THE SHADE GARDEN

I am anxious to get a look under the fallen leaves in the shade garden to see what is alive. My so-called shade garden is just a strip about three feet wide running along the length of my small house between it and the neighbour’s place. Two columnar cedars, a nanny berry and a high bush cranberry cast lots of shadow.

The past two years I have planted ferns at the back of this bed but last summer I noticed some spreading by roots. This is always a worrying sign. Plants or weeds that spread aggressively by roots are usually more difficult to remove than those that spread by seed. Forget-me-not, sun flowers, feverfew and Himalayan impatience seed the beds with new plants but they are easy to pull out. Root speading stuff is not. So I will keep an eye on those ferns.

Best plants for shade IMO
1) Columbine (or Aquilegia) I love the flowers on this plant. They look like fairy hats in soft colours: white, pale yellow, rose and blue. Three or four in a clump give a lovely long-blooming show. However, this perennial is short lived, with a life span of only two or three years. So the plants have to be constantly replaced. Luckily they are easy to start inside from seed. I have been told Columbine is the only garden flower that will grow beside rhubarb.

2) Lamium – a creeper with variegated leaves. This stuff makes a pretty edging.

3) Impatience – the best shade annual. It comes in many sizes and colours and a snap to start inside. I grow Elfin, a dwarf variety, in mixed colours and weave them among the perennials.

4) Bleeding Heart – every garden should have this old fashioned Thunder Bay fav. It prefers semi-shade shade but will come along even in a dense shade. The usual colour is pink. The white variety is not as tough.

5) Monk’s Hood. Another favourite for semi-shade, this old fashioned plant grows all over town and is so tough it even thrives on the North Shore in places like Marathon where gardening is a mega-challenge. Monk’s Hood must be propped up or tied to a fence. I use a tomato cage around mine and then loop light picture wire around to hold the blooming stalks in place. If you don’t do this early, the plant buckles at the knees and eventfully a wind will take it down. Every part of this plant is poisonous.

6) Lobelia – for pots. It takes a lot of lobelia to create any kind of show in a bed but it’s a dynamite hit of blue in a window box or a big round pot all to itself.

7) Begonia. Three or four in a clump make a nice shade feature.

8) Hostas. In spite of the fact that hostas are advertised as perfect for shade, I find they prefer semi-shade. There are hundreds of varieties of hosta and it may be that I have not yet found the one that will thrive in deep shade.

9) Ferns. Can’t be beat for really deep shade.

Under no circumstances, plant Gout Weed. This hideous plant spends out aggressive roots in every direction. I have seen roots emerge from under a three-foot stretch of pavement to colonize the lawn on the other side. Don’t allow your neighbour to plant it either because, like the Black Death, you will be infected. Even worse, it spreads into the bush – check the walk along McVicar’s Creek. I believe this Voldemort of the plant world should be outlawed. If you try to dig out the roots, tiny bits left behind will quickly grow and spread again. The only way to get rid of this monster is to use Round-up - oh horrors! Irresponsible nurseries and catalogues still recommend this stuff for shady places. Note that some people in town call it by more up-scale names such as Snow-in- summer or Snow-on-the Mountain. Check carefully before you accept a chunk as a gift.