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The Complete Guide to Landscape Design, Renovation,
and Maintenance
by Cass Turnbull
ADDING THE LOWER STORY
When people plant their yards they tend to do it like putting in
furniture--up against the wall, in rows along the edges. And, as
you know, too close together because, unlike your footstool, a shrub
doubles or triples its volume. After the homeowner puts in the shrub,
he digs a bed around it to fit, and that's it. Even though the shrub
gets bigger, the bed stays the same size. Sometimes, grass being
the way it is, the bed even gets smaller. This creates the optical
illusion that your shrub is too big, when actually the shrub bed
is too small. Cutting a shrub back to fit the bed is sort of like
cutting your house plant back to fit the pot. In your yard it might
be time to repot!
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| When pruning along doesn't work, consider enlarging the shrub
beds and rearranging the shrubs. This is often the longer-lasting
and better solution. |
At the yard of one of my favorite clients, a grouping of evergreen
azaleas finally became so big that they were crowding each other
and those next to the edge of the lawn were being held back by the
edger's going by, chop, chop, chop! It looked like water building
up behind a dam. The beds simply needed to be made bigger and the
azaleas rearranged so that they looked comfortable again. The amount
of work was minimal compared to hacking back the azaleas every year.
People don't realize how very easy it is to dig up plants and move
them around. They also are wary of the idea of removing lawn. Yet,
the amount of lawn removed is often negligible. Most people can't
even tell when lawn has been reduced by about a foot or three.
Sacred Grass: Don't Let It Ruin Your Yard
Some people are afraid that more shrub bed space will mean more
weeding. This is not the case and the effect of the larger beds
on the overall beauty of a yard is quite significant. They also
dread digging up turf. Do it anyway! And bury it in a compost hole
in the corner of your yard. Or, turn it over, cover it with water
and black plastic. Next year it will be great compost!
You should also surround your trees with dirt and mulch, not lawn.
This area is called a "tree well." The absence of turf
will make the trees grow faster. If you mulch, you won't need to
weed much. Besides, tree wells are great places for bulbs, ground
covers and perennials, ferns and whatnot. Tree wells not only increase
the growth rate of your tree but they greatly improve its chances
of survival during drought. And you won't be tempted to girdle or
injure your tree with the weedeater, causing troublesome suckers.
Large tree wells make your tree look comfortable, and help to keep
it from appearing too big.
So, make your beds bigger--much bigger, as big as you dare, certainly
out beyond the dripline of your trees and shrub canopy. And move
some plants around until it all looks good. Good gardeners are always
digging things up and moving them around. Small plants are easy
to move, but even big trees are movable. Americans used to move
trees bigger than we do now, with horses and wagons. The limiting
factor is power lines. No tree on its side can be taller than those
wires. We're talking BIG. Get over the idea that anything in your
yard is or should be of a permanent size or location. Gardens are
kinetic art, just very slow moving. Your job is to manage them in
motion.
Some plants are easy to transplant and some aren't. Tree-likes
are easiest and look good right away. Cane growers, especially ones
with mat-like roots, are harder. It's difficult to get a real root
ball, and things tend to fall apart. Mexican orange, for example,
can just be cut back drastically and maintained at a lower level
rather than being moved. Rhododendrons are easiest because their
rootballs are like pancakes. I've moved rhodies up to six feet with
help from friends. It's a fun project.
How To Move A Rhododendron
First, make sure your plant is healthy. Next, dig a trench around
the outside as if you were planning to make a root ball bigger than
you could carry. When you are down past where the roots go, flip
your shovel over and start chipping the roots and dirt back with
the back side of your shovel and digging dirt out from under the
roots using the back of the shovel. This protects the roots and
makes a clean, tight root ball. Towards the end, you flip the shovel
back right side up and stomp on it under the root ball in an attempt
to slice the final roots. Keep an already-dull pair of root loppers
to cut any big anchoring roots as you run into them. These are not
the roots you need to handle with care. They just hold the plant
down and store energy. It's all the tiny, tiny rootlets which absorb
nutrients and water that need special treatment. This means you
1) do not break up the root ball, 2) do preserve as many rootlets
as possible, 3) do keep them in dirt, 4) do keep them moist/wet,
and 5) do not let them dry out in the open air. Each minute counts.
If the plant is big, have your buddy tilt it by pulling or pushing
it over while you dig and slice. NEVER, NEVER yank the shrub out
or pry up on it with your shovel. Just keep working on it, digging
and slicing, until you feel it get loose. You will know when that
is. Now, rock the plant and slide a big tarp under it, then rock
it the other way. Have your buddy pull the edge of the tarp on through
and under the plant. Use the tarp to tug it out of its hole. Sometimes
you can give it a gentler ride out of the hole using a board as
a runway. If your shrub is big, you and your friends can slide it
out, pull it on the tarp, and drag your plant over to its new home.
If your shrub is truly huge, you can rig something up with a chain
and truck, tying the rope to the tarp used sort of like a diaper
around the root ball. Do NOT tie it to the trunk. Trees and shrubs
with great gashed trunks will usually die from the injury--later--probably
next spring or in the late summer. If your shrub is three or four
feet tall or under, you won't need to go through this trouble. You
can just do it by yourself. Use your shovel handle to measure how
broad and deep a hole to dig. Dig it, slide the shrub into the hole,
and bury it. Then, WATER, WATER, WATER! Today, tomorrow, and next
week.
It is always best to transplant broadleaf evergreens when it is
cool or warm and wet, not hot and dry or cold and frozen. That means
spring or fall. Summer is stressful for plants even if you water
them. They need a lot more water than in milder temperatures. Very
cold weather also dries them. It is possible to transplant things
off-season, but it's considerably more stressful for them. Deciduous
plants and needled evergreens transplant well in early winter when
they are dormant, but do not wait until the weather is below freezing.
Land of Giants (See how to deal
with them here.)
Sometimes you have a yard where all the plants are giants, but they're
not crowding each other. They're just all sort of huge. Instead
of cutting them back or moving them or killing them, you may just
need to complement or contrast them with some smaller shrubs or
plant understory.
If you have a row of giants you may need to remove one to break
up the giant wall effect, as well as generally thinning to give
them definition.
A pleasing yard has a top, a middle, and a lower story, you will
recall. That is, trees, shrubs, and small things (ferns, flowers,
ground covers). Having a yard full of all mature shrubs is imposing;
having one with nothing but small things looks vulnerable. A wildflower
meadow alone will not protect you from the big bad street. A nice
garden is balanced with all three stories. Sometimes, for a woodland
effect, skip the middle story and put in wonderful woodland plants
inside and under your giants, like ferns, bleeding heart, trillium,
hellebores, and hardy cyclamen. Under your deciduous flowering shrubs
put spring bulbs that bloom at the same time as the shrubs, such
as daffodils with your forsythia. Add a ring of lower plants around
your giant mounds, maybe something with a contrasting color or texture,
or, conversely, add something tall and skinny. Add contrast to your
mature shrubs and your garden will seem parklike and tame again.
Yes, I'm afraid this chapter is a plot to get you to buy more plants.
Really, really nice gardens have four or five stories, starting
with a few enormous trees and working down. Under every plant is
a smaller treasure or bulb, and vines clamber up walls and through
trees. You can find rare ferns and flowers growing from chinks in
walls, and you can even find tiny flowers throughout the lawn. If
you are a lawn worshiper, as opposed to a flower worshiper, as is
my next-door neighbor, you may wish to forego the lawn flowers.
I thought she would have a heart attack when I proudly pointed to
the English lawn daisy I had just planted. She works so hard to
eliminate them from her yard.
SUMMARY
Alternatives to cutting back shrubs are:
(1) Make beds bigger
(2) Rearrange plants
(3) Eliminate some plants
(4) Make beds bigger and add more lower shrubs
(5) Or, thin out mature shrubs and add woodland understory and other
smaller plants down in and amongst them.
Forward to Speaking and Understanding
Gardenese
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