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Plant IDs

LucidLucid Posts: 385
in Plants
Hi everyone,

I wondered if anyone knew the IDs of the following plants please? We're currently reviewing certain plants in our new garden to see what is good for keeping as it is.

1. There are several of these small plants appearing near the bases of leylandii hedging:




2. Not seen the flowers on this shrub yet but they look like they're going to be white. The shrub is an evergreen:





3. So far we've not seen any flowers on this shrub so I appreciate it might be hard to ID on leaves alone. It's a nice olive green colour and evergreen:





4. This is a really scruffy looking trailing type of shrub and we're just intrigued to know what it is:




Thanks for any help that can be given.

Lucid :)

Posts

  • bullfinchbullfinch Posts: 591
    The second picture looks like a camellia, a lovely one too 🙂
  • PerkiPerki Posts: 2,327
    1 . Euphorbia 
    2. camellia 
    3. Elaeagnus Ebbingei , its the bob standard one , mother plant to lots of other varieties 
    4. winter jasmine ( jasminun nudiflorum )
  • delskidelski Posts: 274
    Agree with 1) euphorbia, maybe robbiae and 2) camellia.
    I personally don't like the euphorbia; it was overunning my borders when I moved in, so it's very usefull for filling space in dry/shady/sunny/whatever areas near leylandii/conifers. I pulled a lot out but a few clumps have persisted. Those lighter green tips will grow upwards to form (imo, ugly) flowers) in the next few months.

  • rachelQrtJHBjbrachelQrtJHBjb Posts: 819
    The camellia, picture 2, looks very healthy with its deep green leaves so you probably have acid soil. I expect gardens in the area may also have rhododendrons and other acid-lovers such as pieris.

    Camellia buds always look like that, irrespective of flower colour. You can expect a really good display of flowers in the white, yellow, pink or red spectrum. If the flowers brown prematurely it's because they will have been hit by frost. Don't worry, it doesn't damage the plant and when they drop more buds will open to replace them.
  • LucidLucid Posts: 385
    Thanks so much for your replies @bullfinch, @Perki, @delski and @rachelQrtJHBjb. I think the camellia sounds really interesting, as well as the elaeagnus ebbingei. It'd be good to have a couple of really mature shrubs as a starting base. A lot of the shrubs in the garden are full of sticks and pretty much no leaves, and we're getting the run of leylandii hedging removed from both sides. Although the green is nice to have, the garden was so shaded in the late Summer that we couldn't sit out there as were getting constantly bitten by mosquitos. The Winter jasmine also sounds interesting and we'll have to see if that can be moved perhaps. It's currently in total shade which I guess accounts for why it looks extra scruffy. On the euphorbia, I don't think we'd want them but my mother-in-law was hoping they were rhododendrons and wanted us to pot them up for her.

    Lucid :)
  • rachelQrtJHBjbrachelQrtJHBjb Posts: 819
    Just out of interest @Lucid do you think the midges are coming from the leylandii? Do they actually bite you or are they bothersome because there are so many in the air, making sitting out unpleasant? They could be cypress aphids rather than mosquitoes?

    This link to the RHS page may be helpful  
    https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?pid=931
  • Lizzie27Lizzie27 Posts: 10,808
    @Lucid, if you do dig out the euphorbia, just be aware that the sap is a skin irritant and can result in blisters so gloves would be good.
    North East Somerset - Clay soil over limestone
  • Loraine3Loraine3 Posts: 558
    The winter jasmine will root wherever a shoot touches the ground, so you may find plants that you can move to more suitable places. It also takes quite severe pruning.
  • LucidLucid Posts: 385
    @rachelQrtJHBjb - Thanks for your post. They were definitely mosquitoes as they bit us continuously, especially me as I seem to attract them with no trouble. You'd be out there and they were straight on you, to the point where we hardly went outside if we could help it. We've got a small pond and there's lots of shady spots in the garden near the pond, including a completely grown over mass of small trees and shrubs that you have to walk under a densely covered archway to get through to the other side. I think they must have really thrived in the garden with all the shade around. The plan is to remove all of the leylandii over the next few weeks and replace with fencing. We'll remove all of the killed off shrubs and small trees that are littered about, but I want to keep some good and established plants and shrubs, at least for now. The garden is going to take a huge amount of work as it's not very level and needs drainage improvements, so some mature shrubs in the meantime will be great to have around for the birds. We're going to replace the pond with a bigger one but the hope is if we can open up the garden much more, it won't be so shady, and we'll at least have areas we can escape to from mosquitoes in the daytime when the sun is out. In our previous garden we had a pond but it was very sunny and the mosquitoes only started to arrive as the sun got lower later in the day.

    @Lizzie27 - Thanks for the tip. I will check with my mother-in-law but as it seems that they're not rhododendrons I don't imagine she'll still want them. I'll be sure to use gloves and long sleeves.

    @Loraine3 - Thanks and that's great to know. I have to say that I hadn't expected to keep it as it looks so scruffy, but actually if we can find the right spot I think it'd be nice to have some colour over Winter.

    Lucid :)
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