Archive for Plants I Recommend – Page 15

Hellebore Heaven

Posted by Carol

· January 5, 2016

A sample of the many varieties of Hellebore in bloom at the open garden.

If you love Hellebores (like I do) don’t miss this open garden. The O’Byrne family designs Hellebores and have an international following. Marietta and Ernie are rock stars in the garden design world. Their Hellebores will dazzle you with color and form. Plus they are sturdy plants, bred in Eugene Oregon at the Northwest Garden Nursery.

Why go?

First, you’ll have a chance to buy these unusual and fantastically beautiful plants (most are not available locally). Second, you can buy them in a large 2 gallon size, not in tiny sizes.

Hellebore in woodland setting.

Display Garden

Walk through a 1.5 acre garden with many different micro climates. See Hellebores planted en masse in an open woodland with companion plantings of shrubs and spring bulbs.

Here are Hellebores with drought tolerant Yucca in full sun.

Also see the large sun garden where you will find Hellebores in combination with interesting rock garden plants, succulents and more. Most people think Hellebores are for shade only.

The garden art is unique, interesting and never overwhelms the garden, something I appreciate in a design.

My sister’s feet on a Jeffrey Bale stone mosiac landing.

Open Garden in February

Call a friend and save the date: Northwest Garden Nursery holds an open garden every year, typically the third week of February. Last year I took my sister Donna and her friend (and my client) Sherry. They are plant fiends and appreciated seeing such a large display of Hellebores. We were not able to purchase any plants, however, because they were sold out! So make sure you go early in the week if you want to make some purchases.

We also visited Greer Gardens and I got to say good bye to Harold Greer who is beyond the rock star status. His lifetime of work with Rhododendrons and other plants has enriched my designs and my life, so it was poignant to go and purchase a few last plants from him. I purchased a rock garden plant, Rhododendron kiusianum White Form. It was exquisite. He has closed his mail order company. Bloom River Gardens will be trying to fill Harold’s shoes.

Pictures left to right: Double Hellebore covers my fingers. Amazing foliage. Dark edge contrasts with sunlit pale petals.

Categories : Dramatic Flowers, Garden Tips, Plants I Recommend, Shade Plants

Tags : cutting flowers, dramatic winter plants, flagstone in the garden, garden design with stone, long blooming flowers, spring flowers, Winter Color in the garden

New Shrubs Expand Designer’s Palette

Posted by Carol

· November 4, 2015

Add to Your Drought Tolerant Landscape Design

Drought tolerant Ceanothus G. 'Hearts Desire' Picture from Xera

California Lilac Ceanothus Griseus ‘Hearts Desire’ Picture from Xera Plants

I’m excited about these new plants for Portland gardens.

Many of us are familiar with California Lilac and its blue flowers. Beloved by bees, including our endangered native bumble bees, it’s also a host plant for Swallow Tail butterflies. However, it has its problems in a home landscape. Many varieties are short lived because they receive summer irrigation along with your other plantings. They need infrequent or no summer water to be a long term plant. Most of all keeping them a manageable size is difficult for many gardeners. Ceanothus Griseus ‘Hearts Desire’ is different. It can handle some summer irrigation and unlike all the other varieties of ground cover type California Lilac, it grows to only 4 inches tall and grows slowly to 24 inches wide. It is easy to tip prune so can be confined. These new habits make it a very useful plant for smaller landscapes. It can take a lot of dry so we can plant it in the xeriscape dry tolerant gardens that have no irrigation or it can receive some summer irrigation. I see this plant as a major improvement over old varieties like ‘Anchor Bay’ or ‘Points Rey’. Xera Plants is growing ‘Hearts Desire’ but expect other growers to jump on the plant wagon soon. I’d use ‘Hearts Desire’ under limbed up fir trees, on SW facing banks or in “hellstrips”. I will be trialing this new variety of California Lilac in my xeriscape garden.

Manzanita needs little to no watering after first year.

Manzanita Photo from http://www.laspilitas.com/nature-of-california/plants/74–arctostaphylos-pungens

Manzanita is a shrub or large tree known for its colorful bark and picturesque windswept shapes on the northern California coast. Here in Portland it’s too wet or too cold for most Manzanitas. News flash! Some of the California Manzanita species have been hybridized (designed by humans) into cold hardy evergreen ground covers and shrubs. I love the leaves and the bark color and will be using these two specific varieties of Manzanita in my designs more frequently. My favorite is ‘St. Helena’ which grows to 24 inches, and can take irrigation if it must.

Hummingbird sitting on Manzanita plant

For success with Manzanita don’t feed the soil with compost or fertilizer at all, not even when doing initial soil preparation. Work with the existing soil. It needs to be watered through its first summer and then little to no irrigation is best. This year (2015) my clients will be instructed to water it through its first winter as well since we are expecting a very dry winter but most years this would not be necessary. Note: hummingbirds love Manzanita flowers. Pacific Horticulture Society has an in depth article about Manzanita/Arctostaphlylos for the NW; by our revered plants man Paul Bonine.

Callistemon viridiflorus ‘Xera Compact’ Picture from Xera Plants

Callestemon or Bottle Brush is well known to Californians. They have many varieties with hot red flowers and they attract hummingbirds like crazy. Their loose needles have a tropical feel to them and they can look wild or messy depending on your point of view! While talking with Greg Shepard at Xera Plants, I got good news about the varieties of this plant that we can grow here in Portland. A few of these make very attractive tidy evergreen shrubs. I’m always looking for soft textured evergreen shrubs with winter good looks that don’t get too big. Hummingbirds are attracted to all of the Bottle Brush plants but deer are not. Pretty great huh?

Here are 2 varieties I am most interested in for my clients:

1. Callistemon Pityoides ‘Corvallis’. Yes found in Corvallis, Oregon the original plant withstood 20 years of cold and everything an Oregon winter can throw at a plant. It grows 5’ tall and 3’ wide in ten years. It can take regular water or can be trained into drought tolerance easily. It flowers twice in a season with soft yellow bottle brush flowers that remind people of baby ducks. Deer usually leave it alone unless they are desperate.

2. Callistemon viridiflorus ‘Xera Compact’ grows to 4 ½’ feet tall. It is VERY heavy blooming for 6 weeks. The flowers are chartreuse and yellow brushes 3 inches long, the leaves are deep green in summer and take on hints of red in winter.

For more information on other drought tolerant landscape plants, go to my contact page.

Categories : Dramatic Flowers, Garden Tips, Gardening Green, Low Maintenance Landscape Examples, New Improved Plants, Plants I Recommend, Winter Gardening

Tags : drought tolerant plantings, evergreen plants w color, food for hummingbirds, garden tips, plants to attract birds, Winter Color in the garden

Summer Heather – Perfect for year round color

Posted by Carol

· October 7, 2015

Summer Heather – Perfect for year round color

Summer flowering heather can be easy care

I use heather at my vacation house because it’s so easy. I’m there once a month, have no irrigation system and I have hungry deer. It’s got to be a tough plant to make it! Lots of people buy heather, plant them and they die quickly. Without knowledge specific to heathers, success is tenuous, but with a little knowledge this is a very tough drought tolerant winner of a plant in my book. It has year-round beauty, is great food for bees and it can be the evergreen plant that holds a summer garden together visually through the winter.

Calluna Vulgaris ‘Firefly’ Photo from Great Plant Picks

Planting Tips:

Heathers need good drainage but if you have clay soil don’t despair. Heathers planted on a burmed planting bed or on a low mound do well. Heathers are perfect for sunny slopes.

A designer pal plants her heathers in pure barkdust. I’ve done this and had excellent results as long as it was on a slope or berm. Don’t try this crazy bark dust idea in a flat landscape with heavy clay unless you berm up.

Watering well the first year is critical. If heather plants dry out to the point of wilting, even just a little bit, they will die. There is no rescuing it with water and having it “perk up” as many other plants will do. When the tiny fine foliage wilts or dries the plant stops taking in water with its roots. Avoid this first year problem and take advantage of the benefits of a fall planting. You still have to water carefully the first summer after a fall planting but it is not so edgy.

Pruning Tips:

Pruning is important and easy. The most important year for pruning is the second spring after you have planted the plant. Prune before new growth starts. You must trim to just above the previous years wood; trim too much and you will have ugly holes in your plants that may never fill in. Avoid pruning late in fall or winter.

Calluna Vulgaris at Heaths and Heathers nursery in Shelton Washington

Trim too little or not at all and in a few years you will have an ugly plant with bare wood stems in the center of the plant. When this happens we can’t simply cut it back severely which we can do with many plants to fix the problem. Trimming every year before new growth starts (February or March for Pacific Northwest) will keep your plants attractive long term. Who knew low maintenance was so much work right? Once you know what to do, you have a plant that will work beautifully for decades with a once a year trim. That is low maintenance.

Calluna Vulgaris ‘White Lawn’ w Sedum ‘Xenox’ and Sedum ‘Voo Doo’

Summer heather/Calluna Vulgaris is a great plant for hot sun situations. This summer for the first time ever, I actually had foliage burn. They got no water for 45 days in record breaking heat, but since these plants have been there for five years there was not permanent damage or loss. New plants would not tolerate that amount of drought but mature plants took my neglect in stride. 6 months later there was no sign of any damage. My kind of plant!

Categories : Fall Gardening, Garden Tips, Low Maintenance Landscape Examples, New Improved Plants, Plants I Recommend, Summer Garden Tips

Tags : bee friendly plants, evergreen plants w color, garden tips, long blooming flowers, saving bees, summer flowering plants

Small Trees for Fall Color

Posted by Carol

· September 16, 2015

What trees are small enough to mature in the typical yard space, have low water needs and have full season beauty?

Acer circinatum ‘Pacific Fire’ photo from Handy Nursery

Our Native Vine Maple is Tried and True

Select a new variety of native vine maple, Acer circinatum, like Pacific Fire with scarlet red winter twigs. It is attractive in partial shade to dappled sun but the best effects of color, both twig and fall leaf color occur in half day sun. It can be grown in full sun but this will probably spoil the foliage with leaf scorch. Plant it in morning sun with dappled afternoon shade for best results. Matures at 15′ to 20′.

Seven Sons Flower is Great for a Tough Spot

Seven Son Heptocodium photo courtesy of Treephoria

Heptacodium miconioides ‘Seven Sons’ photo courtesy of Treephoria.com

Here’s a tree for a hell strip! Seven Sons Flower, or Heptacodium miconioides, is great for full sun and less than great soil. You can buy it as a standard, or single trunk tree, which will fit in your parking strip nicely. Or buy the low multi-branched form (pictured) for placement in the landscape. It flowers in late summer and holds the color of the flower into late fall so you don’t miss out on fall color either even it if isn’t the leaves that glow red; 20′ at maturity.

Use Phoenix Snake Bark Maple for Something New

Acer Conspcium Phoenix photo courtesy of Treephoria

Acer conspicuum ‘Phoenix’ photo courtesy of Treephoria.com

Here is the newest darling tree Acer conspicuum ‘Phoenix’, or Snake Bark Maple. It needs regular watering, less after a few years have gone by but is not drought tolerant. Amazing twig color and the bark’s dramatic color show just gets better and better as the tree matures. Like all maples, plant up on a mound if you have heavy clay soil. Good drainage is the key to longevity.

Use Crape Myrtle for Four-Season Interest

Crepe Myrtle - photo taken at J Stone Garden

Crape Myrtle – Focus here is on bark color. Photo taken at J Stone Garden

My favorite Crape Myrtle, or Lagerstromia, is ‘Tuskegee’, maturing at 15′. These trees need to be planted in well drained soil or up on a mound. Don’t plant this tree with an east wind exposure. Best in full sun or 3/4 day sun. Winter bark, wow fall color, hot red orange summer flowers, with low summer water needs. Another great variety that is easier to find is Tuscarora, or Lagerstroemia indica x fauriei ‘Tuscarora’.

Crape Myrtle in NE Portland Landscape Design

This Crape Myrtle putting on an early Fall show in a NE Portland front yard.

Categories : Fall Gardening, Garden Tips, Plants I Recommend, Tree Selection

Tags : bark, fall color, red twigs, small trees, winter interest

Euphorbia – Full Season Color Shrub

Posted by Carol

· September 2, 2015

Euphorbia a Perfect Plant or “She Devil”?

Euphorbia Humpty Dumpty with wagon wheel

Euphorbia c. ‘Humpty Dumpty’ encircling a wagon wheel

Growers clearly think euphorbia (spurge) is a perfect plant – Blooming Nursery, a local grower, shows over 50 varieties in their on line catalog. Many varieties have come along in the last ten years.

What is Euphorbia?
It is a low maintenance shrub or ground cover. Most varieties prefer sun and well-drained soil making them perfect for a SW facing landscape. They provide a lot of color and they are very unusual looking. The flower itself looks like a fat column filled with whorls of petals. The flowers are actually tiny little leaf bracts in contrasting colors. People will say to me, “Oh you know, it looks like it came from Mars.” Regardless of its peculiar look, people like the fact that most are very low water and they can enjoy six weeks or more of flower color in the hot sun.

If it’s such a great plant why did I call it a “She Devil”?

A kind of latex sap exudes from every injury or cut to a leaf, stem or flower and can be a skin irritant. Get some in your eye and you’ll call it a worse thing than a she devil. For this reason, I never use it in a parking strip and I make sure the client knows about the potential problem before I use it in a design. The sap does not affect me, but I know people who have gotten rashes, extreme but temporary eye pain. I have read that if ingested it will cause extreme stomach discomfort and should not be included in dog friendly landscaping. I don’t know anyone who has eaten any of it but this plant probably should not be in a yard with children, a puppy or a goofy dog who lacks common dog sense. A local pub ran into legal trouble when someone’s child came in contact with a Euphorbia. Since each person has their own sensitivity, no one can say whether a plant will cause an individual discomfort but Euphorbia is well known for causing skin irritation. Here is the local pub article.
The species Euphorbia characias tend to be 4′ to 5′ tall. The varieties I use are shorter.

All varieties of Euphorbia seed around. Some are prolific, some are not but they all seed. It is not a no maintenance plant but it is a low maintenance plant. The varieties I use must be deadheaded, usually in early June to prevent seeding around and to ensure the plant will be a handsome devil for winter. If the flowering stems are not removed to the ground, the shape for winter will be ugly and to me rather sad since it can be such a radiant winter shrub.

Some varieties of Euphorbia (only one that I use) will spread by running root. I know that I only use it for dryish shade situations where it can spread. Others might plant it next to their hostas and discover in a few years that the hostas are no more.

Enough of the doom and gloom! Here are the plants that I enjoy using in gardens with consenting adults. There are so many varieties that I don’t even try to trial them all personally. I don’t use the plants that I have not trialed or that a person I know has trialed.

My Favorite Euphorbia List

Euphorbia amydgaloides ‘Mrs Robb’s Bonnet’ or just ‘Robb’s Spurge’.
I use it under fir trees with sword fern. I NEVER use it in mixed plantings or flowers beds, it will take over. I use it where I want a low water needs, shade tolerant ground cover (not deep shade). It should be fully contained by a path or root barrier. It’s a very useful and handsome plant if deadheaded properly.

Euphorbia 'Humpty Dumpty' with water drops

Euphorbia c. ‘Humpty Dumpty’ with water drops

Euphorbia characias ‘Humpty Dumpty’
It’s a perfect size unlike most Euphorbia varieties. I use this plant in south or west facing foundation plantings. My plant survived the cold at 900 feet for six years. It looked fantastic with it’s silver green foliage in the dead of January. It won’t look nice if you don’t deadhead it properly in June. Companions: Low 4” high heathers, coneflowers such as ‘Miss Kim’.
Variety grows to 24” x 24”. Flowers at 30” high.

Euphorbia ‘John Tomlinson’

Euphorbia characias ssp. wulfenii ‘John Tomlinson’
John is taller than ‘Humpty Dumpty’ and has more green blue than green silver foliage. Select California Lilac such as Ceanothus griseus ‘Kurt Zadnik’ as the background shrub for the most amazing color combination in early summer. The purple blue flowers of the California Lilac sizzle next to the chartreuse flowers of the Euphorbia. Variety grows to 36” x 36”.

Euphorbia ‘Rudolph’

Euphorbia x martinii ‘Rudolph’
Rudolph develops brilliant red new leaves in winter. The combo of blue green old leaves and the red hint in winter is why I like this compact variety. Blue fescue grass is a great companion, both for color and texture. Variety grows to 30″ x 30″.

Categories : Dog and Cat Friendly Gardens, Dramatic Flowers, Garden Tips, Low Maintenance Landscape Examples, New Improved Plants, Plants I Recommend, Shade Plants

Tags : blooming nursery, dramatic color, drought tolerant plantings, euphorbia, full hot sun, long blooming flowers, low water

Archive for Plants I Recommend – Page 15

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