Gardeners often come to embrace shrubs because we need low-maintenance plants. In my new garden, I’ve created a shrub garden that requires less work, and works with the limitations of my soil and space.
I have concentrated on water-loving shrubs like button bush, elderberry and willow, but the shrub list is long.
The earliest shrub to bloom in our neighborhood is Hamamelis or witch hazel. My neighbor’s witch hazel grows in front of her house and those twirly golden flowers are brilliant in a landscape where there is so little color. They began blooming in early March.
Witch hazels can grow to about 15 feet with a pretty wide spread. They like well drained, loamy soil and lots of sun. The flowers of a native witch hazel are a bright yellow. There are also cultivars that are different in size and color. Arnold’s Promise was introduced by the Arnold Arboretum about 40 years ago. It has large, fragrant flowers.
Hamamelis x intermedia “Diane” blooms at the end of winter and has deep red flowers that will age to a copper tone. There is very little fragrance. This cultivar will be about 10 feet, wide and tall. “Jelena” is a coppery orange and also blooms in March.
Depending on what you read, the size of these witch hazels seems to fluctuate. I think we can count on between 10 to 15 feet. After blooming in the spring, witch hazels should be pruned so they can bloom the following year.
The common pearlbush, (Exochorda racemosa) can grow to 6 feet or more, and is covered with white flowers in early May. Cultivars like Snow Day Surprise and Snow Day Blizzard are easy to find in garden centers. These will grow to about 3 or 4 feet, and will bloom profusely and beautifully in May. There is a lovely pearlbush on the Bridge of Flowers, but I cannot be sure of the cultivar. It is a stunning spring bloomer.
Pearlbush will need pruning when the flowers fall off because it is a shrub that blooms on “old wood” — the wood that will grow after pruning and will be old the following spring when buds bloom. If you prune a pearlbush in the spring, you will be throwing away all the spring buds.
The issue of old wood and new wood has confused many gardeners. I just attended the Western Massachusetts Master Gardeners spring symposium and attended a talk by John Barry. Barry is a hydrangea lover and told us how aggravated gardeners can get if they don’t understand old wood and new wood.
I have known these terms for a long time, but they confused me. In Heath, my first hydrangea was Mothlight. In my timidity I did not prune it much; I just cut out dead branches, or branches that crossed each other. Mothlight did not seem to care very much; it just grew to 10 feet or more with a wide spread.
Barry said that was understandable. Mothlight is a hydrangea in the paniculata family. It blooms on new wood, and if you are not pruning it at all, it will keep growing.
The thrust of Barry’s talk was really about the new smaller hydrangeas that are so useful for people with smaller gardens.
Barry offered a list of small hydrangeas in the Arborescens family that can tolerate some shade. These all bloom on new wood and should be pruned back to 1 or 2 feet in the very early spring, which is to say, now. They are hardy in our zone.
Some gardeners may be familiar with Annabelle, a very popular “mophead” with its large round flower. There are now two new similar cultivars. Invinciball has the biggest flowers and the sturdiest stems. Spirit II is the deliciously pink-flowered Annabelle.
Hydrangea paniculata is also called Hardy Hydrangea. All the hydrangeas I have grown have been paniculatas. Limelight, Firelight and Angel’s Blush are all doing well on my property’s south border. Barry said arborescens and paniculatas are just about fool proof in our area.
There are small paniculatas that have airier blossoms than arborescens. Little Lime, with green flowers, will only grow to 4 feet. Little Quickfire has flowers that turn from white to pink over the summer on a 4-foot shrub. BoBo has the largest white flowers in this group.
Hydrangeas bloom all summer and into the fall.
Callicarpa or American beauty bush is a relatively small shrub. In our climate, it will probably not grow much taller than 3 or 4 feet. It prefers a lot of sun and a well draining soil.
This small native shrub has insignificant white flowers in June. The real attraction in is the small purple fruits that appear in late August and last until hard frost.
Housekeeping: I made an error in my last column. Walter Cudnohufsky will be at Elmer’s Store, 396 Main St. in Ashfield, on Saturday, April 27 at 4 p.m. with his book, “Cultivating the Designer’s Mind: Principles and Process for Coherent Landscape Design.” On Wednesday, May 8, he will be at Boswell’s Books, 10 Bridge St. in Shelburne Falls, at 6:30 p.m.