Underplanting a dogwood

I have an unknown variety of dogwood in my front yard. Currently the grass grows up to the tree trunk - there is no mulched area surrounding it. I would like to plant some annuals around the tree. Do dogwood have alot of roots close to the surface that don't like to be disturbed? Also, are there any type of flowers that I should NOT plant around a dogwood?

The tree was here when we bought our house two years ago. I think that the flowers are white.

You more than likely have a flowering dogwood (Cornus florida). These are pretty common (and pretty) ornamental native trees in eastern North America.

You should not have any difficulty planting annuals around the base of your tree. I wouldn't use a tiller or anything like that to prepare the ground, but if you were just digging a few holes to plant your annuals then the dogwood should be just fine. It will probably appreciate some extra TLC that it will benefit from as you care for the annuals.

It certainly will be happier with mulch/flowers around it instead of turf/lawn, which is a much greater competitor. I don't know of any flower species that would be detrimental to the dogwood, or vice versa.

How big (trunk diameter) is this dogwood?

Me either. I have lots of Hostas growing underneath my Kousa Dogwood and my Pagoda Dogwood also.

VV,
My dogwood is about four feet around.

One additional thought: I am assuming that I need to take up the grass to put down the annuals and mulch, rather than layering it with newspapers in a lasagna style because of the tree's roots. Please correct me if I am wrong. I wont be doing this until late April/early May anyway, but I want to start some plants from seed.

Using RoundUp will not harm the tree, (but keep it off the bark to be safe) but taking up the sod would probably do some root damage. You could lay newspaper down as early as possible, with layer of topsoil a few inches deep which would be enough to plant annuals. Then, a shallow layer of mulch wouldn't do any harm, but probably you would be better to have about 3" of light mix topsoil (pulverized with compost) to allow the roots to breath, with no mulch (not necessary if the grass is smothered or killed and the annuals fill in anyway). In my experience, using RoundUp will not harm the dogwood at all, and you can add some topsoils and plant as soon as it's dry. (Also, did you really mean the dogwood is four FEET around?)

Four, maybe five feet. Does that sound strange?

I wish we could grow dogwoods that big in Indiana! Regardless, with a tree that size, I wouldn't hesitate using RoundUp as it kills only on contact with green plant tissue (including green bark, but that shouldn't be a problem with a tree that size). It'll kill the grass and you can safely plant after it dries. I've used it for years in my landscaping business with never a problem. Of course, it's not an organic way to kill the grass compared to smothering with newspaper, but it's one concession to convenience. (Note: Other grass killers may damage roots of the tree. Make sure it's RoundUp or some other generic that is based on glysophate.)

pennefeather:

Why don't you post a picture of your dogwood and the planting situation? That always helps when we can see what you have to work with.

After checking, I found that I don't have a single picture of this tree in bloom. I don't even have one of it with leaves. I think that the reason for that is that it doesn't have any attractive plantings surrounding it.

These two pictures are a couple of years old. The closer tree is the dogwood. The farther tree is a maple.

This picture just gives a view of the trunk and ground. Some of the branches are fairly low. We cut off a few branches last year because they were dead. It looks like the previous owner did the same. I wish that the dogwood and maple hadn't been planted so close to each other.

I just wanted to be sure that I wouldn't hurt the tree by planting underneath it. I know that the roots for the nearby maple are very close to the surface, with a number of them coming halfway out of the grass. I will need to add some topsoil, but I am going to try to keep it to a minimum just in case.

I tried underplanting a 10 yr. Cornus florida 'Cherokee Chief' with four hosta starts about 4 ft. away from the trunk. Oddly enough the tree began to sucker. This cultivar did seem to resent the root disturbance. I think might have planted too close to the trunk. I removed the suckers at the base for two succesive years. The hostas grew fine, but I don't think I will try adding any other plants. The roots were dense within the top six inches. I cut nothing larger than 1/4".

I just realized that I posted the wrong picture. The second picture is the maple, not the dogwood. The dogwood's roots don't lie on the surface. This is the dogwood.

What a fine old tree! I wasn't sure of what you meant by "4' around" either. (maybe the branch spread) but it is clear that your tree has weathered many years.

I want to gently disagree with the recommendation of adding soil to create planting beds under established trees. This is done quite often, I realize, but it alters the gaseous and hydrologic relationship between the roots of the tree and the environment they are growing in. Roots are growing at a depth that they "like", and to change that by addition or subtraction puts the tree in jeopardy. This could be a whole long thread by itself, and I won't further belabor it here.

In the case of this dogwood: the general recommendation I gave above stands, but you've mentioned and I can see that several large branch removals have occurred on this plant. Unfortunately, any arborist will probably tell you that this old tree is in decline, and may not have many years left to grace your yard. You can take steps to support it so that it will endure longer -- good soaking watering during droughty times, and maybe a preventive spray program to reduce inevitable dogwood borer attack or dogwood anthracnose or powdery mildew damage. Only you can make the decisions about whether this will make sense for the cost versus benefits.

Back to your question. Roundup (or similar nonselective herbicide) to kill the grass is the best route. In VA, you could probably do that now - a day or two with temps above 50ºF and the grass growing will be enough. A thick bed of coarse mulch (pick your favorite material that is well-draining) that you can plant your annuals through will create the clear zone under the dogwood. If you intend to create a permanent planting bed here, you might consider adding flowering bulbs to the mix come fall.

In my never to be humble opinion: that dogwood has graced that site for quite some time, and I imagine that it has stood proudly and beautifully without any ornamentation other than the turf below. I bet it is striking in full bloom. I would leave it as is, and consider an annual flower bed (created as HoosierGreen described above) in a different spot where you won't have any of the concerns about damaging this specimen and all the benefits of full sun and good soil preparation.

Whatever you choose, have fun with it. Post some pics of that dogwood in full bloom for those of us jealous of you.

Thank you. I will have to take some pictures in bloom this year. In the two years that we have had this house, it has been completely ignored. I spent a lot of time on the planting beds, including creating two entirely new ones as well as expanding the old ones. The rest of the yard doesn't look anything like the pictures that I posted, but the trees haven't been touched.

I suggested to my husband that we were probably going to need to get rid of the tree since you could see that some of the branches were dead. His solution was to just cut off the dead limbs. We'll see what happens this spring.