Forum home› Plants

Anyone else have too many shrubs?

ManderMander Posts: 335
in Plants
I'm just thinking about the various cuttings and shrubs bought on a whim at the pound shop etc. that I have in pots all around the garden. I'm wondering what I'm going to do with them all. Probably trash them or give them away eventually but right now I have several fairly well established bits of chanomeles, camelia, hibiscus, forsythia, philadelphus, an azalea in a pot indoors that was part of a holiday arrangement, lots of climbing hydrangea cuttings, clematis, goji berry, tayberry, aucuba, photinia, and hebe. I already have too many shrubs in the ground as it is and the garden is fairly small.

Right now they are all in pots of various sizes but they probably can't stay that way for long. Maybe I should take a leaf from a neighbour and plant some of them in the scrubby woods nearby. Yesterday I noticed that somebody has planted one of those little "living Christmas trees" complete with the label from Lidl out there. It might be fun to give it some friends of the less invasive examples.

Posts

  • punkdocpunkdoc Posts: 14,381
    Please don't plant "domesticated" plants into woodland.
    How can you lie there and think of England
    When you don't even know who's in the team

    S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border
  • B3B3 Posts: 26,573
    Too many of the same cutting. You plant a few just in case and then they all root.
    I agree about not planting domestic plants in woodland. I think that it's wrong to chuck wildflower bombs in the countryside with no regard to the natural ecology is wrong too. 
    In London. Keen but lazy.
  • LoxleyLoxley Posts: 5,423
    I've taken on a bed at my local community garden to deal with 'overflow' perennials. Shrubs tend to go to my sister's garden, which is much bigger than mine. I find it hard to let go, some of the shrubs I can't find space for in the garden itself, I am keeping on in pots.
  • Nanny BeachNanny Beach Posts: 8,622
    Yes see if you have community garden,garden club,plant swap, Facebook,free or cheap, Freecycle
  • FireFire Posts: 17,403
    edited April 2021
    Get to know your neighbours - take cuttings and give them to locals.

    I am tussling with shrubs at the moment. They probably have 'structural' value but are not really my thing. I prefer trees, climbers and long season flowering plants. I have two shrubs left in my back garden having wittled them out over nine years. I don't like them much but they provide some good height to a small garden, winter evergreen interest and variation. Boring though. Cistus and shrubby potentilla do appeal.

    Buying stuff for the garden counts as consumerist mesmerism just as much as any other kind of shopping. (Mental note to self).
  • B3B3 Posts: 26,573
    Cistus , in my opinion, has a foul smell - well the white one does anyway. I have to hold my breath when I walk past a large one up the road. 
    In London. Keen but lazy.
  • ErgatesErgates Posts: 2,429
    Could you pop a few pots outside the front gate with a help yourself sign on them?
    Mind you, I did read about someone doing this with a piece of furniture, put a free, help yourself sign on it, it sat there for days. Put a new sign on, £40, and it was gone the next day!
  • ManderMander Posts: 335
    The woodland I have in mind is all waste ground that has been populated with volunteers, but I take your point. Shrubs seem to be easier to come by in the kinds of cheap places that I shop. I guess perennials are harder to keep alive?
Sign In or Register to comment.