Trees & shrubs Ideas, Tips & Guides

Adam and I talked about not just the Japanese types, but also other garden-sized maples for adding interest in every season and garden situation–in pots or the high shade of woodland gardens, to full-sun locations.my maple q&a with adam wheelerQ. When I was at Broken Arrow recently, there were many choice things to look at—but I kept noticing the maples you offer, particularly. How many do you grow?A. In the collection at the nursery, I suspect we have 150 or 200 different maples, and really that’s the tip of the iceberg with this genus.Q. There are a lot of native A

I’ve told you how to do this before with various shrubs, to get two seasons of interest from the same space: with Clematis, and also the oddball called Codonopsis.After seeing Brushwood Nursery’s selection of vines at the Trade Secrets show last Saturday near me (just a few of the astonishing 400 or so in the online catalog), I’d have to say proprietor Dan Long has something for every shrub, and then some. Wow. Though I had already added four or five new clematis to the garden the last two weeks, I bought five more from Brushwood’s booth, good-sized plants for very fair prices, and tomorrow they will get their homes here.And then I went back to my place and emailed the ver

On my radio show and podcast, we talked about why having extra-early and extra-later bloomers—from spicebush to Clethra to goldenrods and more—mean important insects and even birds will choose not just to stop by your garden, but call it home and raise a family.Read along as you listen to the May 11, 2015 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).read/listen: choosing native plants,a q&a with broken arrow’s andy brandQ. I know that when the subject of native plants is raised, peopl

THE TALLY IS COMPLETE, though I avoided facing it for nearly two weeks. My dear neighbor, Herb, with the smaller of his trusty chainsaws, did the deed: took down the disfigured or otherwise devastated woody plants that the freakish October 2011 snowstorm maimed. I walked around with him the other day, once I had gotten past the initial shock, and pointed: Take the left side of this; this one goes completely; remove the three broken stems from that one. And then I went out for the afternoon, returning only after all evidence was erased. (Wimpy, I know.) The body count:

Spring, and also fall, are perfect times to add some bird-friendly plantings, since many are woody plants, and also to provide for the most important thing off all: water. Big surprise–it’s all about keeping them fed, watered and sheltered in every season. Here are the essentials:1. water needed 12 months a yearWater is required 12 months a year, preferably moving water; curious birds cannot resist a drip or spillway, such as the little waterfalls in each of my two small garden pools. Even when those are shut down due

ALL GOOD THINGS MUST COME TO AN END, but this year the crabapples did so a little too quickly. Days of near-90 temperatures will do that to a flowering tree that popped open expecting 65 or so.

J UNGLE CONDITIONS NOTWITHSTANDING, some things are still standing here, and even looking good. I wanted to make sure to give each one its due so that these brave souls, who didn’t pack up and float away lately with all the you-know-what, know that I appreciate their courage and tenacity.

THE MOST COLORFUL CREATURES HERE as April turns to May: returning male birds in mating plumage. The last week included the arrival of rose-breasted grosbeaks and Baltimore orioles…but I am straying, as the point is plants, right? Oops.

Aralia elata, which in time may grow into a 10- or 12-foot large shrub or small tree, suckers like its close American cousin Aralia spinosa, or devil’s walking stick—and both have spiny trunks. A. elata has a tropical look, between the giant frond-like leaves and the oversized billows of creamy flowers from midsummer into fall, when purplish fruit forms that the birds enjoy. The straight green species (too rambunctious for the garden, but used as the rootstock for the fancier variegated cultivars) is hardy to Zone 4, and ‘Silver Umbrella’ may be, too—but it certainly is here in Zone 5B. Mine is growing on the north side of the house, getting maybe half-day indirect afternoon sun from the west, so part shade is fine.The downside: The handsom

I KEEP WONDERING WHY (SCIENTIFICALLY SPEAKING) the first weeks of spring seem to be so inclined to glow in solid gold. Is it something about co-evolution and early season pollinators liking the color, or just a side effect of how we’ve selected what plants we make our gardens from over the history of the nursery industry? (These are the kinds of things I think about, you see.) Whatever the “why,” the “what” is pretty great, and so an homage to spring’s favorite color: yellow.I love the way gold makes things seem to advance; the way it grabs my attention, screaming (never whispering).

She is an Extension Urban Horticulturist with Washington State University, and an associate professor of horticulture and landscape architecture there—and joined me this week on the radio podcast to talk (and debunk) popular garden myths.You know, like whether you should dig a really big hole for trees and shrubs and amend the soil before backfilling. Or whether gravel in the bottom of a container helps drainage, or bone meal is a must (or a bust) for bulbs. Or whether landscape fabrics are really the miracle they claim to be—that has so many people using them as “weed block.”Linda has been

IT’S ALMOST TIME TO GIVE MY WINTER FRIENDS the twig dogwoods and willows some pruning, the only care they ask in return for year-round beauty.  But will I really have the nerve to cut my favorite of all, Cornus sericea ‘Silver and Gold,’ back hard? Why I love this easiest of shrubs…and how that love may have backfired just a bit.

COARSE AND SLIGHTLY UNKEMPT AS IT MAY BE, Viburnum sieboldii was one of my first viburnums and is still beloved here.  And as if it knows it has some rough edges to make up for, it gives me little extras, in addition to being easy to grow. There is fruit the birds enjoy that evolves through several colors as it ripens over a long period, and foliage that smells like a somewhat funky pineapple to me whenrubbed or crushed (one not-quite-aroma-therapeutic way to tell if V.

AS MANY TIMES AS I HAVE SEEN THEM, I’m always startled when the Korean fir, Abies koreana, puts out a fresh crop of purple “pine” cones each year at this time.

I don’t grow C. florida in my current garden, but looking around here now since the snow receded and making my pruning list for the weeks ahead, I realize how many other dogwood species I do grow, and enjoy. The dogwood bloom season begins even before Forsythia, with Cornus mas (above), in April. A slideshow of it and some other reliable favorites.Use the thumbnails to toggle between slides, or hover your cursor on the middle of the right edge of the big photo to display navigational arrows. A list of dogwood profiles and other links is below the gallery. Enjoy

I had only ever seen a bottlebrush buckeye (Zone 5-8) once before, at the public garden called Wave Hill in New York City, a giant suckering mound of a thing probably 20 feet across and more than a dozen high. It grew there in the semi-shade of tall trees, as it is does in its natural habitat of the Southeastern United States, specifically rich woodlands in Alabama, Georgia, and northern Florida. I loved its big mountain of a presence right away—and then on that shopping trip to Allen Haskell’s former nursery in New Bedford, there it was. My plant!Though from a distance the flowers appear to be cream-colored, each tiny one on the long wands (technically panicles) is delicately splashed with drops of orangey-red paint–actually the red anthers and pinkish filaments inside the little trumpets. Butterflies and many insect pollinators love to visit them (that’s a silver-spotted skipper sampling the offerings, above).One year, a group of Baltimore orioles explored them enthusiastic

Thankfully, for the latter areas, I have old clumps of lower-light plants to divide, including those in this new slideshow of my top 54 shade subjects. I included some woodland-garden shrubs and trees for those seeking to manufacture some shade of their own—or wanting to add more understory structure to what nature has provided.a mostly alphabetical tour of 54 favorites for shadeplant profiles of shade subjectsPerennialsAstilboides tabularis Aralia cordata and Aralia racemosa Cimicifuga, or Actaea, racemosa Dicentra ‘Gold Heart’ Epimedium Ferns:Japanese painted, and Autumn fern plus a wider range

So many plants seem at their loudfest and most insistent now, don’t they?, positively shouting from all corners of the place. That’s a tender thing, Oxalis vulcanicola, up top, defiantly hanging on and getting more fiery each day as if it dares frost to just try to take it down.Click on the first thumbnail to start the show, then toggle from slide to slide using the arrows beside each caption (or the arrows on your keyboard). Let this newest gallery be the matching bookend to the one about garden gold that I posted in spring. Enjoy.Categoriesannuals & perennials conifers deciduous Nature slide

Four Winds Growers was founded around the idea of developing and promoting dwarf varieties of citrus to fit the scale of the new-home boom in post-war California and beyond–including on all those patios, and also in pots as the container-gardening trend began to take hold. Four Winds remains a family business, and a multi-generational one. It was taken over by the founder’s son, who ran it from the early 1950s until recently, when his son took charge, along with his daughter; her husband, and a grandson.In his own home garden, Four Winds marketing director Ed Laivo has potted citrus that he has been growing for “upwards of 25 or even 30 years.” He joined me on the radio and podcast to share his tips on container growing and pest control. (The transcript of the Nov. 3, 2014 show is below.)citrus-growing q&a with e

WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE CONIFER, the “beautiful one” to your eye? I could only narrow my list down to 10, plant-mad person that I am, but with hints of the winter landscape in the cooler air, I’m thinking of just how important evergreens are. And not just to me. Coniferous trees and shrubs also provide important winter shelter for birds, and many small mammals depend on their seed, as do various bird species. Conifers’ value as nesting spots is another reason to plant more.

On a part of my hillside that’s visible from key spots indoors, a grouping of ‘Michael Dodge’ grows in front of three gold-fruited ‘Bob White’ crabapples, with a mass of yellow-twig dogwood (Cornus sericea ‘Silver and Gold’) in the picture, too. This simple and virtually carefree planting provides endless fall and winter pleasure, and ‘Michael Dodge’ even adds reddish fall foliage to the mix for a time.I grow a lot of varieties of Viburnum—a habit that started more than 20 years ago, when I set out to make a garden for me and my avian companions. Many Viburnum have reddish or blue to blue-black fruit (or red fading to blue); but some species, including V. dilatatum or the linden Vib

I HAVE TO HAND IT to extra-early and extra-late garden performers for knowing to do their thing when it’s really needed—just when the gardener may be giving up hope. Today’s star: Spiraea thunbergii ‘Ogon,’ just beginning to turn brilliant butterscotch seven months after flowering, then sporting chartreuse foliage since; the butterscotch phase will last till around Christmas, when the leaves will drop).

Research from the nearby Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, New York, reveals how acorns initiate a complex series of ecological chain reactions. And not just the obvious ways, like feeding turkeys or chipmunks or deer, but in influencing Gypsy moth outbreaks and tick-borne disease risk, and even the reproductive success of ground-nesting songbirds.Dr. Rick Ostfeld, a disease ecologist from Cary Institute, helped me understand what–both seen and unseen–is going on with those tiny acorns and their mighty, wide-ranging influences. Read along as you listen to the Oct. 19, 2015 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).my q&a on acorns’

The Broken Arrow Nursery introduction is in the ground now, and leafless, and though confined to a pot it only had a small number of orange-red fruit (yes, ‘Sunsplash’ is a female clone). I’m eager to see how we do in the year to come—how much gold the irregularly splashed leaves display, and how much fruit the plant will bear. (That’s Broken Arrow’s catalog up top, below, by comparison to my late-season leaf detail from a plant that has sent a whole summer in its pot, below.) Broken Arrow, which introduced the plant, touts it highly, and they have had years of experience with it.I have more than 50 Ilex verticillata growing here, in three big groups—much to the delight of local birds. Though I cannot imagine a garden without the hollies, I have always had the one complaint: They’re ugly most of the year, except when fruiting (or at least they’

IF YOU HAVEN’T even started bringing in your houseplants or are in a warmer zone, the first part of the discussion talked about taking stock of what needs storing and evaluating and prepping potential overwintering spaces at your home.  I recapped that quickly yesterday in Part 2, then got on to specifics how to store dahlias, cannas, elephant ears and more. You can always subscribe to the free podcast on iTunes. (Select the September 12 and October 17 shows from among the weekly programs I do with Robin Hood Radio, the nation’s smallest NPR affiliate, in nearby Sharon, Connecticut.)Part 1 (September 12 edition Part 2 (October 17 edition) Other Pushing-the-Zone ExperimentsREMEMBER, it’s always an experiment–but it’s worth trying to carry over treasures from one year to the next rather than composting them now. From the archives and elsewhere, some plant-specific tactics to inspire your efforts:Japanese maples, top photo (or other marginally hardy shrubs and small trees) in pots How I grow Zone 8 Farfugium (Ligularia, above) a

LAST WEEK, BETWEEN edits on my next book, I gathered some friends and the proper tools and pruned–trying to erase more damage from last October’s snowstorm, and also the general stuff one needs to do late winter here each year.  Lots more to go, but we’re off to a good start–which got me thinking you might be wondering what to prune when and how. That’s the topic of this week’s radio podcast–and also of some useful stories in the A Way to Garden archives: From the Archives:New to pruning, or just a little rusty? Start with the pruning FAQs page.

IMARCHED UP THE HILL and stuck my face in a stand of twig willows and dogwoods the other day, starved for some color in this relentlessly mud-toned non-winter. The world looked really bright and shiny through their gold and red twigs, and then I remembered the giant pussy willows (Salix chaenomeloides, cut and stuck in a vase, above) down by the road and went to pay them a visit as well. Time to sound another cry in favor of these easiest of plants–and offer a new source of an incredible variety of willows, in particular.

On my public-radio show, Arboretum director Mark Weathington took me through the years-long process of “discovering” new plants. Plus, Mark highlighted some Arboretum specialties that may belong in your garden, including standout redbuds and mahonias, and the lesser-known evergreen shrub Illicium, and even showy native dogwoods selected to withstand increasingly saline soils in tricky coastal areas.What’s now called the J.C. Raulston Arboretum at North Carolina State University is where I met my first Cephalotaxus–a near-lookalike to our common evergreen yews but excitingly deer-resistant. And then a moment later I met another one–this time a columnar form–an

More of a good thing, I guess you could say, and also deer-resistant.The Japanese plum yew has linear, dark green flat needles that resemble its namesake’s: the yew, or Taxus. Those are its needles and also its male reproductive structures, below; ‘Prostrata’ is all-male, and therefore makes no female seed-producing structures.While Taxus is deer candy, though, Cephalotaxus is rated as not to their liking by experts from geographic areas as diver

IHAVE DECIDED TO PASS THE REST OF THIS VENGEFUL WINTER in a dream state: dreaming of plants that would make me feel better if only I could see them right now. But they’re either buried or (if they are showing any of their goodies above-ground) inaccessible to me thanks to thick ice or thigh-high snow.

A little about Michael:“That’s Michael Dodge,” I say, when I show people around the fall garden, as we pass a large group of show-offy, yellow-fruited Viburnum I enjoy all fall into winter. V. dilatatum ‘Michael Dodge’ is truly a standout plant.But the original Michael Dodge, the one that great shrub was named to honor, is a well-

By intermediate, or x intermedia as it would be stated in formal botanical Latin, it means that ‘Jelena’ is a child of two great parents: the Chinese witch-hazel (Hamamelis mollis) and the Japanese species (H. japonica). Their offspring (hardy in Zone 5-8) are mostly fragrant, and all bloom early and have hot fall foliage besides.I have said before that if garden centers were open in February or March in cold-climate zones like mine, I am certain that early blooming Asian witch-hazels would knock the far-more-vulgar (and admittedly later) Forsythia out of the ring. I call the latter “vomit of spring.” Witch-hazel I call simply beautiful.‘Jelena’, with its coppery, scented flowers, is more horizontal in stature than another I made a spot for, the vase-shaped ‘Pallida’ (above). I’m figuring on perhaps 10 or 12 feet in

The clove currant, which in some references is listed as synonymous with Ribes aureum var. villosum, is native to the central United States, specifically “Minnesota and South Dakota, south to Arkansas and Texas,” reports “Dirr’s Encyclopedia of Trees and Shrubs.” My friend and fruit expert Lee Reich points out that odoratum and aureum are two distinct species, and grows both (you can see his comment below).I first smelled the plant in my friend Bob Hyland’s ga

The answer is the pawpaw, and to say that Andrew Moore has a passion for pawpaws and encyclopedic knowledge about them would be an understatement.The Florida-born and Pittsburgh-based writer was just 25ish years old when he began work on what is now the book “Pawpaw: In Search of America’s Forgotten Fruit,” and he did indeed go on a search for it, or maybe more of a magical mystery tour–through history, horticulture and literally around the nation with many unexpected adventures along the

Compared to the plain-vanilla form of a shrub—the one with green foliage—a gold- or wine-leaved or variegated selection means more than a single season of interest from the same square footage.  When the early spring flowers are done on Spiraea thunbergii ‘Ogon,’ for instance, it looks a whole lot better than plain S. thunbergii (which I probably wouldn’t allot space to; too much of a one-trick pony for me).I find such plants especially useful in breaking up the green monotony of large shrub borders or plantings of multiple shrubs used as hedging or screen, avoiding the “big black hole of green” effect that it might otherwise read as from a distance.COLORFUL SHRUBS (or trees, for that matter) can create an axis or focal point—particularly the lighter-colored ones. Help the eye get to there by hinting at a couple of smaller stops along the way with a similarly colored shrub or a mass of perennials here and there before the

Like a carefully crafted sentence, the garden needs proper punctuation to read well, and clearly convey what’s going on. On the November 28, 2016 edition of my public-radio show and podcast, Ken and I discussed design challenges that these tall and narrow things answer; the technical difference between the columnar and fastigiate plants; and some of his favorites.Read along as you listen to the Nov. 28, 2016 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).columnar tree and shrub q&a with ken druseQ. You got me thinking on our phone call the other morning—we were talking about earthworms and all these other crazy things…A. [Laughter.]Q. …and then you started talking abo