most shops and homes during December. Being such an omnipresent sight makes it unappealing for many of us, but, thankfully – if the standard scarlet species makes you wince – there are less common forms available that are well worth buying to brighten the house this Christmas.

Witch Hazel '‘Amanon’ 'at Kalmthout Arboretum in Belgium

Fall Foliage Combinations Full of Texture There's no need for flowers when you can grow fall foliage combinations like these for stunning late-season borders! Make fall foliage the star of your border

There’s nothing quite like coming home to your own slice of paradise, such as a pocket of greenery in the backyard. But transforming a drab garden into an oasis is not everyone’s area of expertise and can be costly if it’s attempted without a little know-how.

We’re off to New Zealand today to visit Lynne Leslie’s garden. We’ve visited before (Lynne’s Garden in New Zealand), and it is always fun to see what she is growing.

When and How to Transplant Camellias

Evergreens keep their leaves all year round, so are a must in any garden. They’re particularly good choices in winter when their green foliage adds some much-needed interest and structure to a bare garden. Here, we share some of our favourite evergreens. There are options to suit any style of garden, as well as ideas for evergreen hedges. Our choices include recommendations from the Gardeners’ World team and familiar faces from across the gardening industry.

When you grow pearlbush, you are adding a flourish of rare beauty to your garden. With its brilliant white flowers, this shrubs makes a beautiful plant for a border or hedge. Common pearlbush (Exochorda racemosa) is known for its dazzling display of bright white flowers in early spring. These flowers blossom from pearl-shaped buds which gives this shrub its name.

Deciding to grow common privet (Ligustrum vulgare) is an easy choice if you need an easygoing standalone shrub or plant for hedging. Indeed, the common privet (also called European privet or wild privet) has long been a popular hedge plant. If you’re looking for the fastest growing shrubs, this one is really fast. It grows as wide as it is tall, and it is also fairly cold-hardy.

Q: Could you please recommend some species of trees and shrubs that can be used to make natural, home-made Christmas decorations? I love to decorate the house with ivy and holly from the garden, but I’d love some suggestions as to what else I might grow that can be used in the same way? AN, Monkstown, Dublin

From erosion control to weed suppression, ground covers play an important role in the garden. They benefit neighboring plants by shading the ground, which helps keep soil cool and reduces moisture loss to evaporation. Many ground covers provide nectar to pollinators and shelter ground-dwelling insects and vertebrates. From an aesthetic standpoint, ground covers lend gardens a finished look. They can be used to emphasize focal points or to soften transitions between garden elements. Evergreen ground covers provide these services all year long, while creating a bridge from one season to the next. Here are a few fabulous evergreen ground covers for the Southwest.

Green hawthorn (or Crataegus viridis as it is also known) is a slow-growing native tree, dense with dark-green leaves and small thorns. It is a popular choice if you are interested in defensive shrubs for landscaping and its growth habit makes it perfect for hedges and screens.

You may have noticed that the Rocky Mountain region—especially if you moved here from either coast or the South—is notably lacking in broadleaf evergreens. That is because these evergreens are more prone to burn from both winter sun and wind—as well as to suffer winter water loss—than deciduous woody plants or needled evergreens. As a result, gardeners in our region must select and site such woody plants more thoughtfully than gardeners in other regions. Of course, what we call “Rocky Mountain” is really more like two regions: one that reliably retains winter snow cover, and one that does not. The three broadleaf evergreen natives described here, however, do well in a variety of gardens and exposures.

Late fall and early winter can be a drab time in northeastern gardens. Most of the leaves have faded from the trees, and the perennial border is looking mushy and brown. What’s a gardener to do? Luckily, there are many plants that look great at this time of year. The following are a few trees and shrubs that might be lesser known but are worth adding to your garden for a late-season show.

How to Care for a Rosemary Christmas Tree

Trees With Red Leaves All Year offer a striking aesthetic to any garden, transforming ordinary landscapes into a colorful delight. They provide a stunning visual appeal, and these trees are also a testament to nature’s diversity and resilience.

My name is Tingshu Hu. I live in Dunstable, Massachusetts (Zone 5b), but I love plants for warmer regions, such as canna (Canna hybrids, Zones 8–11 or as tender bulbs), crape myrtle (Lagerstroemia, Zones 7–10), Cordyline ‘Red Sister’ (Zones 9–11), and lotus (Nelumbo nucifera, Zones 4–10). I started my cannas indoors and planted them outdoors after the last frost. They started to bloom in July 4 and ended by the first frost. This year the first frost came on Oct. 31, about a month later than normal, so the cannas’ flower stems grew very tall. Most of the pictures were taken on Oct. 27 and 28.

In this guide, we have hand-picked Flowers that Are Safe for Cats. These blooms promise beauty with peace of mind, helping you make a harmonious living space for your beloved pet.

As these seemingly harmless plants weave their way up tree trunks, they may slowly strangle and suffocate them, leading to a slow, unnoticed demise. This comprehensive guide will uncover the truth about the treacherous Vines that Kill Trees.

Today we’re off to Berwyn, Pennsylvania (Zone 6b), to visit Carol Verhake’s gorgeous garden. We’ve visited Carol’s garden before (Carefully Chosen Colors Bring a Garden Together), and it is always a beautiful and inspiring visit. Carol has a way of combining colors to make magical garden scenes.

Christmas and Poinsettias: History of the Christmas Flower

Autumn is often the most colourful season in the garden, and one of the longest as foliage tints and fruits develop over the course of many weeks. There are many trees and shrubs that are renowned for their autumn displays but it’s euonymus that really catch the eye, both for their unusual leaf colour and for their fascinating fruits. 

We’re in Westminster, Maryland, today to see how fall is treating Mary Spencer’s garden. Last time we visited Mary it was in the spring (Spring in Mary’s Garden), so it is fun to see how different the garden looks at the other end of the growing season.

Regular pruning of certain trees and shrubs can increase vigour, improve fruit or flower production, and ward off disease. But it can be difficult to remember the techniques required to do a good job, and it’s hard to know if you’re doing it right.

These hardy blooms, ranging from the frost-kissed whites and icy blues to the rich reds and purples, offer a stunning visual feast when most gardens are resting. Here are some stunning Flowers that Bloom in Late Fall and Winter!

Gardening for Wildlife: 21 of the Best Trees and Shrubs with Winter Berries

Landscaping Mistakes When Designing a Garden are the key elements you need to avoid. To help you out, we have listed the major ones with solutions!

Have you ever wondered what it means when a deer crosses your path? It’s not just a random encounter with a cute animal in the woods. In fact, many people believe that seeing a deer is a sign of something. But what does it signify? Is there a hidden meaning behind this meeting? Scroll down to uncover the truth!

While searching through our archive of episodes we discovered something: There are a few specific plants we just can’t stop talking about. As the years have progressed here at Let’s Argue About Plants, we find ourselves experimenting with more and more varieties, so we have something new to report back to you on. But frankly, there are a core of plants that we could talk about every episode because they are just that good. We try to mix it up, but these stars have made it into more than a couple recordings—and rightly so. With that, we decided not to fight nature and give these stars their spotlight. In today’s compilation episode you’ll hear about Carol and Danielle’s top four plants…again…but for good reason. They are selections that no garden should be without, in our humble opinions.

Last week, I found this pineapple guava fruit growing on a bush in Charleston. Pineapple guava is an incredibly tasty fruit from an evergreen shrub native to South America.

Wood sorrel (Oxalis acetosella) is a creeping woodland perennial in the Oxalidaceae family. It’s native to parts of Asia and most areas of Europe, including the UK. It’s used as an indicator of ancient woodland in southern and eastern England.

I had hoped to add a video to this end-of-month report on the garden, but sadly it is not going to happen because Time, as always, is ‘of the essence’. Hey ho…let’s just get on with it then, because time, as you know….

Are Spirea Shrubs Evergreen?

I seem to have been a little lax in the garden of late, the result of weather or other commitments rather than general sloth, but seem to have made up for it this week by ticking off many and varied jobs on my mental ‘to do’ list. Ridding the garden of excess ivy is not one of those and is unlikely ever to be so, but I was pleased to remove this admittedly very attractive arrangement of ivy from the wall near the bottom of the garden. It began as a single stem snaking its way vertically upwards before branching out over the years into this neat fan shape – a very satisfactory result if this was a fruit tree or other decorative shrub. Sadly, it isn’t, but I was pleasantly surprised that with a chisel and wooden mallet it came off the wall quite quickly in large pieces of matted root; even digging the main root out of the cutting bed wasn’t as onerous as it might have been, although there may still be small sections of root making their way across the bed out of sight.

We’re in Yorkville, Illinois, visiting with Anita Drendel again. We saw some photos of her garden in the GPOD recently, and she’s back to share more of her favorites from the past few years.

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