Creating A Flower Arrangement With Hosts In The Shade

2024 Author: Sebastian Paterson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:47

Types and features of hosts

The list of ornamental plants for shade is small, however, you can always find something that will satisfy your need. Hosta is one of the best herbaceous plants.

Hosta is also known under the names "funkia" and "plantain lily". Hosta belongs to the Liliaceae family, has about forty varieties. They are all natives of Japan. The common name "host" was introduced in 1812 in honor of the outstanding physician Nicholas Thomas Host (1761-1834).

Gardener's guide

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After World War II, gardeners around the world took an unusual interest in these amazingly lush and beautiful plants. By the way, new types of hosts are still being discovered. For example, in 1985, a plant search expedition in the most isolated regions of the Japanese archipelago discovered two previously unknown hosta species.

Host Kabitan

These unusually hardy, attractive diverse groups of plants for colder locations tend to thrive best in shade or partially shaded areas. They adapt to different conditions, but grow preferentially in the northern regions and less well in the south. Extreme drought and humidity do not scare them.

The host has ornamental leaves basal or petioled silvery-blue, bright yellow, gold, yellow-green and from light green to dense green color scheme. All styles of variegation and a wide variation in sizes and outlines are inherent in them. Many varieties have a golden color of young leaves, which subsequently disappears.

The color also changes from the degree of illumination. In the sun, gentle transitions from one color to another change. In the shade, they fully reveal their charm. Hosts come in a variety of sizes. For example, some species only grow up to a few centimeters high and have cute small leaves. Others - form a bush up to a meter high and up to 1.5 meters wide.

The leaves can be long and narrow, round, oval, cordate, or pointed. The texture of the leaves is very good, from smooth to deeply ribbed. Hostas are good not only with leaves, but also with beautiful bell-shaped or funnel-shaped flowers on slender, strong peduncles 25 to 100 cm long. Flowers are lavender, lilac, purple and less often white. They are especially attractive on overgrown hosts, when they reach the age of more than 2-3 years.

Hosts are easily propagated by seeds. At the same time, they reach full decorativeness in 3-5 years. Sowing should be done immediately after harvesting the seeds. They reproduce well vegetatively - by dividing a bush with compact or short-branched rhizomes. It is better to divide the bush in the spring. The host can also be propagated by cuttings.

Using host in garden design

Hosta Siebold

The plant is unpretentious. It is undemanding to the soil, but it prefers loose and nutritious soils with a depth of the fertile layer of at least 50 cm. It is patient with dry sandy soils, moderate moisture and even damp conditions.

Hosts are shade favorites with gorgeous leaves and flowers in mid-summer. They grow rapidly. Winter hardiness. Since the roots of the host are exposed by the end of summer, in late autumn they need to be poked up, protecting them from the winter cold.

Due to their decorative qualities and variety, hosts are indispensable for creating garden compositions. They are used in flower beds of any type - in tapeworms, when creating curtains, arrays, in the border.

In the flower bed, tall large varieties successfully occupy the central part of it, and low compact varieties - in the foreground.

Hosta Ginko Craig

In the rabatka, they take pride of place in the background (high) or as a front border (low varieties). In the mixborder, among the many herbaceous perennials, the host will always find a place. It will harmoniously fit into the lush inflorescence of perennials and annuals.

On the edge of the path, medium-sized hosts, such as the SoSweet variety, are appropriate. This hosta has dense green leaves with white edges and very attractive flowers. Golden Tiara is a hosta with long, heart-shaped leaves with yellow edges.

Create a striking dirt carpet from a host of small hosts like the Kabitan with its narrow golden leaves or the Ginko Craig, a green and white beauty, or Univittatt. They grow quickly and look like a solid carpet. Place the hosts at some distance from each other, that is, partially covering the area intended for the carpet. For spring color, plant one blooming daffodil in between. Hosta leaves will appear as soon as the daffodils fade. Over time, the hosts will grow and create a solid carpet.

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Long, large hosts form the basis of a mixborder or tapeworm on the lawn. They are rarely blue. Nevertheless, the hosta Siebold Elegans of a bluish-green color is often found among gardeners in the Leningrad region. Of the large-leaved hosts, Sum and Substance deserve attention - very valuable with heart-shaped leaves and up to 30 cm wide.

Siebold's large, robust, robust, robust hosts create a distinct contrast in size and texture when planted next to saxiphragus or sedum. Their textural contrast can provide a beautiful view in the garden after the flowers have faded.

In spectacular rocky gardens, in proportion to the size of the "rocky" plants, compact hosts maintain the style of the gardens. With their shape, color, texture of leaves and duration of decorativeness, they provide planting density and adorn the foreground. Hosts are valuable because they have not so much beautiful flowers as beautiful leaves that remain attractive throughout the summer. Everywhere on rocky hills you can plant hosta varieties with powerful roots. They look great next to large stones.

It is difficult to overestimate the location of the white-bordered host in the corners of the recreation area, especially if it is surrounded by white climbing roses or flowers with a predominance of white color scheme.

Hosts look very impressive on their own or in a company with begonias and bulbs in containers.

The blue leaves of the dicentra, decorated with the fringe of broken hearts, gracefully emphasize the broad, wrinkled leaves of the Golden Tiara hosta.

The spiky golden leaves of the San Power hosta feel great when combined with the dark green hosta in the shade.

Floral arrangement with hosts

Plants placement in garden design:

1 - Clefthoof; 2 - Lilies; 3 - Dicenter; 4 - Hosta Golden Tiara; 5 - Hosta Siebold (Main Standard); 6 - Hosta White with Green; 7 - Hosta White-bordered; 8 - The host is blue; 9 - openwork fern; 10 - Blue bell; 11 - Fern Ostrich feather

Broad-leaved hosta Siebold (Francis Williams) next to a light openwork fern or with belt-like leaves of daylilies, with drooping bush, variegated ivy, and a hoof create an amazing contrast of leaves, especially against the background of a hedge. This magnificent border in the shade loses its expressiveness in the sun (see diagram).

The option of using hosts in garden design was also discussed in the magazine "Flora Price" No. 6 (10), 2002. I propose another option for planting around a tree, designed for five years. In addition to stunted hosts, the composition includes astilba, barberry, pink-flowering sedum, tiny Ayugs.

All ornamental plants are planted around a young tree that grows with the flowers. New plantings on bare ground are widely spaced: several astilbes with upward white panicles, three ornamental red Japanese barberries, a pink-flowering sedum, and a tiny Ayuga in empty spaces.

Hosta Golden Tiara

After three years, the host will double in size, the astilbe will grow and converge. Sedums also grow in breadth, and Ayugs scatter and fill all the empty spaces, creating a dense thick carpet. At the same time, the barberry and the young tree have not yet reached maturity.

But after five years, the flower bed gives pleasure in full bloom. The shrubs are firm and compact, continuing to expand by several centimeters per year until reaching their maximum size and increasing shade. Herbaceous plants - hosta, astilba, sedum - will need partial division to give the composition a well-groomed look.

The cultivation of the latest, most modern plants is now widespread. You can get a great mixture of original options for sizes, outlines of leaves and colors. All kinds of hosts are in wide demand. In my scheme, I propose several host varieties that are widely used in the North-West of Russia.

Try, experiment and don't be afraid of mistakes. Hosts are sturdy and strong plants. You can replant them without much damage if your plantings are not successful the first time.