A fast growing perennial evergreen hedge. Campsis grandiflora: planting and plant care

The choice of shrubs must be approached very carefully, but before you decide to purchase seedlings, be sure to find out about the pros and cons, the main characteristics of fast-growing types. This will allow you to understand where to make a hedge, what possible problems you may have when leaving, and much, much more.

• Advantages. First of all, most of the fast-growing shrubs are characterized by a certain height. And if varieties of plants that grow slowly can grow above the designated standards, then these species cannot. They are also characterized by a high frequency of growth and excellent density. But the most important advantage is the high growth rate, and that is why such shrubs are chosen by those who want to grow an impenetrable "green fence" on their site as soon as possible.
• The disadvantages include the fact that such shrubs are difficult to change in the process of their growth. And all due to the high speed, which leads to difficulties in the process of forming bushes. But in many ways, the general appearance of the hedge depends on the appearance of the plants.

Thus, you need to weigh the pros and cons a thousand times, consider whether you are ready to spend so much time doing all the necessary work, because creating such a fence will require a lot of labor from you.

Fast growing plants and shrubs for hedges

You will quickly get a hedge if you use willow for planting. First of all, the tree grows at an incredible rate. The second advantage is that you will be able to intertwine the branches, forming a green and dense clutter. Most of all, their unpretentiousness attracts, since these varieties of trees grow on almost any soil, quickly take root and tolerate a haircut. The most famous varieties include the well-known weeping willow, red willow, goat and purple willow. Perfect for creating a barberry hedge, which will not only serve as a “fence”, but will also bring practical benefits in the form of berries from which you can make delicious jams. A quick hedge will also be obtained from a plant such as a thorn, which will become a real obstacle to animals and thieves, since its branches are incredibly thorny. Attracts ease of care for him, as well as undemanding plants to the conditions of detention, frost resistance. Rose hips also have many useful properties, which not only grows rapidly, but also delights you with valuable and tasty fruits. Among other things, such a shrub will attract birds to your site, which will become a real protection against harmful insects. Decorative varieties of shrubs have also found their wide application, which, although they do not have much practical use, can become a magnificent decoration of the garden. So, they include, which, with proper care, will reach three meters in height, various types of viburnum vesicle, lilac.

Proper fit and care is the key to obtaining a spectacular result

As we have already said, when planting fast-growing breeds, you need to be as careful and accurate as possible, especially when it comes to shaping (cutting) a bush. Otherwise, you can run the plant hard, then you will either have to spend a huge amount of time and effort on its restoration, or uproot the whole bush. First of all, it’s worth starting with a landing. So, we mark the territory in advance and, just in case, be sure to create its borders with the help of a rope. After that, we dig small ditches for planting seedlings, while their dimensions should be larger than the seedlings. When planting, be sure to ensure that the root system is intact, otherwise, this can lead to the fact that the plant simply withers. Be sure to use mineral fertilizers, and after planting the seedlings, water your hedge abundantly for three weeks.

Even though you have selected fast growing shrubs for your hedge, don't expect them to reach their maximum size the following year.

This should take at least three to four years. to give the desired shape, be sure to stretch the wire along the line of the desired height. You will need to cut exactly at its level, and not do everything “by eye”, otherwise you will not get the perfect shape. At the same time, pruning of shrubs is necessary only in summer, so that the fast-growing hedge does not have “bald spots” at the roots.

The traditional fence of their fence or mesh reliably protects the site from prying eyes and, most importantly, from uninvited guests. But only a hedge can fit into the landscape as harmoniously as possible, what is the best way to make such a fence?

Types of hedges in landscape design

The world of plants is incredibly vast, but not all are suitable for solving the problem facing the summer resident. The choice of plants depends on the intended appearance of the future fence and its purpose.

Hedges are used:

• for external fencing of the site;
• for dividing the territory inside according to the functional purpose;
• for framing flower beds and, lawns and mixborders.

At the same time, plantings can be of different heights and densities, evergreen and retain foliage only in the warm season. Shrubs for hedges are given strict forms by shearing, or the plants retain their natural shape throughout their lives. Fences made of intertwined living shoots of bushes or trees look especially decorative.

To give the hedge proper density or originality, plants are planted in one, two or three rows.

When planting a living wall, sometimes not one species is used, but several ornamental plants at once, the main thing is that they have a similar growth rate, frost resistance, as well as requirements for soil composition and care.

An excellent example of this approach would be a hedge of different types of currants:

• golden or fragrant;
• alpine;
• blood red.

Evergreens for hedges

Evergreen fences and borders are very popular for a variety of reasons. Among them:

• high density green fence;
• decorative effect that persists even in the cold season;
• easy portability of a haircut, which is indispensable if the hedge is to be given a clear shape;
• slow growth of shoots, helping to maintain a neat appearance of the shrub for a long time.

In addition, evergreen hedge plants are low maintenance and versatile. Unfortunately, not many such cultures are adapted to Russian conditions. Almost all of them are conifers.

Popularity leaders are:

• spruce of various subspecies;
• common juniper;
• dwarf mountain pine.

With the help of plants of modern varieties with needles in green, silver and golden colors, it is possible to get around one of the weakest sides of conifers - the monotony of the color of the hedge.

Evergreen shrubs, such as juniper, are used when planting a hedge of deciduous plants. Gradually weaving crowns strengthen each other. Ephedra all year round paints the fence in green tones, and deciduous culture makes its appearance bright and changeable.

Deciduous crops for hedges in the country

Coniferous hedges are almost a classic. But what is the best way to make a hedge if you want to decorate the site with something original?

Numerous deciduous crops will come to the aid of the summer resident, which:

• well adapted to the climate of the middle zone;
• do not require time-consuming care and special conditions
• tolerate pruning painlessly;
• form a crown dense enough for a fence;
• change their appearance throughout the year, determining the seasonal appearance of the site.

When choosing species for hedges in the country, it is better to give preference to plants that have proven their unpretentiousness and winter hardiness. Best of all, small-leaved varieties with strongly branching shoots have proven themselves as a fence.

The list of such shrubs and medium-sized plants is quite large:

• blackthorn;
• yellow acacia or caragana;
• elder;
• small-leaved elm;
• snowberry;
• viburnum;
• laurel cherry;
• mock orange;
• black chokeberry;
• honeysuckle of infertile varieties;
• euonymus;
• hawthorn;
• vesicle;
• derain white;
• currant;
• irga.

At the disposal of the summer resident there are dozens of worthy deciduous plants that not only form a reliable and durable hedge, but also attract the attention of variegated foliage, like barberry or deren, lush flowering characteristic of mock orange, lilac, fieldfare, vesicle, viburnum or hydrangea. There are many plants with ornamental or edible fruits. These shrubs include barberry and euonymus, chokeberry, shadberry and blackthorn. The special charm of the site is given by the views with the appearance changing from season to season, like white turf.

Plant selection for molded hedges

The green fences of geometric shapes, achieved thanks to regular haircuts, look incredibly beautiful. However, not all of the above deciduous crops can withstand such a procedure. Which shrub is suitable for a simple hedge?

For plantings that will have to maintain strict, pruned forms for many years, it is most important to choose plants with frequent branching of shoots and small, quickly renewed foliage. This will help create a semblance of a dense living wall, curb, arch over the gate and other structures.

Not only does hedge trimming not harm such crops, the crown of shrubs is becoming denser every year and is better able to cope with the protective function of the fence.

Another feature of strict forms of shrubs suitable for planting is a small annual increase. The choice of plants in this case is considerable. This:

• numerous species and varieties of barberry, differing not only in height, but also in the color of dense foliage.
• hawthorn and vesicle with green or purple foliage;
• currant alpine and golden;
• privet;
• euonymus;
• japonica.

No matter how resistant to shearing the plants are, they should be subjected to this procedure very carefully, having a certain skill in such work.

Having decided to grow a rectangular fence on your site, and then a more rounded one, you will have to stock up on both patience and special hedge scissors.

Free growing hedges in landscape design

If painstaking work on the formation of shrubs is not to your liking, but natural beauty is closer, the plants are planted at a small distance from each other so that the crowns intersect, but they do not give a single shape. On the side, such a hedge seems airy, but inside its intertwining branches create a strong, impenetrable frame.

What is the best way to make a free type hedge? Since the plants are not specially sheared, their crowns actively grow and can take up a lot of space on the site. Ornamental shrubs in adulthood can have a crown diameter of 50 cm to 3 meters. This is taken into account when selecting crops for planting.

In dachas of a small area, it is difficult to implement such a project, but it is possible by planting a low-growing border, for example, from Japanese quince, euonymus, some varieties of arborvitae and juniper. If the summer resident is not constrained in area, the list of shrubs and even small trees expands significantly, including flowering, decorative deciduous and fruit trees.

What to plant in a hedge? For an unpretentious green fence, which requires almost no maintenance and winters well in central Russia, suitable:

• hawthorn;
• vesicle;
• fieldfare;
• barberry, which creates a dense prickly protection for the site;
• elder;
• mock orange;
• spirea of ​​almost all cultural varieties;
• Hungarian and common lilac;
• different types and heights.

In order for a hedge in landscape design to be not only an ornament, but also a real protection, it is reinforced with a second tier. It may be higher than the first or lower.

Often the second row is trimmed to form a wall or border to support and limit plants of hydrangeas, lilacs, park roses, and other species. In winter, thanks to such support, the hedge retains its density, and when using conifers, it also remains opaque.

How to make a living fence?

Work on laying planting trenches and planting plants begin only after creating an accurate well-thought-out fence plan. For the outer boundaries of the site, green walls up to 2 meters high are more suitable, and in some cases, for example, in the vicinity of a busy highway and higher. Inside the site for space zoning and edging, borders from 50 cm to a meter high are suitable.

Before making a hedge, based on the average height of the plants and the width of their crown, calculate the required number of shrubs. Planted on each linear meter:

• 1-2 large specimens, for example, hawthorn, common lilac, shadberry, chokeberry, vesicle;
• 3-5 plants of medium size, which include viburnum, derain, snowberry, barberry, honeysuckle;
• 5-7 shrubs with a low crown, for example, Japanese quince, spirea, individual varieties of euonymus and arborvitae.

For a single-row planting along the line of the future hedge, they dig a trench 40–50 wide and 50–60 cm deep. The more rows of plants, the greater the amount of land work. With each row of shrubs, the planting trench becomes wider by 30 or 40 cm.

Planting is carried out in mid-spring, using 3-year-old coniferous or 2-year-old deciduous seedlings. Such planting material takes root quite quickly and painlessly. In multi-row hedges, planting is carried out in a checkerboard pattern, adhering to the intervals between shrubs described above. In molded fences, plants are placed closer to each other, and in free plantings - a little further.

Hedge Plants - Video

Flowering plant hedges adorned gardens in ancient Babylon and ancient Egypt, and have been widespread in Europe and Russia since the 18th century. And even now, despite the abundance of ordinary wooden fences, economical corrugated fences, impenetrable brick and concrete fences and openwork forged fences, some owners of summer cottages and private mansions use tall trees and small shrubs for hedges.

Plants for tall hedges

Does it make sense to grow plants for hedges for a long time and spend time on regular care for them, when you can install a ready-made fence from any building material at any time - from inexpensive profiled sheets to exclusive forged fences with aristocratic monograms?

Evergreen trees and lush bushes for hedges can noticeably transform your site: they will cover outbuildings, unsightly fences and ugly landscapes, create a special atmosphere on the site, filled with harmony and peace, and become a great backdrop for flower beds. It is impossible not to note such useful properties of hedges as creating a favorable microclimate and protecting the site from dust, noise, prying eyes, uninvited intrusions. And of course, neither wooden nor brick fences in terms of durability can be compared with a green wall, especially if it consists of juniper, hawthorn, spruce, linden or arborvitae, living for hundreds of years.

Video about hedge plants

A green wall up to four meters high looks best in large areas. To create it, you can use: Tatar maple, western thuja, Berlin poplar, small-leaved elm, small-leaved bush linden, Siberian hawthorn and golden honeysuckle.

If you don’t want to engage in constant cutting and shaping crowns, grow an unshaped high hedge from Canadian shadberry, shadberry, common or Hungarian lilac, golden and Tatar honeysuckle, common mock orange, Siberian apple tree and common viburnum. Fast-growing shrubs for hedges are planted in a row every meter, in two-row hedges, half a meter should be kept between rows.

A green wall up to four meters high looks best in large areas

They are good because they do not lose their beauty throughout the year and, moreover, saturate the air with useful phytoncides. An excellent high hedge will be obtained from the following conifers: Lawson's cypress, common spruce, Canadian spruce, prickly, Chinese juniper, columnar, medium, western thuja, pea-bearing cypress, berry yew. The last two plants, although they are exotic, you can find winter-hardy varieties suitable for growing in Russia.

Shrubs for hedges of medium height

In most cases, a hedge up to two meters high is enough for a private plot. Such a green wall allows you to hide outbuildings and isolate yourself from the outside world, as well as protect fruit trees in the garden from winter winds.

Such a green wall allows you to hide outbuildings and isolate yourself from the outside world.

Shrubs for hedges (you can easily find photos of the listed plants on the Internet):

• currant golden,
• alpine currant,
• barberry purple,
• common barberry,
• ginnal maple,
• acacia yellow,
• hawthorn,
• derain white,
• cotoneaster shining,
• cotoneaster pale-flowered,
• spirea Vangutta,
• mock orange Lemoine.

Evergreens are also well suited for hedges of medium height - Canadian spruce, laurel cherry and western thuja. Coniferous and hardwoods can be alternated - then in winter, when there is little sunlight, your hedge will look lighter, more transparent. And if you plant the same tree species with different colors of leaves and flowers (for example, purple and common barberries), the hedge will sparkle with bright colors. Planting density for medium hedges varies from 0.4 m to 0.8 m, depending on the characteristics of the shrubs.

Evergreens are also well suited for medium-height hedges - Canadian spruce

Low growing hedges and borders

If you do not set yourself the goal of hiding your site from the prying eyes of passers-by, but, on the contrary, want to emphasize the beauty of your garden, grow low hedges up to one meter in height. For a molded low hedge, such plants are suitable: golden currant, alpine, brilliant cotoneaster, columnar juniper, common barberry (purple and green), Ginnala maple, western thuja.

Untrimmed low-growing hedges can be created from red-leaved rosehip, Lawson's cypress, rugosa rose, Bumald's spirea, snowberry. Flowering shrubs will look very beautiful: Vangutta spirea, Maak's honeysuckle, mock orange, Amur and Hungarian lilacs, Lemoine, Wilson and Amur deutsia, heather, wild rose, tree hydrangea and rose.

Video about growing a beautiful hedge

When choosing ornamental shrubs for hedges, think about whether you need thorny plants (roses, wild rose, sea buckthorn, barberry) or non-thorny ones (golden currant, honeysuckle, common privet)? Thorny shrubs will provide additional protection from unwanted intrusions into the area, but if you have small children, it is better not to grow such plants.

If you want to achieve the best visual effect and, if possible, avoid mistakes, choose hedge shrubs that are well adapted to the climate in your area and can successfully grow on the type of soil that is characteristic of your site. It is also desirable that the plants have small foliage, and shoots form quickly.

Linear plantings of shrubs or trees are called hedges in green building. Plant walls and fences are not only picturesque - they protect the site from prying eyes, uninvited guests, winds, noise and dust. In addition, natural hedges can successfully disguise outbuildings, aesthetically divide the homestead territory into different zones and at the same time serve as a certain background for landscape compositions.

Woody hedges: how do they differ

Hedges are created from low-growing trees, various types of ornamental shrubs, less often from perennial herbaceous plants on trellises.

Height and width

Green fences are conditionally divided by height into three groups:

• walls - more than 3 meters high,
• hedges themselves (low, medium, high) - from 0.5 to 3 meters,
• curbs - up to 0.5 m.

Each of these groups has its own range of plants. So, tree crops with a vertically directed crown are suitable for living walls, while dwarf forms are used for borders.

The height of the fence, designed for visual isolation from prying eyes, must be at least 2 meters. When choosing the height of a living fence, it is necessary to foresee in advance whether the shadow that it will cast on the fenced area and, possibly, on the neighboring garden will not cause unwanted problems. In order to delimit the internal space of the backyard territory, hedges are planted with a height of no more than 1.5 meters.

The width of a living border depends on the number of rows of plants in it. Landings can be one-, two-, three-row. Moreover, the rows are both from one type of plant, and from different ones; both identical in height and differing in this parameter.

Some trees and shrubs eventually begin to become bare from below as a result of the natural death of the lower branches. Given this, the “legs” of such plants are immediately covered with a number of lower, stably ornamental shrubs when planting. So, a line of lilacs with a line of spireas planted in front of it will look spectacular.

Form

Hedges can be cut (shaped) and uncut (free-growing).

The molded hedge has the correct geometric contours (parallelepiped, trapezium, sphere, hemisphere), which are obtained as a result of regular pruning. Sheared hedges, in addition to straight ones, are wavy, zigzag. The top surface also does not have to be strictly horizontal. It all depends on the imagination of the owner, the design idea and the skill of the garden "hairdresser".

For clipped hedges, most flowering shrubs are not suitable, since molding excludes their flowering. The "building material" of a living "geometric" fence is most often tree and shrub crops with good branching, small decorative leaves. The smaller the leaves or needles, the more dense the texture of the sheared surface, and the more effective the living barrier looks. A small nuance is that, for all its “beauty”, the molded hedge is quite monotonous and will require playing with flower beds, contrasting companion plants or small garden forms.

For free-growing hedges, plants with a compact crown are chosen - decorative foliage, beautifully flowering, beautifully fruited.

Attention! Unshaped hedges will definitely need pruning too, but these will be stimulating, corrective, sanitary haircuts without giving the bushes a clear shape.

Color

Thanks to a wide range of tree and shrub crops, there are now much more options for coloring hedges than just using the usual green color. Using plants with different colors of leaves or needles, you can plant golden yellow, silver, purple, fences combined from different colors on your site.

Using shrubs with colorful leaves to create hedges.

Important! Colored hedges on the site are a powerful accent. They themselves become an element of landscape design and it is much more difficult to harmoniously fit them, unlike monotonous green ones, into the overall holistic picture of the garden.

« Colored "hedges on the site allow you to play with the illusion of perception of objects. A barrier of warm-colored trees or shrubs (such as the purple-leaved barberry) appears closer than it really is. The use of cold shades (for example, thuja with bluish needles), on the contrary, visually distances it.

You can visually lengthen the garden path (and, consequently, increase the size of a small garden) by starting a double-sided border of varieties with dark flowers of any plant species and ending with varieties with light colors. To create such an effect, for example, paniculate hydrangea with its wide color palette is suitable.

An interesting design novelty is the creation of heterogeneous ("marble") hedges. For example, an original motley fence can be obtained by planting seedlings of two (or three) differently colored varieties of common barberry in three rows. After some time, the branches of closely planted plants penetrate each other into the crowns, and then come to the surface of the hedge in different places. The view of the sheared freakishly spotted living fence is very impressive.

"Marble" hedge.

The use of flowering plants in a hedge requires a developed sense of proportion. The low fence made of the purple-leaved form of the common barberry looks exclusive, but the high dark purple walls of the Ottawa Superb barberry will make a gloomy, depressing impression.

Hedges in your area

When choosing shrubs for hedges, it is important to decide what main function the living fencing of the local area should perform:

1. To weaken the winds while maintaining the ventilation of the site, a loose hedge of deciduous crops (amorphous, turf, hawthorn, etc.)

Important! The screen fence should catch and partially pass the wind through itself, and not reflect it completely. An impenetrable plantation is almost indistinguishable from a stone or metal fence wall. The wind speed when passing over the top of a too dense strip (it does not penetrate through it) is reduced by half, but immediately behind the fence, the air flows begin to swirl. This phenomenon adversely affects the well-being of nearby plants.

1. The best curtain from street dust is conifers and tree and shrub crops with wrinkled and pubescent leaves (willow, rough elm, field maple, etc.)
2. Sounds are most effectively absorbed by coniferous trees and, above all, by pine and spruce.
3. A reliable barrier from uninvited visitors - people or animals - is a prickly obstacle made of common barberry, prickly rose, large-thorn hawthorn, European gooseberry.
4. To create green "rooms" and secluded corners inside the garden, decorative undersized shrubs are suitable - spirea (Japanese, Bumalda, etc.), privet, undersized varieties of western thuja, etc.

Attention! Low-growing, so-called dwarf, varieties of both deciduous and coniferous species grow very slowly (annual growth does not exceed 15 cm).

As a rule, adult, well-developed specimens are of the greatest aesthetic value, the cost of which in the nursery is much higher. Therefore, when buying planting material to create a border of "dwarfs", you will have to take into account its high cost.

The durability of green spaces (and living fences are their special case) is sharply reduced if the atmosphere in the area of ​​​​their growth is polluted with dust, gases and the water-air regime of the soil is disturbed due to a hard coating.

Fast growing shrubs for hedges

To create a perennial hedge, they try to use shrubs with fast growth, so that they show their protective and decorative properties as early as possible. The favorite "building material" for fences from deciduous shrubs in central Russia are recognized:

• barberry,
• privet,
• cotoneaster,
• vesicle Kalinolistny,
• chokeberry,
• hawthorn,
• deren,
• bloodroot,
• spirea,
• currant golden and alpine,
• forsythia.

The annual growth of shoots in many of them is up to 1 meter.

With a single-row planting, from 2 to 5 seedlings are planted per meter of the border strip, taking into account the diameter of the crown of an adult plant.

Planting seedlings.

Already from an early "youth" the hedge should acquire a thick base. Strong pruning of the bush stimulates the appearance of side shoots. In seedlings planted in autumn, in the spring of next year, all shoots are shortened by one third of the length. When planting a hedge in spring, plants are given the opportunity to build up the aerial part during the season for the subsequent formation of good roots. Pruning is then done next spring. Gardener's scissors during each season will be needed, depending on the type of plant, 2-4 times.

Vesicle viburnum

One of the popular types of ornamental fast-growing shrubs used in the construction of hedges is the viburnum (Physocarpos opulifolius).

Vesicle viburnum

All parts of this shrub are of decorative value - flowers, leaves, and fruits. Bush up to 2-3 meters tall - sprawling, with a dense hemispherical crown. Small leaves are serrate-toothed along the edges. Small flowers with red stamens, collected in white or pink umbrellas, bloom in June. Composite fruit bubbles change color from green to reddish when ripe. In garden design, the following varieties of viburnum vesicle are most often used:

• Dart's Gold (Darts Gold) - with lemon yellow leaves,
• Diabolo (Dyabolo) - with purple foliage,
• Luteus (Luteus) - yellow-orange in spring, green in summer and golden in autumn,
• Red Baron (Red Baron) - with dark red leaves.

For borders, dwarf varieties of the vesicle type Nana (Nana) are used with dark green leaves and a bush height of up to 1 m.

The vesicle tolerates partial shade, but varieties with golden and purple leaves prefer sunny places to maintain a rich color. Does not like waterlogged soil. The undoubted advantages of this shrub include:

• frost resistance,
• undemanding to soil fertility,
• good environmental tolerance.

The high unpretentiousness of the vesicle allows it to be planted as undergrowth even along roads and railways.

Cotoneaster brilliant

Cotoneaster brilliant ( Cotoneaster lucidus)- one of the best deciduous shrubs for creating dense clipped hedges. Bush cotoneaster brilliant upright, densely leafy, up to 2 meters high. Glossy dark green elliptical leaves turn crimson in autumn. Due to the abundance of black fruit balls on the branches, the cotoneaster remains picturesque for a long time even against the dull background of late autumn.

Cotoneaster brilliant

The value of cotoneaster brilliant for landscaping is that it:

• winter-hardy,
• drought-resistant
• unpretentious,
• shade-tolerant, although it develops better with sufficient light.

The gas and dust resistance of the cotoneaster makes it indispensable in the fence, if the site is located near the highway or in the city. Cotoneaster does not differ in rapid growth, but in one place it grows up to 50 years.

Karagana shrub

Caragana shrub (Caragana frutex) is one of the commonly used species in the creation of green fences.

Karagana shrub

This variety is very similar to its "sister" - tree-like caragana, popularly known as the yellow acacia. The same plentiful "golden" flowering in May, the same thin shoots with light green paired leaves, creating an openwork crown. The height of the bush is not more than 2 meters, it grows very actively, a powerful root system is able to strengthen the slope from shedding the soil. Karagana shrub is frost-resistant, hardy, withstands drought, loves the sun, but also puts up with partial shade.

The most popular varieties of shrub caragana in garden design:

• Grandiflor(Grandiflor) - large-flowered variety,
• Latifolia (Latifolia) - large flowers and shiny leaves,
• Globosa(Globoza) - compact spherical crown.

Shrubs for flowering hedges

Hedges of flowering shrubs are usually not given a clear geometric shape, but are allowed to grow freely. In this case, the distance between the bushes in a row should be approximately 0.8 of the diameter of an adult bush. In such a not too dense planting, the crowns of neighboring bushes will only partially overlap.

Ornamental shrubs with a long flowering period are most suitable for creating flowering frames:

• spirea Vangutta,
• varieties of Japanese spirea,
• weigela varieties,
• varieties of cinquefoil shrub,
• varieties of white turf.

Spirea Vangutta

Spiraea Vanhouttei (Spiraea x vanhouttei) surprises with the size of the bush, a lush cascading crown and the luxury of snow-white flowering. The height of the bush and the diameter of the crown reach up to 2 meters. Flexible shoots, strewn with numerous hemispherical inflorescences, lean to the ground from gravity. Beautiful and jagged leaves - dark green above and bluish below. Spirea Vangutta is distinguished by rapid growth, unpretentiousness, tolerance to shade. It should be noted that such a picturesque border strip will require a lot of space.

Spirea Vangutta

Derain white

White dogwood (Cornus alba) is an extremely ornamental shrub, very promising in the green construction of central and northern Russia. The second name of this handsome man is white svidina, the third is white dogwood, and among the people he is most often known as red. Beautiful foliage, green and white in summer, turns red-violet by autumn. The graphics of flexible reddish-brown shoots are very expressive against the background of white snow and greenery of coniferous trees. It blooms profusely, in two waves - in May-June and August-September. Small white or cream flowers are collected in numerous inflorescences up to 5 cm in diameter. White fruits at the end of summer are adjacent to newly emerging flowers.

Derain white

Decorative and deciduous varieties of white dogwood are the best for flowering hedges:

• Sibirica Variegata(Sibirika Variegata) - the bush is dense, compact, the leaves are decorated with a white edge;
• Spaethii (Shpeta)– the leaves are bordered around the perimeter with a golden yellow wide stripe, young leaves are bronze in color;
• Aurea(Aurea) - plain golden leaves.

For all their attractiveness, these varieties are resistant to frost and heat, unpretentious, but fully show their decorative properties only in good light. In order not to turn into an impenetrable overgrown jungle over time, a fence made of such material will require a systematic correction of height and width, as well as alignment of the planting line.

evergreen hedges

Evergreen hedges are good because they noticeably enliven the boring picture of the winter garden and the colorless period of late autumn. They come from coniferous and deciduous trees.

Mahonia holly

Holly mahonia (Mahonia aquifolium) from the barberry family is a real gift of nature to gardeners and designers. This is a very showy evergreen shrub up to 1.5 meters high. For the aroma of flowers, mahonia is called lily-of-the-valley shrub, for edible blue-gray berries - holly grapes. Large, glossy, toothed leaves are deep green in summer, turning bronze-red in autumn. It blooms in late spring - early summer with fragrant, yellow inflorescences collected in a brush. The border of holly mahonia remains picturesque all year round.

Mahonia holly

The indisputable advantage of coniferous trees and shrubs is that they are decorative from the very beginning, durable and enrich the air with the aroma of pine needles and phytoncides. But among there are no fast-growing species.

A respectable hedge can be planted from spruce (ordinary, prickly, Ayan). But there is one significant trouble: if for some reason bald patches appear in the crown of these trees, then such holes in the fence will irreparably spoil this status living border.

Numerous varieties of junipers - virgin, ordinary, Cossack - have proven themselves well as a natural barrier. These are small trees or large shrubs with a more active annual growth of shoots. There are columnar and pin-shaped varieties suitable for high walls, there are lower sprawling varieties that are good in free-growing hedges.

In the climate of central Russia, well-known varieties of hardy and winter-hardy western thuja (Thuja occidentalis) feel good:

• Brabant (Brabant) - with a conical shape,
• Smaragd (Smaragd) - with a conical silhouette,
• Sunkist (Sunkist) - with a golden color of needles.

Using the color scheme of modern varieties of thuja and junipers, a natural fence can be made combined - play with shades of green or include blue, yellow, gray colors in it.

Miniature ("dwarf") varieties of thuja and junipers are great in borders, but significantly increase the cost of such elegant frames.

If the question is about choosing the most spectacular, unpretentious, easy to take root and inexpensive shrubs for hedges, then here are the six best ones:

• vesicle Kalinolistny,
• turf white,
• cotoneaster shining,
• spirea,
• cinquefoil shrub,
• barberry.

A hedge, protecting the territory from the outside or decorating it from the inside, really lives - it breathes, grows, blooms, changes, pleases the eye, creates a favorable microclimate in the garden for both plants and people.

A fast-growing perennial evergreen hedge can be an excellent solution for a summer cottage or a country estate. Such landings are not only an original decoration, but also have a very practical function. They will protect from prying eyes, as well as from dust and extraneous noise. Of course, initially you will have to make some efforts, but then the hedge will grow completely independently, and its maintenance will not require much work.

What are living fences?

Throughout the world, hedges have been used in horticultural art since ancient times. Both in the countries of the East and in stiff England, such plantings were an integral part of the park culture. This landscape design technique has many variations.

The height of the hedge is the main parameter by which they are classified. Depending on this factor, they are divided into:

border hedges. Green living fences (up to 1 m) perform a purely decorative function, which consists in highlighting paths and paths, separating lawns and flower beds.

Internal hedges. A fence with a height of 1 m to 2 m is designed to zone the site.

outer hedges. Plantations with a height of more than 2 m act as a fence that limits the external space.

green wall. An almost impenetrable park structure, reaching a height of 4 m. It is an excellent replacement for traditional fences.

By design features, internal and external fences are conditionally divided into:

open - are purely decorative barriers that perform the function of a conditional division of zones;

semi-open - visually protect the object, but do not become a mechanical barrier;

closed - not only visually protect the territory, but also represent a real physical barrier from plantations.

The plants themselves can be planted both in one and in several rows, in a different order. Multi-row hedges are simple, that is, all plants are the same in height and variety. There are multi-row cascading plantations in which plants of different heights.

plant varieties

By the type of plants used to create living fences, the following groups are distinguished:

evergreen plants. Remain decorative throughout the year. This includes coniferous crops and some deciduous plants.

deciduous plants. Leaves are shed for the winter. At this time of the year, the hedge becomes bare and transparent, which is not always convenient. But on the other hand, the rest of the time it pleases the owners with a seasonal change in the coloring of the leaves, and some also with colorful flowering. This group includes various trees and shrubs.

perennial plants. Such fences are created for several years.

annual plants. Allow to equip the fastest growing fence. But she lives only until winter, then the plants die. Usually annual vines are used.

fast growing hedge

Fast-growing shrubs are ideal material for creating such plantings. Shrubs grow quickly enough and in relation to trees and vines they have a number of advantages, which are as follows:

it is easy to carry out zoning of the site with a shrub fence (garden, garden, recreation area, playground, etc.);

allow you to equip borders near paths, flower beds and in other places;

ideal for creating any shape by cutting and trimming (ball, square, pyramid, etc.);

among the shrubs there are species with different shades of foliage, which allows you to transfer accents to some details;

such fences, thanks to the dense foliage, perfectly protect the owners of the site from street noise and dust.

Consider some fast-growing shrubs that are not particularly difficult to care for, which do not lose their decorative effect from the first days of spring until late autumn.

From the barberry, you can quickly form a perennial evergreen hedge. Due to its plasticity, it allows you to form low hedges-curbs. Handles haircut well. If you plant bushes less often, then you can get completely impassable, impassable and very thorny thickets. Uninvited guests in the form of neighbors' cats and dogs will not penetrate through such jungle. Grows quickly, very well increasing the green mass.

It looks very decorative, as it changes the color of the leaves at different times of the year. Shades range from bright green to yellow-crimson and almost burgundy. Dark red edible berries ripen in autumn and adorn the bush until frost. It looks impressive both as a monoculture in a single-row planting, and in compositional solutions with other shrubs.

The culture is characterized by unpretentiousness and good frost resistance. The most common fast-growing varieties of barberry are small warty, boxwood, Juliana and Thunberg. Evergreen varieties prefer partial shade, deciduous varieties develop better in full sun.

Privet is very loved by landscape designers and gardeners for its extreme unpretentiousness and very fast growth. Among perennials, it is considered almost the fastest growing. It tolerates decent frost and drought. It grows on absolutely any soil. Feels great in both sunny areas and in the shade. They will allow you to form fairly high fences up to 4 m high.

The wall of this shrub is formed dense and dense, requires regular shearing due to rapid growth. Privet is an excellent object for creating garden sculptures from shrubs. It can be given almost any shape.

The berries of this plant cannot be eaten, they are considered poisonous. But the birds are happy to feed on them. In dense thickets, various small birdies like to build nests and raise offspring. For the winter, privet always sheds foliage.

vesicle

An ornamental unusual shrub that has many varieties with different leaf colors. It grows very quickly, during the summer its branches can stretch up to 40 cm. The culture is very winter-hardy and resistant to various diseases. Even in severe frosts, the tips of young shoots only slightly freeze near the bushes. Prefers to grow in sunny open spaces. But it will survive perfectly in the shade, although it will lose color saturation.

The leaves are very unusual and decorative, resembling the leaves of maple, viburnum and currant. Coloring can have cardinal differences, depending on the variety. There are varieties with a yellow-golden color and purple-red. Plants that have leaves of 2 colors at once look very original: burgundy and gold.

The bush has the ability to grow simultaneously in all directions, while it is usually almost perfectly round in shape. In height and width it can exceed 3 m. It allows you to form any bizarre shapes from yourself by cutting. In late June and early July, the plant is densely covered with umbrella-shaped inflorescences, consisting of a large number of small whitish-cream flowers.

evergreen hedge

Such plantings remain equally decorative at any time of the year. They do not shed their foliage and cannot please the owners with a variety of colors. Evergreen hedges always look a little gloomy, especially coniferous plantings. To avoid this, it is recommended to combine coniferous crops with deciduous crops in one plantation. Coniferous shrubs and trees will not only decorate the site, but also purify the air of harmful impurities thanks to the phytoncides contained in the needles.

Evergreens must be selected in strict accordance with local climatic conditions, since most heat-loving crops are not able to survive harsh and snowy winters. Planting them anew every year is not very reasonable, and quite expensive.

Such a hedge always looks great and goes well with other garden plants. It will suit any garden style and design. Even in winter, covered with snow, such a fence looks extremely impressive. Many owners believe that green spaces grow very slowly and require enhanced care. But it is not so. By choosing the right evergreens, you can get a green fence in 2-3 years

Norway spruce

In the first years after planting, spruces grow very slowly, but after that they significantly accelerate their growth. A large number of ornamental varieties have been bred. Most of them have very dense dense branching and impenetrability. Look good in group plantings. The culture is resistant to extreme cold. It is not very demanding on the composition of the soil, but does not grow well on heavy clay soils. Does not like lowlands with stagnant water.

All conifers require good lighting, with a lack of it, the branches are drawn out and exposed. Spruces with golden and blue needles grow better in sunny areas, and with dark green needles they prefer partial shade.

The crown starts right from the ground and lends itself perfectly to formation, which allows you to create curly hedges. The height of plantings can reach 30 m, the life expectancy of plants is about 250-300 years. Such a hedge always looks great and goes well with other garden plants. It will suit any garden style and design.

Boxwood ordinary and thuja western

Boxwood is one of the oldest ornamental shrubs. This evergreen plant has about 30 varieties, each of which has its own uniqueness. This is a fairly thermophilic culture, it does not tolerate frost well and requires careful shelter for the winter. In the northern regions, it is practically not used. Common boxwood is a rather unpretentious shrub that grows on any soil. Easily tolerates shade and transplant at any age.

The branches are covered with small shiny leaves. When pruning, it does not lose its decorative effect and allows you to realize any fantasies. It does not grow very fast and does not require frequent haircuts. There are dwarf varieties, and there are varieties that can grow up to 3 m under favorable conditions. The better the conditions, the faster the boxwood will grow.

Thuja is an evergreen shrub, but at the same time it is able to change its color depending on the season. In summer it is green, and in winter it acquires brownish hues. There are a lot of varieties, and they are very different from each other. There are varieties of a spherical shape of a light green color that do not require a haircut. And there are columnar thuja up to 7 m high, which have a rich dark green color. Fast-growing plants of some varieties are able to create a hedge in 3-4 years.

The culture tolerates frost well and does not require additional shelter. He likes regular pruning, from which it is better to bush. Densely planted seedlings look very good, growing, they turn into a solid green wall.

Plants for hedges can be very different. When choosing them, many factors must be taken into account. With the right selection of planting material, proper planting and proper care, the green hedge will allow you to enjoy its magnificent view for many years.