hey

temporary water is unimportant ... especially this time of year in MI ....

i would suggest you will do more harm than good trying to remedy it ...

if you can somehow dig a ditch/culvert.. to simply allow the water to escape .. without disturbing the plants.. all the better ...

we dont really change our methods .. for a once a decade problem .. other than to consider a french drain ....

i dont know what this means: less-than-partial shade

less the part shade .. in my book is darkness ... a grotto
as to how much sun .. or lack thereof.. that a plant can take.. you are left to speculation... plant it.. if it doesnt perform.. move it ...

ken

Thanks for your helpful comments. I think I'll move the fothergilla, since it's surrounded by water and probably won't get enough sun where it is anyway when the trees have fully leafed. I'll leave the viburnums and keep an eye on them.

Less than part shade = less than 4 hours of direct sunlight, so it gets filtered light part of the day.

Anne

I don't know about the fothergilla (I'm getting Blue Shadows in a couple of weeks to try), but I have Viburnum tomentosum and Viburnum rhytidophylloides 'Alleghany' and my yard floods every spring and neither viburnum seem to mind. The ground has been saturated for several weeks with standing water around where these plants are growing and they're leafing out and showing lots of flower buds (on the tomentosum, anyway). In the summer, when we dry out and don't have rain for weeks is when the viburnum tend to look stressed, so I give them all a good soaking and they perk up. The viburnum love the water. And so do the gazillion mosquitoes we get every year.

Karen

Karen, thanks for the comforting comments! I agree about too much dryness--I'd moved the Shoshoni from a well drained, not moist area in part shade and only morning sunlight where its drooping foliage (along with the cornus florida) during the drought last summer was my first signal to water everything again. I was afraid that maybe I'd gone too far in putting it so close to the rising water in the pond.

I had to chuckle when reading that "the plants are leafing out and showing lots of flower buds" after being in standing water for several weeks, because we cut down some 6" to 12" in diameter oak trees a month ago, and their branches are still putting out buds and leaves as they lie on the ground waiting to be burned--not dead yet! I'm always concerned about the long term effects of something, because I'd like to avoid having to remove and replant when I'm older. I've got enough aches and pains doing it now!

Anne