Pacific Northwest Gardening: New in WA, need help,please, 1 by Rarejem

Rarejem wrote:
Hi Jo. Welcome to Washington! You will love the Tri Cities... it is a lovely place and the people are for the most part still small town friendly.

Although I live on the West side, we have a vacation home near you in Othello, and have a lovely garden there. Although your side of the state is desert by nature, the soil is rich and if you add water on a regular basis, stuff just goes ape! Be ready to do some agressive pruning when things get a foothold.

We have a very thick hedge behind our house that acts as a wonderful windbreak. It is made up of Lilacs and Rose of Sharon, with some Red Twig Dogwood and a Flowering Almond thrown in. Both the Rose of Sharon and the Lilacs are self sowing and almost invasive there if you don't keep them deadheaded. As a matter of fact, if you are interested, we have some of all that we would be willing to share on a "you dig" basis. There are several RofS that are quite large (5' pruned) that we have decided need to go because keeping up on the deadheading when we are only there every other week or so is just too much of a chore with the number we have.

Delphiniums do do well there, but we try to plant in a spot somewhat sheltered from the wind. Iris thrive, as do quite a few rose varieties, and many annuals.

Let me know if you are intersted in some of our excess shrubs. We will be going out towards the end of March to do the final yard cleanup, so they would be available at that time.

I will share a few pics of our little E-WA world.

Julie

This is our lilac hedge 5-3-08