Any suggestions for vines for the shady garden. We get some nice filtered sun and part day heat. Dicid or evergreen.
Devi, Hello from Anacortes..... How high do you want these plants to get? I like VINCA minor because it naturalizes well here. But, over time it can spread everywhere. AJUGA does about the same as the vinca. There are Cotoneasters and a couple of creeping Junipers, but they may require more sun than you have. Please do not plant any form of ivy - that will be around for ever! Especially where you don't want it. I have a book called "Right Plant, Right Place" by Nicola Ferguson, that groups plants by growth conditions, purpose, appearance, and many other things. You might find it helpful. barb
Thanks Barb. I'm looking for longer vines, not groundcovers, but vines that will grow up trellises and on fences. But do OK in part shade. I love vinca minor as a groundcover but i do have to beat it back every few years.
I've had some success with Hydrangea anomala petiolaris, Clematis paniculata, Lonicera periclymenum, and Vitis coignetiae. I suspect none of them are performing as well as they might in full sun, but they grow well and look nice. All are deciduous. The hydrangea needs something (like a woody surface) to attach its sticky pads to, the clematis and Vitis will twine around anything that comes to hand, while the honeysuckle tends to grow upward and through things, sort of flopping around a bit, though it's easy enough to manage.
Ah, what a great tome! That was one of the very first garden books I ever owned -- a gift from an old gardening friend -- and it proved immensely helpful, largely in saving me from the frustration of trying to grow things that were utterly unsuited for my climate and situation. I wonder what ever happened to that book. I hope I've still got it in a box somewhere.
You should provide more details about the site conditions, and what characteristics you want the plants to have including growth size, sizes and shapes of parts, coloration etc.
I grow a lovely ferny climber called "Allegheny Vine or "Climbing Fumitory". The scientific name is Adlumia fungosa. It grows nicely in dappled shade or with morning sun, in rich soil not too dry. It is biennial, but it self-seeds modestly. The first year it is a small rosette, but the second year it takes off and scrambles through anything above or around it. It will use through a trellis with some encouragement. In nature it scrambles through other shrubs. I originally started my plants from seed-- cold moist stratification is required. The other vine that did surprisingly well for me last year, in quite deep shade, was Spanish Flag / Firecracker Vine / Exotic Love Vine (Ipomoea lobata). The blooms were late and fairly sparse but the location was far too dark. With dappled shade it'll do very well, I'm sure, and it likes heat. A really easy annual from seed.
Devi, Another Idea! I used to grow Virgina Creeper (PARTHENOCISSUS) just under the edge of the car-port. It only got morning sun till maybe 10 am. I put cup hooks on the beam that held up the east side of the car-port, cut circles out of old nylons and hooked one side to the cup hook, looped the other around the creeper and back to the cup hook and let it go. Growth later in the year was not "Hooked up" and fell to the ground creating a green wall that turned red in the fall. Look it up in Sunset under P, quinquefolia. They say it crawls all over the place and will take full sun, part. or shade. Kaspian, Great book, check out amazon.com they have used ones, Hard and soft cover from $6.10 to $17.50.
