Yesterday I should have edged the beds that surround the front garden and plied the hedge trimmer on the perpetually sprouting privet that bounds the property. \u00a0Instead I remade a corner of the garden that has never quite succeeded aesthetically and always bothered me.<\/p>\n
The corner in question is mostly shaded by a nearby maple tree. \u00a0The outer edge of one side gets enough sun to support some daylilies. \u00a0The shady portion has filled up over the years with an assortment of heuchera, hellebore, tiarella, erodium (heron\u2019s bill) and woodland phlox. \u00a0A few peach-leaf bellflowers (Campanula persicifolia), the remnants of a clump that I moved two years ago, bloom sporadically, \u00a0\u00a0In the spring, the corner also features clumps of daffodils and tulips. \u00a0Before the big upheaval yesterday, the area looked adequate, but not inspiring.\u00a0 It also lacked depth and needed a focal point.<\/p>\n
As is often the case, I wanted to make positive change without spending any extra money.\u00a0 One of the \u2018Nikko Blue\u2019 hydrangeas in the backyard gave birth last year and the offspring is now a health four-footer that bloomed nicely earlier in the summer. \u00a0I uprooted it and made it the centerpiece of the revived corner. \u00a0Before installing the shrub, I moved the heuchera and other low-growers closer to the front edge of the bed where their flashy leaves will attract more attention. \u00a0The peach-leaf bellflower was relocated to a sunnier position near the daylilies.<\/p>\n
I added compost to all the planting holes, watered everything in and surrounded all the transplants with mulch.\u00a0 Though the full effect of all the change won\u2019t be dramatic until next spring, the space already looks much better with the hydrangea as a focal point. \u00a0Best of all, the entire corner beautification process took only about an hour, start to finish.<\/p>\n
Edging is nice\u2014and necessary\u2014but sometimes you just have to do something more dramatic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Yesterday I should have edged the beds that surround the front garden and plied the hedge trimmer on the perpetually sprouting privet that bounds the property. \u00a0Instead I remade a corner of the garden that has never quite succeeded aesthetically and always bothered me. The corner in question is mostly shaded by a nearby maple … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,2,3],"tags":[350,348,346,349,345,347],"class_list":["post-574","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall","category-general-interest","category-spring","category-summer","tag-fall-planting","tag-garden-focal-points","tag-plants-for-shade","tag-quick-garden-renovation","tag-shade-gardening","tag-shade-loving-plants"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=574"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":575,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574\/revisions\/575"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=574"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=574"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=574"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}