Plants for a Shade Garden
To have a good looking garden, it is necessary to manage your watering in a productive manner.
The first active step is to ensure your plants have adequate water and this means that you do have to provide them with enough water to grow and flower. Do it with a house-hose, an eaves trough bucket or overflow from the swimming pool (pool chlorine doesn't hurt garden plants) but do water your plants. Generally speaking, I find I have to apply at least one and a half inches of water a week to keep the shady perennial garden looking good. In a dry year, I'll go to two inches.
Half of this is absorbed by the tree or trees providing the shade. And the other half is made available to the perennials. Remember that those trees have very greedy roots and will outcompete perennials in your garden just as they do in nature. You have to water if you want real success in the shade garden.
A Garden Video on Shade Gardens
Garden Tips
Two practical tips for successful growing of shade perennials found here.
Four Things You Need To Know to ucceed with perennial shade gardens here.
Free Ebook on Good Plants
Here's a few articles you might find useful if you are interested in specific plants for the shade garden. A few of the Perennial Plant Association Plants of the Year are good in the shade and I've posted a free ebook for you to download right here.
Easy-Plant Suggestions
Note that this one on perennial geraniums describes a plant that will grow in part shade or sun rather than deep shade. I really perennial geraniums so I've included them here.
The queen of the shade garden is of course the Hosta plant. There are thousands of varieties of this plant - from huge ones stretching four to five feet wide to tiny little ones that could grow in a thimble. Here's how to successfully grow Hosta
A plant that resembles Hosta because it has great foliage but differs in that it has marvellous spring blooms is Lungwort I really like this plant for the shade garden with rich soil (not a dry shade plant by any means).
The plant that I grow more than any other shade plant (except Hosta) is the Helleborus or Christmas Rose I grow several different varieties and flower colours and I would recommend them highly. They are not difficult to grow as long as you don't try to move them or divide them. That root is a big one that doesn't like to be messed with.
The new and sexy shade perennial is the Heuchera family. Now available in leaf colours ranging from bright gold 'Lime Rickey' to almost black 'Obsidian', combine them to give summer-long foliage contrast.
I have grown Jacobs Ladder or Polemonium for many years and actually stopped growing them when the breeders "improved" them and made them too tender in the winter and too prone to "melting out" in the summer heat. I do love the species and I have a few brand new ones in my garden for trial. Here's how to grow Jacobs Ladder
I have never understood why so many gardeners like this Lunaria Money Plant. Put it into a garden and money will grow almost everywhere. It hardly needs any instructions on how to grow it (put the roots in the ground) :-) but it does grow well in the shade.
On the other hand, Tricyrtis or Toadlilies are a superb fall-blooming plant. Their delicate flowers won't compete with fall mums but they are in a class by themselves when it comes to fairy-like flowers.
And Athryium or Japanese Painted Ferns have been a Perennial Plant of the Year and a tremendous addition to the shade garden. I have always enjoyed their colouring and growth habit. Check them out in this article.
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Shade Perennial Plant List
Here are some other plants that do well in the shade garden. A few have links now and more are coming based on questions I get from readers.
Actaea or Baneberry is a wonderful plant for moist, rich soil in shady gardens or bog gardens.
Alchemilla mollis and other species
Aruncus or Goatsbeard is a large astilbe-like flowering plant for the large garden.
Astilbe is one of the stalwarts of the shady perennial border. It can become a bit of a thug if left unchecked.
Brunnera is one of my favorite spring blooming perennials - in sky-blue with delightful forget-me-not blue flowers. Here's how to grow it along with a picture.
Convallaria or Lily of the Valley is one of the easiest of shade garden ground covers
Dicentra or bleeding hearts are the long flowering plants in the shade garden.
Digitalis or Foxglove is a wonderfully easy shade biennial.
Epimedium is a delicate flowering plant but tough.
Geraniums are great for ground covers and specimens
Hellebore or Christmas Rose is a rock hardy plant for the shade garden that will tolerate drought spells.
Hosta belong in every garden and here are a few guidelines to grow and design with hosta Here are some basic hosta care tips
Q&A on Hosta Problems - likely Virus X
One of the delights of the hosta world are the blue hosta
Lathyrus: if you like sweet pea flowers then you might want to check this part-shade grower out. (not for deep shade)
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Myosotis or Forget Me Not is a biennial spring flowering plant for shade or semi shade gardens. It does not grow in dry shade.
Pulmonaria are one of my favourite spring bloomers
Symphytum or Ornamental Comfrey is a superb plant for shade gardens with excellent soils.
Thalictrum - do you have rich, organic soils with adequate moisture in your shade garden? If you do, you definitely want to include this plant to your list.
Tricyrtis or Toad lily is a small flowering plant for fall blooms.
If you want to ask about other gardening tips for shade perennials, click here
Questions and Answers
Folks, please use this form to ask questions about shade gardening. I do my best and I can only ask that you have patience. If I don't get to yours right away, I'm sorry and I hope you'll understand.
Ask a Shade Perennial Gardening Question
If you have a question about shade perennials, then feel free to ask it using this form.
If you have a picture of the problem or situation, feel free to upload it here as well (keep the pic under 100K please for faster uploading)
On some browsers the entry boxes are a little hard to see - name and email boxes are either immediately to the left of the captcha box or right below it (close to the submit button) depending on your browser settings.
What Other Visitors Have Asked about Shade Perennials
Click below to see questions from other visitors to this page...
Hosta's and Mulch
Is is alright to use cedar mulch with hostas? I was told you can not use cedar mulch with hostas. Is this true?
Doug says this will come as a serious ...
Planting Beneath a Cedar Hedge I have an area beneath cedar trees that I would like to put something green and beautiful there. The cedars are very well established, so their root system ...
Plants in shade in Florida
What kind of plants will grow in complete shade under a big oak tree?
Doug says that he's not a Southern gardener and really can't advise you on those....
foxgloves stopped blooming My foxgloves were beautifully bloomed when I planted them about a month ago and now they have all brown buds on them and no flowers. What went wrong? They ...
pathway plants in shade I wanted to plant woolly thyme between the flat bricks in a shady spot at the garden shed entry but I understand thyme likes lots of sun. What could I ...
Foxglove Seeding Mid Summer I was wondering if I could seed Foxglove now (almost mid July). I didn't realize how much shade I would get in the one spot of my flower beds and planted ...
Pruning Bleeding Heart
When do you cut back foliage? After blooming, fall, summer?
Doug says he doesn't cut back the foliage on this plant. It doesn't really need pruning ...
How to make lily of the valley bloom? I have lillies of the valley in my little shade garden, but they hardly ever bloom. Last year I had 2 plants with flowers, this year NONE! they have nice ...
Perennial geranium leaf spots These plants come up every year but before they bloom often get a rusty look on their leaves, like they are drying out but aren't. What can I do to prevent ...
polemonium in a pot?
can polemonium be grown in pots?
Doug says that any perennial can be grown in a pot.
Area with no sun I have a small corridor type space between garage and house. About three feet wide by 6 feet long. There is no sun and very little light in this space....
shade perennials for a cutting garden What are the best choices for the pacific northwest in a perennial garden with only morning sun. Also, the plants need to be upright and not lean out over ...
Can't find English Cowslip under sun or shade.
Title pretty well covers it. Won this at a Horticulture mtg. and it says to plant now. Wasn't til I got home, I realized I didn't know where! Thanks
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how to grow a helleborus x hybridous plant I just bought a helleborus, it is flowering and has Huge leaves but all of them are starting to turn brown. I was told to trim it. When and how far down ...
Bleeding Heart Yellow Leaves I have several bleeding hearts in my garden, but some of them are beautiful green leaves and others get yellow leaves and die off. I know there is a variety ...
Care of Jacob Ladder
Can you please tell me if there are any special precautions that should be taken to Jacob Ladder upon the winter season?
Would it be possible to pot ...
when to plant perennials in the fall
should i plant the heucheras, japense fern, etc right now? i found the plants to buy but wanted to make sure... thanks
Doug says that perennials in ...
Persistent Tree Roots I have large fower beds, some have areas within 15-30 ft of some large 60 yr old maple trees. When tilling the soil 15 yrs ago, I was amazed at the ...
hosta aerial plantlets
at the end of the season comes and the tall chutes from the hostas are flowerless they grow new leaves if planted will those grow?
Doug says he's never ...
Hosta for full sun
please tell me what are the hosta plants that do well in full sun
Doug says that almost any hosta will grow in the full sun. It will *grow*. Now ...
Heuchera and Astilbe in the shade of trees
I have several heuchera and astilbe which have been growing in the shade of a pine tree and a maple tree for about three years.
They have expressed ...
Something is eating my Jacobs Ladder I planted 3 Jacobs Ladder plants this spring. Something seems to be eating them, one of the plants is almost gone and the other two are showing signs ...
Shade Perennials Zoning
Hello,
I have a very shady spot in my backyard and I'd like to fill it with perrenials. I wonder wich ones I can use as I live in a 4a Zoning area. I ...
Shade Perennials in Containers I am so envious of my neighbor with her mounds of beautiful purple verbena. She gets the afternoon sun they need and my planters get only morning sun ...
