Shady characters - a permanent home for shade garden suggestions!

[shovetheholly]

Because we get the question about what will grow in the shade so often, posts about it sometimes don't get many answers. So I thought I'd make a permanent thread that we can point people to when this comes up. I know some of you have written the same thing 10 or 20 times before, so hopefully this will save the repetition!

I'm hoping we can post some pictures of shade plants here so that people can see what they look like. A lot of them aren't all that familiar. Plus, I love pictures!!

This thread needs a mention of the fantastic nursery Long Acre Plants who cater for all kinds of shady areas and are very informative

website here

I have Aconitum nappellus (Monkshood) doing very well in my shady garden and responding well to division as well

Lovely thread idea, thank you. Watching keenly for when I sort my shady patch. Currently adding loads of compost and getting rid of large stones. The joys of a new build. Good news is it used to be a farm so the soil is pretty good.

Aconite is very poisonous by the way so don't eat it.

Is there any type of hedging that grows well in shade. I have a garden wall on the west of my garden that only gets sun for a couple of hours in the morning and I need to grow something against it that sits tight to the wall, grows to a metre or so and doesn't spread outwards.

Arisaema are really unusual shade plants from china and Japan- sort of like cuckoo pint on steroids with lovely big, lobed leaves. Grew well in moist sandy loam in my old garden. Would love to get another one. Also liked my toad Lilly (trycitis?).

Can anyone recommend a good website to buy plants please? I like the look of some of these ideas but I never focus in the garden centre and end up impulse buying lots of things I don't need!

Plantsforshade.co.uk I have found good.

Yes, that plants for shade (otherwise known as Long Acre Plants) is brilliant. Everything I've had from them has thrived - they're good plants with good root systems at a reasonable price.

cuttedup - I love aconite, and I am always tempted by it. But I've been really put off by the stories of gardeners actually dying from touching it without gloves. There was that poor fella recently, for instance! I also worry about my (very stupid) cat chomping it. He seems to eat a lot of plants in the garden and not just grass Is it as dangerous as reports suggest?

OK, some shady climbers today.

Here's clematis armandii - it's quite a rampant climber, is evergreen, and has very early white flowers which have a nice smell. What more could you ask for in a climber? Like most clematis, it likes to have moist, cool roots.

Another classic shade loving climber is Hydrangea anomala subsp. 'petiolaris'. It's quite woody and self-supporting. Prune carefully and selectively, because it flowers on the last year's wood. Likes damp soil but will tolerate quite dark, dank conditions.

Another clematis - this time a deciduous one, clematis rehderiana. This is a big beast that likes more partial, dappled shade - it will happily scramble over a darker wall provided it gets a little bit of sun during the day. Also called 'nodding virgin's bower'

And another climbing hydrangea, though you might not guess it was by the look of it! This is the evergreen Pileostegia viburnoides. I haven't grown this one myself yet, but I like it's slightly exotic-looking, shiny dark green leaves - and they emerge pink! It has sprays of white flowers that are slightly less neat than those of the hydrangea above. Will tolerate full shade, but apparently happier in partial.

Eep, that picture looks a lot like the other hydrangea! It's quite different - here's a close up.

Finally, this is one of my favourite climbing plants - I really, really am desperate to make room for it in my garden because I just LOVE it!

It's Garrya elliptica 'James Roof' (aka the 'Silk Tassle Bush') and it has the most wonderful long tassles right in the deepest, darkest depths of winter, when you really, really need interest. It's evergreen, too, with gorgeous green glossy leaves. It's quite a woody-stemmed thing, so it's a climber that needs a bit of space - but if you prune it well, it can have the most lovely form. Will stand alone, but it has a tendency to get damaged in harsh, cold winds, so growing against a north or east facing wall is ideal - little plants may need wrapping in fleece over winter. It does need free-draining soil, which is why I'm pausing a bit on my heavy clay.

It comes in two forms - male and female. The male has longer catkins, the female has shorter but perhaps prettier ones. Check when you buy which you are getting!

Oh, and totally agree with the need to improve soil. And that 1cm of mulch per year is not even close to enough!

I suspect not adding enough mulch is the number one mistake of the vast majority of new gardeners on any soil and in any conditions. It is staggering how much you need to give a really deep, thick covering. I use home-made compost and leaf mould mixed with cheapo stuff from the garden centre, and a bit of grit.

Any views on when to mulch? I generally do it in autumn, but have read people saying that it's better in the spring as you supply nutrients to the plants when they need them.

Thanks for websites. I love clematis and hydrangea and climbers would be perfect for covering the fence. Are there particular times of year to plant them?

My mil was very ill through cutting aconite in her garden. She thought it was a dodgy curry but it was the aconite! Dreadful dtomavh cramps and diarrhoea and possibly vomiting.

pointless - I think early autumn would be ideal. Let them get their roots down a bit into the warm soil.

Haggis - oh lord! I'm so glad she recovered and is fine. I have heard several anecdotes like that about aconite, but it was the death of Nathan Greenaway from possible aconite poisoning that really made me think twice:

www.itv.com/news/meridian/2015-06-24/mystery-surrounds-death-of-hampshire-gardener/

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-29949698

Early autumn is perfect, gives me a few weeks to decide what I want and do some weeding/digging.

Shameless place marking. I have more of a forest than a garden.

Picture for Shove
I bought them at the Ghibli museum.

TOTORO!!!!!!

The Ghibli museum in Japan?? I went there on honeymoon! It was sooooo great. I love the fact that you have all three totoros - and an acorn! (Practically the only Japanese word I know is 'dongari' (acorn) from that film. It is not really the most useful word to remember!!)

I have a kitten bus too.

Pointless If you are going to put climbing hydrangea on a fence, you'd need to make sure it was fairly new and very sturdy. They take a few years to get going, and when they do, they're very 'meaty' plants.

Fence painting/preserving are difficult unless you grow them on a frame attached to the uprights so that you could lift it forward a bit to paint behind.

Mine also has aerial roots that help it cling to the wall. TBH even at 6 foot, my wall isn't really tall enough so I train it sideways as much as I can. The stems tend to be quite brittle too, which makes training trickier.

I think it's more of an 'investment' plant iyswim - it really does take time to establish.