This trees and shrubs in this design have already been planted but now we are struggling with what and where to plant in the way of perennials. Thanks in advance!

get adult beverage ..

get lawn chair

place it where you most likely will spend time sitting ..

sip adult beverage..

and decide where in that vista you wish to add color for your viewing pleasure ..

personally i can not tell you.. from a drawing..

what would be the use of putting such way out back across the lawn ... heck..after a few ABev's.. you wont even be able to see way out back ... lol ...

so after the pitcher of AB's is gone.. drag yourself back in the house to get the camera.. and give us a few shots of where you would be sitting.. so we can give you ideas about what to put in a given seating position ...

make any sense ..

if the trees are planted.. in other words.. the backbone is in..

i say its time to forget about the drawing.. and go sit out there..

ken

ps: move the chair around to various positions.. to define various bed designs .... start with the closest.. we have years to fill outwards ...

If there is a bush or tree area that I would like some color. I like to plant clematis.

I like fragrance near any sitting areas and entrance....front door, and coming down the driveway. I plant fragrant bushes, Lilacs, I have two reblooming lilacs on either side of the patio.

Next I do bulbs, bulbs, bulbs....Spring Hyacith, Daffs, Late Spring Asiatic, Summer, Oriental Lilies, LA Lilies, Orientpet Lilies. I get on the net, go through catalogs, visit nurseries and buy, buy, buy whatever looks pretty to me.

Others that may be able to go by a drawing might be able to give you more suggestions.

Do the same thing next month, and the month after that until October.

Do the same thing next year.

If something does particularly well, think about other places you might want similar things. If something does particularly badly, remember that and try to avoid it in the future.

Continue until the backyard is jammed full of plants.

Compared to trees, perennials are cheap and easily moved. They also tend to take a certain amount of maintenance, so they aren't for people who want to plant and forget. Getting to know them is part of the experience.

Southwest corner of backyard along deck

Northwest corner of backyard along deck (lilacs)

Center of back deck

North side of yard (river birches)

Northeast corner of yard

Another picture of northeast corner

Back of house

Back of yard (east side) facing south

Back of yard (east side) facing north

Future site of deck (12x16')

Your landscaping looks like it is off to a great start. I like your selection of trees and shrubs - some great natives. Is the back of the house on the north side?? If so, the house will cast a lot of shade. There are many sun-loving perennials that will do okay in partial sun and there are lots of woodland plants that do well in shady spots, but TOTAL shade is hard to deal with.

Anyway, when I started gardening with perennials in 2004, I read, read, and read some more, websites like perennials.com and the Missouri Botanical Garden database. You can search for plants that have certain features (sun requirements, fragrance, etc.). Like Mad-gallica, I went to the nurseries and browsed and read labels. Also there are some excellent books on perennials, which could be bought used on Amazon or better yet, check them out from the library to see which you like.

While your perennials are getting established, don't forget annuals. Most of them like lots of sun and you have lots of sunny spots in the back yard. They grow quick and are colorful all season. There are endless choices like Sunflowers, Zinnias, Cosmos, Tithonia, Salvia, Petunias, marigolds, etc. A plot of mammoth Sunflowers makes an impressive statement (not to mention, the birds go nuts over the seeds).

First, you have to consider light, temperature, and soil conditions for each bed. Then, you have to decide what kind of look you want and how much maintenance you can afford.
Do you want color? Or texture? Or blooming?

Maybe, you should post several threads for each bed, describing size, sun exposure, and other requirements.

Thanks for sharing.

So, I think it's a good idea to sit back there and see what areas you notice most, where you feel you need to start -- and what colors or textures in general might be good there. It sounds like you have done some of this already.

So moving on from that, to be honest I think more important to me than a detailed analysis of each site, are two things: The overall look and style of what you want (Woodland?), and your budget (and what is most important to you to do with the first year's funds).

My impression is that you have quite a bit of space, and deep beds (as you say at least one will have a path through it, right?). Also, as your trees are not mature yet, the sun/shade conditions are going to evolve over the coming years.

A woodland garden to me suggests a lot of shade/dappled light, and most plants that appear "woodsy" to me do well in those conditions. It sounds like you have some good areas for that, although some of the spots around the small trees for now are going to need plants that are OK with sun!

I agree with the suggestion to go to (several - or at least two) nurseries, maybe a large one or a chain, and a smaller one or a place that specializes in native plants for example. Two places so you can get a better cross section of what's available. See what catches your eye knowing you are looking for part shade, some sun, and whatever else you know about the general conditions.

I would add that I am not too fussy about the details of conditions (i.e. intricate soil analysis, just exactly how moist it is, etc.). Then again I amended my soil heavily with compost when I designed the beds, and we have reasonable soil here in my Great Lakes region, if you have clay or sandy soil you might need to look into that all further. I have had one or two things die over the years but almost none, and I just plant them where they think they will look good and get approx the right amount of sun. I don't fertilize. After a plant's first year I don't water except perhaps in extreme heat or drought. I don't deadhead, but I do prune once or twice a season...

I prefer a cottage garden style, with lots of variety so my suggestions are going to be along that line -- but I also tell you some ideas for shadier and woodland plants I've liked. My garden gets sun to part sun to part shade.

Here are some things that have done well for me with this low maintenance treatment (these are some backbone plants - i actually have a ton of other "specimens" and colors thrown in, but these were some I started with):

Sunny Spots (mine get it until early afternoon)
Walker's Low Catmint (though right now it is flopping, I think I have to give it a prune).
Rudbeckia (black eyed susans - check out some of the more unusual varieties!)
Purple Coneflower
Grasses (maindenhair and others) - fast growing, privacy, and good for "natural"-ish looking areas.
Sedum and other smaller succulents, and hens and chicks
Irises (historical varieties in my garden)
Daylillies (I don't like these because they are SO common, but they are so low maintenance and look neat and clean, a good backbone plant -- PLEASE get something OTHER than Stella D'Oro golden yellow color, try pink or some other new color options!)
Flowering Chives, Sage that flowers with lovely purple spikes, and other herbs - many self seed (chives can be invasive but mine is well behaved), these add scent and are edible which I love.

Many hostas are good low maintenance fast growers and many of them could take the sun now and will be OK with dappled shade when you trees grow - check the types. Again I would encourage you to pick two or three more unusual types or leaves with colorful variegation, if it were me. Otherwise they tend to look a little... boring or generic to me, but then again that's just an opinion.

Shadier/Woodland
Astilbe
Pulmonaria (part shade I think?)
Ferns!
hmm I'll have to think about more but obviously you can get ideas on any nursery site in the shade section - these are ones that have done well for me.

In terms of how to go about planting what where and making decisions here's what I keep in mind:

-low in the front, mid height in the middle, and tall in the back of course... also applies to your paths, put low growers by the paths.

-GROUPINGS and REPEATING plants, types and colors -- unity is important to me in overall garden design. I add in random plants and I like variety, BUT i try to repeat some of the same backbone plants, edging and long bloomers from bed to bed -- or at least the colors (for me lime and silver foliage, and blue and purple blooms accented with organge). To avoid getting boring or looking like a commercial mass planting, try repeating some themes but with different plants - i.e. different plants with similar speckled whiteish foliage in different areas.

- Vingettes areas and avoiding "lonely plants": Dont' be stingy with the plants (I don't mean just $)... budget is key, but I'd choose to buy less expensive varieties to start in order to plant lush groupings of 3-5 plants, buy some larger mature plants to fill things in, etc. And start thigns from inexpensive seed, perhaps even some fast growing annuals this year. But I don't really mean stingy in terms of spending -- try to plant groupings as I mentioned before so things don't look lonely, even if there is large swaths of bare mulch between the little "scenes" you start this year. I find this much more pleasing than spacing things wayyyy out and waiting for them to fill in.

- add inexpensive seeds and bulbs, and think of next year. Plant things now that will grow for you next year, perennials, self-seed annuals (forget me nots! great for woodland areas in my opinion too, and in my yard they grow in sun and part sun to even a bit of shade).

Good luck tell us how it's going and post more pics!

Best,

N

don't count on the reblooming all season.

(from another post in perennials this week)