Mixborder: a scheme of shrubs
Shrubs and flowers for the mixborder are selected in such a way that it looks beautiful most of the year. Perennial shrubs are often planted as the main plants: evergreen, coniferous or deciduous. Flowering perennials and annual grasses are placed in the foreground.
How to create a shrub mixborder
The mixborder differs from other types of flower beds in its elongated shape and plant diversity, which enlivens the garden with a bright palette of colors. Plants try to pick up taking into account the timing of flowering, so that from early spring to late autumn, some flowers are replaced by others.
Mixborder scheme helps to plant conifers in the most successful places
Considering that there can be a lot of plants in a mixborder, before planting seeds and seedlings, a diagram of the future flower garden is drawn on a sheet. Shrubs in such a scheme are always placed in the background, since they are the tallest, then tall perennials come, and in front of them are stunted flowers and annuals.
There are other principles to consider when creating a mixborder circuit:
- plants planted nearby should have similar requirements for acidity and composition of the soil, for moisture and lighting;
- the color of flowers blooming at the same time in a flower bed should be in harmony with each other;
- the width of the mixborder is calculated so as not to exceed more than one and a half times the height of the tallest plant.
The mixborder can be one-sided, planted against the wall of a building or fence, and two-sided, viewed from all sides. In a double-sided mixborder, the tallest plants are planted in the center.
What shrubs can be planted
From flowering plants, you can choose: Lespedets bicolor, lilac, garden hibiscus, colquicia, honeysuckle, spirea
A mixborder should not be monotonous, as its name implies. When creating a coniferous mixborder, several varieties of juniper are planted so that it differs in color and crown shape. Bright flowers are placed nearby to emphasize the beauty of the openwork needles. In addition to conifers, other shrubs are used – flowering or decorative deciduous.
One of the best decorative deciduous shrubs will be euonymus, its leaves can be of very different colors, it easily tolerates pruning. The disadvantage of the plant is its rapid growth. The Thunberg barberry with red berries and purple-carmine leaves looks beautiful in autumn.
Mahonia holly will become a decoration of the mixborder. It belongs to evergreen shrubs, blooms magnificently in spring with lemon-yellow flowers, and in autumn its leaves turn orange and do not fall until spring. Of the conifers, in addition to the scaly juniper, undersized Canadian spruces and decorative larch trees are popular.
Creating a beautiful mixborder is not easy. It is necessary to take into account many details so that the flower garden delights with the unique beauty of natural splendor all year round.