The Golden State: Where & How to Live, Secure, Visit, Enjoy and Thrive in California

Small Home Landscaping

Then there are shrubs which, no matter where they are planted, are individuals; they just do not mix. Among them are the hydrangeas. Straight-stemmed shrubs with a woody, long appearance in winter, they are useful for their summer bloom. The peegee variety can be grown tall and its base clothed with medium-sized shrubs like barberry which will give fall and winter color. The general distance for planting shrubs in a border or in a mass is three to four feet apart. Most, except lilacs and the large viburnums or others over ten feet, do well at this spacing. Closer planting will give you a quicker effect, but later the plants will rob each other of food, light and moisture, and grow tall and willowy, with bare stems at the base. Flowering will be sparse too.

Massed shrubs should cover the ground on both sides to reduce grass-cutting areas. It should not be necessary to cut grass under or between them if they are planted correctly. The soft pendant shrubs generally reach out and cover the ground but the more upright-growing kinds (unless used as a flowering hedge) look better if low-blending shrubs are set around the bases of the taller ones. This requires less upkeep too, of course. The upright stems of lilac or Rose-of-Sharon, for example, look better when covered with lower-growing Euonymus compacta or St. Johns-wort—or a similar type. Select shrubs giving more than display, that is, which flower at different times and give fall color.