Today was a great day to garden! It was warm but it wasn’t super humid. I extended a woodland shade garden bed. It was as a result of the storm damage and subsequent arborist clean up that made me look this space with fresh eyes.

Sometimes that’s all it takes – Mother Nature rearranging so you take another look.

What did I plant? A Camellia “April Tryst” (red). Mountain Laurel “Bullseye”. Azalea “Rhododendron Addy Wery”. Azalea “Rhododendron Peggy Ann Rodino”. And a Christmas Fern and Royal Fern. And I transplanted some Ostrich Ferns and planted a Hydrangea “Munchkin”.

The soil in the shade and woodland beds is lovely in the back gardens. Lots of leaf decay, and every year we layer on more wood chips. And people always ask well don’t you take the wood chips up and don’t you take the old leaves up and the answer is no. And we do that throughout the garden it’s entirety, shade and sun.

The wood chips are chipped from our own trees when we do work, and the leaves are shredded from our trees in the fall for winter mulch. It’s the best mulch I’ve ever used. I do not use bagged mulch, and I would never use colored mulch.

After I planted my plants, I added fresh wood chips and I used some of the logs that were cut from the giant oak limb that caused the space to open up as edging. I had used little log sections as edging in shade and woodland beds on the side and I really like the way it looks.

I will be honest I am a little sore after two hours of nonstop digging and planting, but it felt so good to be able to plant! I may fill in with some other perennials here in there in this bed or I might just leave it the way it is. I haven’t decided.

Happy September gardening!