Green flowers and cammouflage?

Okay, I posted in Daylillies too, because they would survive in this spot too....

First the spot was for a hummingbird garden in the part shade area, and evergreen privacy screen along the whole area. Can you say trash piles on the other side of the fence? Horrid view from my bedroom in winter.

Then, I fell in love with blue/violet stuff for the "deep shade" side.

So, now I've decided on sort of a rainbow theme to tie it all together. I might just use some green foliage/white blooms in the "green" section if I don't have a ton of luck.

Any suggestions on the green bloom? How about taller, evergreen stuff for RI?

-Lu

-Lu

Is it sun or shade?

Definately shady. Little bit of sun around midday, and some filtered light in the evening at best.

How about lady's mantle?

Perfect!

Euphorbia 'Robbiae' chartreuse flowers in spring and they sort of stay on....Helllebores (some turn green) after blooming and the foetidus is green in very late winter.

Hmm, I wonder how the foetidus bloom would be here? We're a bit colder....

I forgot about the hellebores... I have some that I put in just last year, so I haven't had blooms yet.

Would you consider leaves that have a chartreusy effect like certain variegated green and gold ones?

I love variegated yellow and green foliage that looks sorta chartreusy with violet-blues. We echo the yellow/greens at the end of a shaded yew walk at a tall blue gate in Hosta 'Frances Williams', green/gold var. liriope (violet-blue flowers August) and green/gold ivy in the yew (not an aggressive grower for us). These plants are all across the path from each other - not grouped in same bed. We enjoy the light effects at the "end of the tunnel". The dark purple leaved Viola labradorica has self-sowed into little carpets at their feet.

White flowered, tall Japanese anemones are back there, too. It's useful to grow these anemones over a low mass of ferns where they can flop to their hearts' content in the shade. This variety was sold to us as 'Honorine Jobert', but I'm not sure it's accurate.

Something else with black tones would add some gravity to the mix - perhaps a dark purple leaved Japanese cimifuga - C. 'Elstead' does well for us here. The white flowers seem to float alone in the shade. I wouldn't put it right up against the gold/green variegated leaves, though - might use a plain green intermediary between the two like thalictrum aquilegifolium (Hortus III) with pale mauve flowers. Although cutting back after flowering encourages better looking leaves on the thalictrum, it still needs something to "face it down" - a low astilbe would do this without overrunning its bounds.

For taller, evergreen screening - if I were to start all over again, instead of planting a single line of what is supposed to be a "narrow, columnar" cultivar of yew like Taxus 'Hicksii', I would plant two double, staggered lines of the skinnier Taxus 'Bean Pole'. Pruning has become a struggle with the Hicks variety, and I think Bean Pole would be easier to manage in the long run. Just be sure to prune it back hard the first three years to make it bushy and more self-supporting (especially in the snow) in its maturity. I think Ilex 'Sky Pencil' might be another good one for your area. I'm not sure whether Buxus 'Graham Blandy' would be dependably hardy where you live.

If you have room for a thicker screen, those threadleaf Chamaecyparis pisifera cultivars in different shades of green, gold and blue are said to make wonder tapestry hedges - not sure how your color scheme would do with that. They can take some shade, though not as much as yew.

With our budget, we have worked with seeds, cuttings, and small rooted starts. So, when making a screen of plants that won't mature for a few years, we have planted them along a trellis that gives some immediate architectural demarcation.

This is turning into a book - sorry about being windy. The chartreusy colors do go into violet-blue, here, but not directly. The two color groups turn on a fulcrum of black-purple leaved Prunus cistena in the center, which is "arborized" to look like a very small tree.

Let me know if you want me to continue with what we've done with blue-violet in that area.

Woo! Great suggestions!!! I'll be busy w/ research, that's for sure!!!
Those all sound incredible!

-Lu

Lu, it might be best, if you use variegated leaves among the flowers, to stick with a solid green background. Also, as wonderful as the black-green of the yew is, it does have chartreusy-green new growth in the spring. We have underplanted our yew with an evergreen, cream and green variegated periwinkle that blooms surprisingly often from late March December. I don't know if this is considered as invasive as the solid green form.

For boundary plantings that screen, thickets would be fun and great harbor for birds. I need to research interpretations of this with native plants, myself. Do you have enough room for a 10' or 15' width to give to such a planting? Repeating groups of, say, 3 or 5 Virginia cedars (invasive out west, but since they're native here, would they still be a no-no for us?) with groups of 7 (not necessarily in a straight line) highbush blueberries and maybe, on the corner, a native holly like Ilex opaca (can get quite large, maybe there are some smaller cultivars?) might be a start - notice balancing the 3 types of leaves: coniferous (cedar), deciduous (blueberry), and broadleaf (holly). Mountain laurel (kalmia sp.) is another native broadleaf, and there are many gorgeous, delicate, fragrant species of native azaleas.

I need to spend more time on the Indigenous Plants forum - Darwin has really inspired me to try harder to interpret design ideas with native plants.