Best shrubs / bushes

Faze11

Hi all.

Total amateur here so save me from buying the wrong thing in a Lidl or aldi sale :-)

Have a couple of areas in front of house, one of them pictured.would like to plant a mix of hardy shrubs, bushes, plants, flowers for good all year round coverage that blooms in summer. Not sure whats best to go here and need your help. You can see it looks quiet bare currently. South facing and gets full sun until about 5pm.

Thanks for any help.

Faze11

Picture didn't upload

standardg60

Judging by what's growing and what's failing, front left euonymus, back right berberis darwinii (doing well). Front right (not sure, can you take a closer pic?), and middle possibly halimiocistus (failing), it looks like you might have heavy clay, so a nice rose garden would be a definite possibility.

Faze11

standardg60 wrote: »

Judging by what's growing and what's failing, front left euonymus, back right berberis darwinii (doing well). Front right (not sure, can you take a closer pic?), and middle possibly halimiocistus (failing), it looks like you might have heavy clay, so a nice rose garden would be a definite possibility.

Thanks a mill. Was thinking Holly. What type of rose bushes would I need to buy or are they generic.

looksee

The area isn't big enough for ordinary holly. Aldi and Lidl do some good plants but you need to know what you are buying - you would not want to be codded by last week's tropical offerings for example. Or some of the stuff that needs acid soil (rhododendrons and camellias).

If you want to buy roses David Austen are good. However you need to establish what kind of effect you want to go for - masses of smaller flowers, fewer splendid flowers, and all kinds of variations in between. They also need care - not difficult and really not complicated but it is necessary, to ensure an on-going show of flowers. Check out Johnstown Garden Centre and sort out what the different types are.

Even if you don't want a full bed of just roses a few here and there are lovely. There was an experiment done on one of the gardening programmes, and while I cant remember the exact details, it was something like - they had an expert prune some roses, an amateur prune a matching group, and someone with a chain saw prune a third group. It was impossible to tell the difference when the roses came into flower!

Faze11

looksee wrote: »

The area isn't big enough for ordinary holly. Aldi and Lidl do some good plants but you need to know what you are buying - you would not want to be codded by last week's tropical offerings for example. Or some of the stuff that needs acid soil (rhododendrons and camellias).

If you want to buy roses David Austen are good. However you need to establish what kind of effect you want to go for - masses of smaller flowers, fewer splendid flowers, and all kinds of variations in between. They also need care - not difficult and really not complicated but it is necessary, to ensure an on-going show of flowers. Check out Johnstown Garden Centre and sort out what the different types are.

Even if you don't want a full bed of just roses a few here and there are lovely. There was an experiment done on one of the gardening programmes, and while I cant remember the exact details, it was something like - they had an expert prune some roses, an amateur prune a matching group, and someone with a chain saw prune a third group. It was impossible to tell the difference when the roses came into flower!

Good advice. Thanks. Will look into roses and check out Johnstown.