Why I Oughta...

I planted a treeform Doublefile Viburnum shrub out front of our front porch in a row where I lost a Vanilla Strawberry Hydrangea earlier this year .  I also planted a few of these out back.  But, this one - was probably out of place - but in a spot that was mixed sun/shade.  And, in the shadow of the troubled Norway Maple tree in our front porch beds.  I watered it in and watered all of the other things up there the same way.  But, this treeform Viburnum went into decline pretty quickly and is now - officially - dead.  I yanked it out recently.  See below for the tree/shrub and the rootball that I removed: I've long talked about how it is SO hard to grow stuff under that Norway Maple tree.  But with it gone, now?  I'm hopeful that I can turn this area around.  Starting with amending the soil with biosolids and composted manure .  And cultivating the soil in this bed to enrich it even more this Winter (is my plan).  I'm hopeful that the stump grinding of the old tree will f

Our plan for the year called for a focus on shrubs .  Shrubs in the backyard, mostly.  But, also shrubs in the front yard.  In my post outlining the list of shrubs that are called for in the plan, I mentioned needing to replace one of the Vanilla Strawberry Hydrangeas that are sitting in front of our front porch out front.  It started to decline last year and despite watering, it withered and died last Summer.  A couple of factors came in play (I'm pretty sure) that caused the hydrangea to die:  the surface root mat from the Norway Maple tree outcompeting the hydrangea COUPLED with the hydrophobic mulch that was taking place and not allowing the watering that I *was* providing to get down to the rootball.   I found four treeform Viburnum - Doublefile - at Menards and brought them home with the goal of adding them to our yard - mostly in the backyard.  Our plan called for eight additional Viburnum (Arrowwood Chicago Lustre) around the border of our yard that would complement the