{"id":13083,"date":"2014-04-03T06:01:41","date_gmt":"2014-04-03T13:01:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/?p=13083"},"modified":"2014-04-02T01:31:30","modified_gmt":"2014-04-02T08:31:30","slug":"top-garden-shrubs-2nd-week-april","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/articles\/trees-and-shrubs\/top-garden-shrubs-2nd-week-april\/","title":{"rendered":"Top Spring Garden Shrubs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It is only just April and the colour is showing in the early shrubs. These are some of my favourites.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/hortoris\/4322571017\/\" title=\"Ribes Flowering Cuurant, on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.staticflickr.com\/2799\/4322571017_74dbf969ac.jpg\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" alt=\"Ribes\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Flowering Currant ( Ribes Sanguineum)<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>The small currant leaves can&#8217;t hide the large amount of red or pink flowers hanging from all the leaf joints in tassel like profusion. On one tassel I have just picked there are 11 star like flowers open and at least as many buds to still open. A great show of pink and red at this early stage of the season when these colours are harder to find. They don&#8217;t last very long but are a worthwhile plant to grow. The leaves have a strong and pleasant currant smell<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Cuttings are easy to root and I just cut a 10&#8243; length and push it into a  patch of garden where I want a new plant.<\/li>\n<li>They often grow wild on patches of land or a friendly neighbour would give you several cuttings. Look for a colour that you like and ask after it has finished flowering or  at the backend of the season.<\/li>\n<li> Plants can grow to 5 feet and more so keep pruning out some of the old wood and trim the plant to a manageable size.<\/li>\n<li>Pruning should be done shortly after flowering &#8211; cutting back to a new bud.<\/li>\n<li>I grow them in sun and shade at they both perform.<\/li>\n<li>You often see them at coastal areas so they do OK by the sea<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Pieris Japonica<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/hortoris\/5612915728\/\" title=\"Pieris japoninca  on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm6.staticflickr.com\/5185\/5612915728_f4ddebe84e.jpg\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" alt=\"Pieris japoninca\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h3>Pieris japoninca<\/h3>\n<p>These shrubs are usually grown for the new bright red leaves that start emerging during April. This does them a disservice as the mature bushes are now covered in  clusters of white flowers shaped like lily of the valley. This shape of flower gives the plant a common nick name of &#8216;Lily of the Valley Bush&#8217;.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Pieris Forest Flame has red leaves that eventually turn pink then green. They grow slowly but robustly.<\/li>\n<li> Pieris Mountain Fire is another variety whose name implies where it came from and what to expect. Whilst &#8216;Flaming Silver&#8217;s new leaves are pinkish and the remaining foliage is variegated with white edges<\/li>\n<li> The new Katsura range have darker leaves, red or pinkish flower tassels but I have found it less vigourous.<\/li>\n<li>Pieris like a moist acidic soil<\/li>\n<li>Cuttings can be taken in June or July when flowering has finished. They are more difficult to root than Ribes  but the plants are worth the effort<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/hortoris\/3797942903\/\" title=\"Pieris Katsura hybrid, on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm4.staticflickr.com\/3495\/3797942903_d586b70ff0.jpg\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" alt=\"Pieris Katsura hybrid\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Mid April and the Flowering currants are giving way to the Pieris japonica exchanging pink for red in floral terms and berries for small clusters of bell shaped flowers.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Spirea Magic Carpet.<\/strong><br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/wheel1.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"Spring Spirea\" width=\"448\" height=\"336\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-13084\" srcset=\"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/wheel1.jpg 448w, https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/wheel1-200x150.jpg 200w, https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/wheel1-300x224.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 448px) 100vw, 448px\" \/><br \/>\nSpirea leaf just bursting on this orange leafed variety. The white blossoming Spireas flower at the end of the month<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mid April and the Flowering currants are giving way to the Pieris japonica exchanging pink for red in floral terms and berries for small clusters of bell shaped flowers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13084,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trees-and-shrubs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13083\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13084"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}