gle,

Can you be more specific about your site. When you say full sun, what does that mean to you? Does it get sun all day long, or in the morning or in the afternoon, and for how many hours? A lot of the plants you have are shade or part sun plants. Are these plants currently planted elsewhere on your property right now? The hydrangeas are either shade or part sun plants. The Spruce, Weigela, Boxwood, Sand Cherry and daylilies are full sun (meaning they must get at least 6 hours of sunlight a day).

What is it that you want to accomplish? Do you want to fill the gap between the two fences at the back? Are you trying to gain some privacy, or are you just trying to make it more attractive? Why are you transplanting from other parts of your property? Is it overgrown or is this area an important priority for you?

Steve

The site is south facing, gets sun more than 6
hours a day, the
plants will get water from the lawn irrigation system. The plants are currently
planted on the property, the spruce, boxwoods, rhododendrons, Sand Cherry, and two
hydrangeas are planted in the front of the house; which we'd like to
re-landscape. It's not the front landscape we like; it was put in by the
builder. The Oak hydrangea, Azaleas, and the Weiglas are planted around our deck and we do not get to enjoy them. We would like to improve the appearance of the area between the two fences and provide a
green fence to the area that drops off into an adjacent neighbor’s yard.

Thanks again

I would use the Weigelas. Each will grow to about 6' high and 8' wide at full maturity. You could then put the Endless Summer Hydrangeas at their base. These will be 4' in width and height at maturity. The Weigelas will provide some shade for them and the hydrangeas will be the "shoes and socks" for the larger shrubs. A south facing full sun exposure is too much sun for the Rhody's and the Oak Leaf Hydrangea (assuming it's a full sized variety). You could use the Alberta Spruce, but these are extremely slow growing (about a half inch a year). If you are interested I have a friend in Central MA who does this kind of work. Let me know and I'll send you her contact info.

Steve

Thanks Steve,

I'd like to do as much of the work myself.

I enjoy the work, I just have no vision on what plants work well together.

I was hoping to get plan idea's from the forum members.

thanks again

If you aren't really asking us to choose the plants, provide a pic of the site so we can decide what looks good where.

There are a lot of variables to think of. 1.) What lies sun vs what likes shade 2.) What blooms when 3.) What's evergreen. 4.) Color wheel theory...what is a complementary color 5.) What's evergreen...what will the landscape look like in winter 6.) Growth rate.

The dwarf Alberta Spruce are slow growing....Put something temporary and short lived around them. As they grow you can get rid of whatever. Maybe put them in the back? NOT in front of the fence...they don't like shade and if they get a bare spot it never grows bac.

More shade tolerant and prunable plants could go in front of the fence. Perhaps the rhododendron or the hydrangea?

Separate the weigla and Sand cherry. Together they look too dark. Against a green background they provide contrast and "pop". Maybe put the red azalea and rhododendron next to them? Perhaps the azalea in front of the rhododedron?

The blue hydrangea would look good next to the Alberta Spruce.

Do you have anything with orange or violet flowers?

My image is...the rhododendron in front of the white fence. Two alberta Spruce in the gap set back. Azalea in front of the Alberta Spruce or Rhododendron. Weigla overlapping between the gap and the picket fence. Daylies in the gap. Sand cherry in the gap

I have some Rhododendrons in full sun and they are decades old, so despite what the books may say, some varieties do fine in full sun. One is an old deep pink variety and the other is a newer white one. But, if you need them to pe part shaded by some of your other plants, they would also be fine.

My oak leaf hydrangea is also in full sun (8+ hours in summer) and it is also decades old and grows like a weed. In fact I just cut it back last week because it was outgrowing its area. Again, they will tolerate some shade, but I've no problem having it in full sun.

The Alberta spruce does grow fairly slowly, but that may not be a bad thing for the area in which you might use them. The azaleas toward the front, and daylilies at the very front would be a nice transition from lawn to low to higher plants.

Please see the attached photo of the area I need help and ideas in landscaping.

It is approximately 60 feet from the back of the house.

Thank You

NHBabs and forum members,

Do you think I can use the existing plants I have that are listed above to landscape the area?
And if so; do you have any suggestions on how to lay them out?

Thanks

The biggest problem I see with trying to use only what you have is that none of them are big enough to match the fences. So it is always going to look like you have tried to plug a hole with something too small. Some of the plants can be use in front of something larger, but you are going to have to somehow acquire the something larger.

Any plant suggestions and where they should be planted?

Have you thought about getting a small section of fence to match the picket fence along the back and extending it to meet the privacy fence on the right? Since it's only 15 ft, I can't imagine it would be that expensive (a few $100 or less, maybe?) I think that would be by far the best way to close the gap in a way that looks intentional. Then you can plant in front of the fence in a way that's not dictated by the gap.

Yes. Plant the Rhododendron and Endless Summer Hydrangeas in front of the solid white fence. Plant the Weigela and sand cherry in front of the white picket fence. Plant the azalea in a row across the front to form a triangle. Plant the Oak Leaf Hydrangea in front of the blue wall in the back. Plant the spruce in the middle of the triangle. Scatter the lilies in bunches around the triangle. It will look sparse at first, but the Weigela and Rododendron will get big eventually.

Ideally add some violet azalea to the row of azalea and scatter some orange tiger lilies among the lilies. Also put some tiger lilies in front of the blue wall. That would tie things together from a complementary color standpoint. (The orange tiger lilies would be complementary with the blue of the wall and the hydrangea while analogous to the yellow lilies. The violet azalea would be complementary with the yellow lilies).

thanks,

I am not
really sure if I am following the lay-out properly with regards to the quantity of
each plant type in the locations described.

I am
not very good at visualization.

Here is the list of plants I have.

4 Endless Summer Hydrangeas 1 Oak Leaf Hydrangea (2' tall propagrated plant; has not flowered yet) 2 Low growing red Azaleas 2 Red flowering rhododendrons (I am not sure of the variety; currently they are 3' tall most of the foliage is at the top of the plants) 2 Common Boxwoods 2 Dwarf Alberta Spruce 1 Red Wine Weigla 1 Red Prince Weigla 1 Sand Cherry Plant and several yellow daylilies. Thanks

.

I'd start at the back of the bed with either a couple of large shrubs (forsythia, lilac, whatever), or small trees (dogwood, small magnolia, redbud), then put the rhododendrons on one side, and the boxwoods on the other. The Endless Summers can go in the middle with the daylilies on either side. The azaleas can go in front of the boxwood.

I have not been able to get oak leaf hydrangeas established, and know other people here have also had trouble with them. Dwarf Alberta spruces can be difficult to integrate because they tend to grow in an oddly formal way. The other plants I'm not sure how big they will get, to know where they can go in front/behind. Old fashioned weigela is a large shrub, but most of the modern introductions are much smaller.

gle - one of the difficulties I am having is that without variety names, I have no clue of height, so that makes it difficult to arrange. For instance I have rhodies that stop at less than 3', but there are others that can get to something like 20' in your zone. Similarly, Weigelas can range from about a foot to over 6'. Gardening is an art as much as a science, and being given such a specific plant pallet also makes it difficult for me. I am more likely to look at function and growing conditions and then decide on plants. It's less a lack of wanting to help than just not knowing enough.

I like the suggestions of adding a short span of picket fence to make this look intentional, and also to have a small tree or two, otherwise this will end up being too sunny for several of the plants such as the hydrangea to really thrive. You have some suggestions of what to put in front and what to put in back and generally where. I'd probably at this point sketch up a plan and just go for it. Doing the actual transplanting on a damp day will give you some time to move plants around a bit to get an arrangement you like. Leave more room between the plants than you think is needed since having them too crowded will lead to issues in the long run - they need room to grow. Since you have enough for several layers of plants, you will get better blocking of the view than with just a single row of plants, especially if you look from the deck and assure that plants are staggered to fill visual gaps. Install the fence and a small tree or two (you could use the sand cherry as one if it's healthy), move the shrubs, and then mulch and edge. I am not a fan of Dwarf Alberta spruce in this type of mixed shrub border so I would find another spot for them or advertise them on Craigslist for free to see if you can get rid of them. If the bed doesn't work out in the long run, or you decide you don't like it, you will have had a few years of your shrub border and can then move or remove plants, but you won't have been out any money in the meanwhile.

thank you for your idea's

With regards to the fence I was trying to avoid adding any more picket fence because I am not sure if having an extra post next the two existing post would look very good.

I am sorry if I didn't respond to the other lay-out comments.

The reason being; as I tried explaining early in my posting I do not have visualization skills. In other words; I need specifics. i.e starting from the left plant shrub A followed by shrub B, with shrub C spaced between shrub A and B; etc.

Thank you all again for trying to help a novice.

What is not shown is; behind the space is an approximate 5' drop down into the neighbors backyard (Blue house), so I am not open to adding anything such as a trellis to bring anyone to the area because of the drop off. I am open to added plant suggestions to use along with some of the plants I have on-hand if possible. Thanks

We really like the star magnolia.

Is it a tree or shrub, can it be used as a center piece planting, and will it do well in full sun?

Yes it can be used as a center piece, and yes it will do well in full sun. Give it plenty of room to the sides and don't plant anything taller than a couple of feet in front of it (perhaps the daylilies) since the bark and buds are lovely in winter, and it will flower and branch starting low to the ground, so you want to be able to see essentially the whole thing in late fall-late spring.

Ask locally if star magnolia do well. Here, they are one of the few things that regularly gets frosted.