Viburnum Plicatum Mariesii.

I have grown a lot of viburnums over the years, and have pruned them at various times of year for one reason or another. Usually viburnums need relatively little pruning, assuming you planted the right cultivar in the right-sized space (for example, not ‘Mariesii’ among the doublefiles, shown, but ‘Watanabei’ if you only had a smallish area). Even the lightest form of pruning, the removal of spent flowers called deadheading, isn’t needed with most viburnums, since what you want is fruit after the flowers (unlike all that deadheading with lilacs, for instance, to prevent messiness).POOR PLANNING TO BLAMEMost of the pruning I’ve had to do on viburnums was because I didn’t leave enough room for the plant to reach its eventual size, and poor planning (meaning my impatience to have a filled-in garden) caught up with me in time. I have cut several viburnums to the ground or the

There is an archive of viburnum tips and profiles of other fruit-bearing shrubs I love, great possibilities if you’re planning on doing some fall planting and want to bring in the birds, or have viburnum in need of TLC and need a hand. It’s all in the bullets below the slideshow for reference.Click on the first thumbnail to start the show, then toggle from slide to slide using the arrows beside each caption. Enjoy.Other Juicy Viburnum Treats from the Archives:THINK FALL (YES, FALL): My original homage to this genius of a genus. PRUNING VIBURNUM: They don’t like being picked at any more than you do. Prune these beautiful woody plants correctly and they will reward you and wildlife. TROUBLE IN PARADISE: Viburnum leaf beetle will ravage certain species and varieties in a flash, others not so. Learn how to combat this pest with non-toxic October-through-April search-and-destroy missions. More Fruit to Savor (and Share With Birds):WINTER

To create a year-round garden, I recommend starting your shrub shopping in the “V” aisle, for Viburnum. It was the stately doublefile viburnum (Viburnum plicatum tomentosum), that got me started in this outstanding genus of flowering and fruiting shrubs, so many of which are good in bloom, in fruit, and colored up in fiery fall foliage. The doublefile (bottom photo) is a plant whose habit of growth is so distinctive I could not help but notice. It stands with its branches held straight outward, like so many arms outstretched, and in spring they are completely covered with white flowers.The variety ‘Watanabe’ blooms off and on all season, May through summer’s end—how many other shrubs promise that? It is a compact version of the doublefile, reaching only 6 feet or so, an outstanding choice for smaller yards. If you can take the larger scale, the varieties ‘Mariesii’ and ‘Shasta’ (the most horizontal) are recommended. The doublefiles have another feature: handsome fall color, from a burnished wine color to smoky purple—another reason to include one in the landscape.Today I either possess or covet many Viburnum cousins, like the highly fragrant

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.

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

WHEN WOODY PLANT EXPERT MICHAEL DIRR writes in his book “Viburnums” that the fragrance of the Koreanspice viburnum, Viburnum carlesii, “actually reaches out and engulfs passersby,” he is not exaggerating. This is a smell-it-a-mile-away shrub that I would not garden without, and it’s currently doing its engulfing thing here. Delicious.

THE MOST IMPORTANT SUBSET of the fall garden cleanup chores: pest control. Fortunately all our needed cutbacks and raking of leaves–those sanitation efforts we’re all heading out to do, anyhow—help to reduce places for many garden pests to overwinter.

Ken is a longtime garden author and photographer, with many books to his credit including “The New Shade Garden” and “Natural Companions” and “Making More Plants.” He can be found at KenDruse dot com.Read along as you listen to the Oct. 29, 2018 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).the october q&a with ken druseQ. Uh-oh. I can hear in y

Viburnum is a large, diverse group of plants with generally oval, handsome leaves and clusters of typically white and sometimes fragrant flowers that attract butterflies. Blossoms are usually followed by single-seeded, often brilliantly colored fruit that will bring birds to your landscape. Many viburnum are grown for their flower display and a few for their showy fruit. In general, the heaviest fruit set occurs when several different named selections of seedlings that bloom at the same time are planted together. Many evergreen types are valuable as foliage plants. Several species (noted below) can be grown as small trees. Viburnums are somewhat resistant to deer damage.

The Viburnum Tinus Spirit is a fully hardy evergreen shrub. Perhaps with a little more to offer than the regular Viburnum Tinus or the form Eve Price.

Viburnum Tinus Eve Price is a true Winter bloomer which carries on flowering into the Spring.

Viburnum is a genus of over 150 species of deciduous and evergreen perennials that feature showy flowers and attractive foliage, many of which are native to North America.Most species are woody shrubs, though some have