Advice on Jasmine please

[Twiglett]

OK, I who knows nothing about gardens have a small south-facing garden, at the bottom is a brick-wall against which we've planted a Jasmine Originalis (2 years ago) - 2 gardening experts told us it would be fine because even though its a north facing wall it gets a lot of morning sun

Anyhoo - Jasmine is fine in the summer, does grow and flower but is not really lovely and bushy and covering the wall - it is more spindly and weak really

So do I give up and plant another evergreen climber (if so, recommendations would be great), or do I just plant a couple more and hope it will cover the wall

Oh and I thought Jasmine was evergreen -- this one dies off in the winter?

I've got one of these as well. It's spindly at the bottom with all the growth at the top. It's intertwined with some sort of viney thing -Virginia creeper? - they were both here when we moved in. It loses most of its leaves in the winter, though I think it's lucky to have survived at all this far north.

Snap. I'm in the same position, will be interested to hear anyone's advice. I actually bought mine by mistake - the plant I really had in mind was the potato vine, solanum album, one of which I have now bought and it's much more vigorous.

So what should we all do with our weedy jasmines? On this evidence, it looks like they do need to be combined with another plant to cover their nakedness.

Twiglett - the (rather slow growing) but evergreen jasmine is Trachleospermum Jasminoides. Lovely smell. Pretty enough leaves.

You could also run with an evergreen clematis: clematis armandii. The leaves are slightly long and finger-like and not very subtle, and the scent hits you like Mike Tyson instead of

BTW - you would probably want to give your spindly Jasmine a rather vicious chop to encourage new seasonal growth, and then a nice pile of manure for the soil to feed it.

I am considering Rosa banksiae lutea for somewhere in my garden. It is a thornless, evergreen, scented rose with yellow flowers ! How perfect is that combo ? !!! It's got a reuptation for being a bit of a rambling thug, but that might be just what you want !

You're really beginning to tempt me with that rose, hub2dee. I've got an ancient apple tree to cover as well as a weedy jasmine.

tiddly - I wonder if it might get too big for the tree ? It apparently can run to enormous lengths.... perhaps you're setting yourself up for a pruning nightmare ?

But what do I know ? I haven't planted the damn thing yet.

There are other thornless roses, if that was what particularly tempted you which may be more suitable.

This page on David Austin's site here has a list (and links) to about a dozen recommended roses - scroll down.

Twig - it also has a list for North facing walls.

(If you want the full site navigation, you'll have to jump to their home page)

mmmmm...I'll keep you posted, hope you keep us posted on that rose. Might nip down to Wisley to have a look. I'm not really much of a rose person, tho, so I lose interest if faced with too much choice. Did you buy yours from a nursery? Mail order plants die in my hands, so can't do that.

tiddly - ordered all mine from nurseries / specialistst, including David Austin Roses.

i have a potato vine on my garden shed, not as ugly as you might visualize, and it has a lovely flower and is evergreen , very fast growing, its latin name is much more attractive - cant remeber it, looks after itself.

last summer it grew 6/7ft and rapidly spreads out the ways too

Message withdrawn

onlineid: could it be worth a hack attack to force new growth lower down ?

Our Jasmine Originalis has been in for about 6 years andwas spindly and weak looking for the first couple of years, but then really took off, and is now attempting to take over the universe (or at least the apple tree, the shed, our neighbour's shed ...). So perhaps all it needs is time. The other thing you could try is to shade the roots from your early morning sun - some climbers prefer this and I think Jasmine is one of them. A bit of slate or some gravel over the top of the soil would do it.

(irrelevant) - wasn't it great Kew got World Heritage status (just watched a video of Friday night's gardening fix) !

Thank you - didn't realise I needed to shade roots

will give it another year I think and see what happens

hermykne, is it a Solanum? I'm thinking of getting one of those.

I've got two semi evergreen Honeysuckle (Lonicera) and a Clematis. The Clematis isn't evergreen, so no good for cover (but looks good climbing through the holly .

I like some climbers mixed together, sometimes it's easier to get what you are looking for all year round.