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Mini Gardens Under White Oak Trees
by
White Oak Studio Designs
(IC: professional)
One thing I have a lot of in my Small House under a Big Sky property is mature White Oak trees. At one count my husband counted 47 of them!
As an avid gardener with about 2 ½ acres to mow, I love to create mini gardens under our White Oak trees. Not only are these mini gardens attractive, they makes our mowing and trimming task around our multiple trees bases much easier.
There are some trees species with shallow root systems that it is best not to garden too heavily under. But White Oak trees have deep root systems and as long as one is careful you can successfully garden under these trees.
In my Zone 5 part sun/part shade garden these are the plants that grow well under my White Oak Trees.
PLANTS: Day lilies, epimedium, hostas, wild violets, iris, buttercups, pansies, pinks, phlox, and various ground covers.
WHAT WORKS FOR ME:
YEAR ONE: First I carefully dig out the grass and weeds that are under my tree bases. I add 6” to 8“of bark chips around the tree base to begin to amend the soil.
YEAR TWO AND ON: I transplant the above highly performing plants under my trees. I start slowly and add plant each year transplanting in spring and fall. This is a process that I do over the course of several years.
Each spring I weed, replace bark chips as needed and add more plants as possible.
As an avid gardener with about 2 ½ acres to mow, I love to create mini gardens under our White Oak trees. Not only are these mini gardens attractive, they makes our mowing and trimming task around our multiple trees bases much easier.
There are some trees species with shallow root systems that it is best not to garden too heavily under. But White Oak trees have deep root systems and as long as one is careful you can successfully garden under these trees.
In my Zone 5 part sun/part shade garden these are the plants that grow well under my White Oak Trees.
PLANTS: Day lilies, epimedium, hostas, wild violets, iris, buttercups, pansies, pinks, phlox, and various ground covers.
WHAT WORKS FOR ME:
YEAR ONE: First I carefully dig out the grass and weeds that are under my tree bases. I add 6” to 8“of bark chips around the tree base to begin to amend the soil.
YEAR TWO AND ON: I transplant the above highly performing plants under my trees. I start slowly and add plant each year transplanting in spring and fall. This is a process that I do over the course of several years.
Each spring I weed, replace bark chips as needed and add more plants as possible.
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Published February 27th, 2014 10:29 AM
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3 of 9 comments
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White Oak Studio Designs on Mar 24, 2014A good idea, thanks. I'll keep that in mind. I'd want more photographs of them before I write a post, which means this spring. I'm fussy....I like to use my own photographs rather than those of others curated from the Internet! I only have two colors of epimediums creamy yellow and pink but they are a wonderful and unusual plant with interesting heart shaped leaves and between the flowers and leaves there is color all season!
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White Oak Studio Designs on Mar 25, 2014I agree. For 30 some years I was a freelance photographer for newspapers and magazine and got paid per use for my photographs. Although the Internet has changed the playing field, I would never use an image without giving attribution or finding an image for example of a bluebird from the copyright free area.
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