Junipers - What's Not to Love?

A gardener learns more in the mistakes than in the successes.
~Barbara Dodge Borland, 1904-1991, American author

Actually there’s a lot not to love about Junipers in my opinion but then I had an unpleasant domestic relationship with them years ago and still shudder at the remembrance.

 

 
Junipers can grow in a wide variety of situations and locations. This is not the reason to plant one. They can also be indestructible. This is not a reason to plant one either.


With all due respect…..Junipers are not meant to be planted at sidewalks

 

or next to stairs where you have to carve out a corridor.

or at the edge of lawns.

Junipers are not meant to be hedging material, carved into hard blocks...

or soft undulating waves. If you have to prune any plant this severely in order to keep it within boundaries then you have the wrong plant in that spot.

Junipers need room to spread and breathe...

allowing them to take on their natural sprawling habit with graceful branches reaching luxuriously in freedom.

 

 
All of the above can be applied to Heathers and Heaths too.

Exposed, woody stems due to over pruning is just plain ugly.

 

 

Now that’s what I’m talking about! No ugly stems showing, just a blooming delight! Gorgeous.
 

The moral of the story is…if you are going to plant something, always choose the right plant for the right place and you will be rewarded with beauty and less work.

In Bloom In My Garden Today: Alyssum, Begonia ‘bonfire’, Caryopteris ‘longwood blue’ (bluebeard), Cimicifuga simplex ‘brunette’, Coreopsis ‘moonbeam’, Cyclamen, Daisy(white double), Daphne caucasica ‘Eternal Fragrance’, Echinacea pallida, Echinacea purpurea magnus, Fuchsia, Gaillardia (blanket flower), Gladiolus callianthus (formerly Acidanthera), Kirengeshoma palmata, Kniphofia ‘echo mango’Mullen chaixii ‘Album’, Nepeta ‘six hills giant’ (catmint), Perovskia ‘little spire’, Phygelius ‘new sensation’ (cape fushia), Rose, Salvia, Star Jasmine (trachelospermum jasminoides), Tomato
 

Authors photos