Tuesday, September 22, 2015

Shade Garden

This is the shade garden along the side of my house. I worked very hard on it, and I'm happy with it and proud of it. It faces north and when I moved in it looked just awful.

This was taken in early September. There are ornamental grasses, hostas, columbines, coral bells, lamiums, Lady's Mantle, bugbane, Black-Eyed Susans, Brunneras, phlox, toad lilly, jacob's ladder, lungwort and ferns. When the garden is fully mature some plants will be between three and five feet tall, filling up the long blank wall. There will be color from spring to fall as well as different leaf shapes and textures. I'm excited.

This is what it looked like when I moved in last October.

This is what it looked like five  months ago in April. It was a disaster. Mulch was spread over that brown garden cloth, and weeds were growing through it. Underneath that was 2 inches of dirt and then under that was all sand. I had to hire a landscaper to clear it out and spread some topsoil. It was another month before I could put the plants in the ground.


This is the shade garden on Sunday.  Because I was delayed getting the plants in the ground, some of them didn't make it. Replacements arrived last week, and I also transplanted some things I had had in pots. Now everything is where it should be,

 Here's another view from the other end.  It's a perennial garden so everything here will come back again next year, and it will withstand any snow cover, which is a good thing,



because this is what it looked like last February.

11 comments:

Megan said...

Thank you for showing us these pics. I LURVE seeing the outcomes of other people's hard work! As someone who lives in a temperate climate, I find it hard to believe that those dear little plants can survive the NH snowstorms.

Megan
Sydney, Australia

blue star stitcher said...

Your garden looks lovely. As someone who lives somewhere that never gets snow that photo of what it looks like in February was frightening!

Millie said...

Actually Megan, New Hampshire is considered to be in a "temperate zone." LOL!

Millie said...

And I'd rather have snow than the risk of earthquakes or tsunamis.

Quiltdivajulie said...

Excellent post showing the results from this year's work (evil lymes notwithstanding) - but that snow photo -ACK !!!!!!

Exuberantcolor/Wanda S Hanson said...

You will enjoy that garden for years to come. It will fill in totally in the spring.

Anonymous said...

You did a great job! Looks great! The snow, yuk! I will show my husband the snow, he THINKS he wants to live somewhere it snows! yeah,right?

Pat said...

What a transformation! It looks great now and will be even better next year.

Mary Ellen said...

Your shade garden will be lovely next spring and spectacular in a few years.Perennials,as you no doubt know, do a lot of underground growing before the part above ground shows much promise. Our yard has morphed into a shade yard over the years and I have many of the same plants you do. Lungwort, despite its ungainly name, has become a favorite of mine. It was a new-to-me plant when it went into the ground. Prepare to be delighted next year!

Anonymous said...

Looks lovely! ~DKM

Just Ducky said...

Lots of work! Will be interesting to see how it looks a year from now.