12
Yes you can.
This actually an old German Advent/Christmas tradition in honour of St. Barbara's Day (Dec. 04) and it's usually done with branches of cherry or apple trees. Forsythia will work fine, too. Branches cut on 12/04 should flower by Christmas.
The basic idea is to take branches that have had "winter" (that is, some frost), bring them inside and "...
10
Plants will grow up to the light. I recommend planting them perpendicular to the imaginary level surface. Anything else would look odd as the alternative is not seen in nature.
What will help is building a small ring of soil on the downhill side of the shrub and applying a few inches of organic mulch all round.
this will capture and retain rain or ...
10
It looks like a mint or a very closely related labitae. Even the flower spike looks like mint. Is the stem squarish?
In any case it is certainly not part of your bougainvillea.
10
Judging by the new growth being red, I'd say these were Photinia fraserii 'Red Robin'. I can't tell if they're pleached or not, can't see any framework within the foliage, so its possible they're just trained by pruning to this shape. Unless you live somewhere that gets very hot and very dry in summer, they shouldn't need much watering because they have ...
9
The time you spend in preparation is as, or more, important than post planting time.
site location, cedars like access to water, not soggy and not dry
some shade is fine and full sun is tolerated if the soil is not too dry
a wide variety of soil types but I would avoid very sandy soils or soils low in organic matter
protection from winter winds. Cedars that ...
9
I've used sudsy dish soap such as Dawn before to combat insects such as aphids and it is quite effective and the one I used (it wasn't Dawn specifically) was biodegradable and that's important to me.
The key to using Dawn or anything (siding cleaner, bleach, etc.) around plants is that you need to lower the concentration of the chemical low enough that it ...
9
Because of the large pith cavity in elderberry stems, grafting is tricky and good grafts are rare. It's better to grow them from cuttings. Spliced side grafting onto one-year-old seedlings may be successful. semi-ripe or softwood cuttings (best done when new shoots are not yet ripened) should have the stems plugged at the end (I use rose thorns) to help ...
9
You can try rooting it if you want by snipping the stem just below a bud at the base, stripping off the thorns and leaves, leaving one leaf at the top if you like, but you can take them all off, and inserting it into a sharp sand or sand/compost mix in a deep pot. The stem should be around 9 inches long, and you need to bury it so that only a quarter of the ...
9
It looks like Griselinia littoralis "Variegata". It's an evergreen shrub native to New Zealand. Because of its dense growth, it is used widely in Britain and Ireland as a privacy hedge.
Identifying characteristics are the alternate, ovate leaves with the smooth cream colored margins. The interior of the leaves are yellow-green to mid-green, sometimes with ...
8
According to Wayne K. Clatterbuck in the article Tree Wounds on the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Tree Care Kit:
Research indicates that wound dressings (materials such as tar or paint) do not prevent decay and may even interfere with wound closure. Wound dressings can have the following detrimental effects:
Prevent drying and encourage fungal growth
...
8
I reckon its Prunus cerasifera, or a cultivar of, commonly known as Purple Leaf Flowering Plum or Myrobalan plum. The leaves should be toothed or serrated at the edges - some varieties are more toothed than others, but I can see some of that on these leaves. I can't see inside a flower clearly, but there should be a reddish purple centre, or at least a ...
8
After some further research, and with the help of @Escoce's and @Bamboo's answers, I believe this is a Sweet Almond Bush.
Family: Verbenaceae
Genus: Aloysia
Species: Virgata
©Dave's Garden / http://pics.davesgarden.com/pics/2006/05/07/aprilwillis/bfe970.jpg
8
The active ingredient of the herbicide used is Dicamba Mecoprop. It also affects broad leaf shrubs and trees. From this pdf by the International Society of Arborists
Once the material is absorbed there is no treatment to alleviate the symptoms
except to avoid watering and fertilization. Removal of the tree should
wait the second year because often a ...
8
This is a Spiraea shrub. Here is a general article on the genus: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiraea.
There are 10s of species and probably hundreds of cultivars. One of the most common garden Spiraeas is S. japonica.
7
In one word, no, sorry! Training an evergreen by practicing topiary starts when the plant is small and involves repeated prunings over a few years. If you took your existing evergreens and pruned them into spiral shapes you would expose inside areas of the plant where there is no growth.
Most evergreens do not bud or grow from old wood with the exception ...
7
The shrub is definitely a Prunus and I'm trying to decide whether its Prunus lusitanica or P. laurocerasus - the leaves seem a little too narrow for the latter, unless this is a small variety such as 'Otto Luyken', which I can't tell from the photo. The berries do dangle in this way, and they are red to start with, turning black when ripe. The leaves on this ...
7
Growing lilacs from seeds isn’t easy, but it can be done. It can take up to three or four years for a seed-propagated lilac to bloom, though, so you’ll have to be patient and just enjoy watching the bush grow!
From Garden Guides:
When growing seeds from a lilac, two things are of utmost importance. First, make sure you’re not harvesting seeds from a ...
answered Mar 7 '15 at 0:30
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7
Standard, in this context, means trained into tree form. Usually standard shrubs and vines are trained from a young age, allowing only one stem to grow from the ground, forming the trunk. This must be kept free of sideshoots and laterals up to a certain point, which makes up the head of the standard. A good head will look bushy and balanced, and fit with the ...
7
I bought this rose at rite aid on clearance two years ago. We put it in water, and the stem never turned brown. After about 9 months in a glass of water, I put it in soil. It grew a bunch of new branches, and about two weeks ago I saw a bud. I took this photo this morning. So, for people who say it can't re-root or grow new flowers, they are wrong! This is ...
7
The yew bushes in front of the building I work at are flattened by snow and ice every winter, (nobody cleans it off, and if the roof gets cleared, they get extra helpings on top.) They are poorly shaped for snow (trimmed dead flat on top).
When the snow melts they are fine (and have been for 20+ years of this.)
Therefore, my suggestion is: do nothing, ...
7
Probably not doomed.
Cow dung, if not composted (i.e., aged) contains a lot of urine = urea. Even though urea is a potent nitrogen source, in higher quantities it reverses the osmotic balance and draws water out of the plant through the roots. This is known as fertilizer burn. The fertilizer granules add to this though they may take a bit longer to dissolve....
7
You can't - if you want to plant close to a tree, it has to be done when you first plant the tree, at the same time, in other words. You could plant near the apple tree, but not under the canopy.
7
This is definetively Chelidonium majus or greater celandine. In the US it's a neophyte, probably imported by early settlers that used the orange milk to treat warts1 and other skin conditions.
It does contain various alkaloids, so you'd better not eat it, but the sap tastes sharp and very bitter, nothing you'd eat by accident. Wash your hands and do not ...
7
This is a beautiful specimen of common privet (Ligustrum vulgare). The lanceolate dark glossy leaves, the intense scent and especially the four petals are quite distinctive.
6
Bamboo might be a good option as they are evergreen, grow fairly tall and also grow pretty fast here. There are clumping varieties available that don't attempt to escape your yard, but a root barrier is probably your best bet just to be sure. Bamboo come in some interesting colors besides just plain green.
I'd normally suggest rhododendrons or evergreen ...
6
This is a weigela which flowers in late spring to early summer with trumpet shaped flowers. They are native to temperate East Asia, specifically Japan, Korea, and Northern China. In the late 1980's, a series of dwarf Weigelas developed by Felicitas Svejda of Agriculture Canada became available. They are all named after dance steps like Tango or Minuet. I ...
6
There's an interesting piece of research online carried out in June 2005 at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, and published in the Horticultural Research Institute Journal; one of the subjects in the trial was Thuja Emerald Green. Under control conditions, they were planted with various amendments (bio gels, mycorrhizal fungi and various other ...
6
That is a crepe myrtle, Lagerstroemia sp. Possibly L. fauriei.
This is a genus of flowering shubs and trees in the loosestrife family. Most of them are hardy in zones 8 and up, but L. fauriei is hardy to zone 6b.
See comparison pics:
6
Whilst it was once considered essential to paint wounds on trees with a protective/preventive treatment (Arbrex, for instance), this practice has long since fallen out of favour - turns out it often caused more trouble than leaving the sites untreated.
It sounds like you've only removed dead parts anyway, so there's much less risk of any infection gaining ...
6
Looks like Rhododendron ferrugineum, or alpenrose. This plant can be found in European mountain ranges in high altitudes, mainly above the tree line. Here's a similar picture I've found, for comparison:
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