Three More Sun King Aralias Planted - May 2026

Over the years, I've added two sets of Sun King Aralias to our backyard.  First, were six as part of a garden edit in the 'nook' garden in 2024.  Last year, I planted three more on the opposite side of the garden.  In service of reptition and planting what works in the garden, I bought three more at this year's Morton Arboretum Plant sale.  See below for the tag/sign at the sale:

When I brought them home, they were already good-sized plants.  See below for a look at the box of plants the day of the sale in my garage.  Compare the Sun Kings to the All Gold grasses right next to them:

This Spring, the existing Sun Kings suffered some late-frost damage, so I held back on introducing these to the garden for weeks.  But, the time finally arrived. They were getting big and drying out.

One of the things that I've been talking about over the years is what I've described as a 'hosta replacement' project on the northside.  I took this opportunity to remove three hostas (and planted them back against the fence (for now) and stuck the three in a somewhat crowded area.  

You can see them below along with the small Emperor 1 Japanese Maple in the chicken-wire cage:

Here, below, is a more top-down view showing the three Sun Kings planted on a diagonal. 

I'll look to pull out even more of these hostas here and clean up this area.