Shade Gardening: Growing hostas with english ivy, 1 by pastime

pastime wrote:
I have Ivy in my Japanese garden. If left to do it's thing it will cover the area with a thick mat. I have to go in there yearly and show it who's boss or it will get out of control. I didn't get to it this year until the end of July and what a jungle I found. As bad as it was, non of the other plantings in there were suffering. It just looked messy and overgrown. I pulled all the Ivy (5 wheel barrows full) that was infringing on other planting's space so things looked more orderly. I have a lot of mulch in there and the Ivy was growing on top of it. As long as you keep your eye on it and don't let it take over, you should have no problem with it among your other plantings. It's not maintenance free that's for sure.