Hey friends welcome to Gardening with Creekside today we are back at the chicken Coupe and I am
going to enlist the help of my fantastic team my fantastic husband with his lovely heavy machinery
and we are going to plant uh this little island bed here behind the chicken coop I've been waiting
all summer to do it it's just a matter of time and the plants and all the things right well
today is the day we are between uh rainstorms and it is dry enough to get the Machinery up here so
that is what we're going to do I went ahead and placed all the plants out because I just needed
to have some time by myself to think and kind of like work through the process of Designing
it and where the plants were going to go I already knew where a couple of them were going to go but
then sometimes you just have to sit in that space and just kind of let the design happen at least
that's how it works for me so that is what I did and I have got them all place so let me show you
exactly what we're going to plant today just to give you a bit of a frame of reference of where
we are and this space this is the back side of the chicken coop and right here where you see all the
Machinery this is one of the little drives that we have created that will go all the way around
what I call uh the island bed which is this flower bed really you can tell the difference
hopefully between the two different mulches the light colored mulch is from when like the power
company has to come through and like trim limbs we take their wood chips and we use that along
paths and that kind of thing then inside the confines the boundaries of the island bed is
the darker mulch that we use when we were doing the chicken coop we just went ahead and put the
mulch down just to get out of the mud nothing really has been planted in here except for a
couple of things way down there on the corner if you remember we planted um a little Miss figgy in
the pot and that pot was sitting right over here she is going to get relocated so therefore she is
sitting right here in the little driveway now in this section of the bed we essentially have these
three trees one two and then three that give us a um little bit of a miniature bed with inside
the big bed we had a crimson Queen Japanese people here in this 15 gon she was on The Struggle Bus at
the nursery had her for gosh a year over a year and she was just struggling it was a BNB so we
pot it up in a pot and she started looking really good and I went ahead and volunteered and grabbed
it so a crimson Queen is that of course iconic Japanese maple that does those beautiful very uh
dissected frilly burgundy leaves right in has more of a low wide weeping habit at maturity it could
be 10 ft tall and 10 ft wide however it's on the slower growing side this is not on irrigation and
it's going to be competing against tree roots so I suspect it's going to be a pretty slow grower
so it's just going to take it sweet time which is perfectly fine so we got the Crimson Queen here
in the middle and then you will see surrounding it I have three nice Evergreen Chamas this is the
Greensboro red the all three of them are the same Greensboro red is going to be okay we're going to
have a little test looking at these leaves is this a Japonica or is this a sanqua do you remember
sanas have smaller leaves japonicas have nice big leaves so this is a Japonica meaning that it is
going to bloom in late winter um into the spring it does have some bud on it some of them are
smaller the ones at the bottom are a little bit bigger obviously from its name greensbor red it
is going to be a classic beautiful red deep deep red with a little bit of a a yellow throat now
looking at the Habit on these These are definitely going to be more upright more colmer than they are
wide they're going to what I ultimately what I want them to do is basically to touch each
other they're about 5 to 6 feet apart from each other which is really mature size um our property
line is B literally like the trees back there so we are right on our property line um we love our
neighbors they're just through the woods over here not that there's probably any plan whatsoever to
do anything back here but you know just go ahead and if you're if you H if you know that you're
on your property line you never know what could happen they could sell their house that the new
person could come in and cut all this stuff down and put who knows what right there right so we're
just kind of I'm just kind of thinking ahead and giving me some nice Evergreen back here uh to give
me some height it'll be gorgeous when all three of them are blooming I think it'll be gorgeous um
even in the summertime spring summer fall when the Chamas are not blooming and then you've got that
stunning foliage off of the Japanese maple oh it's going to be gorgeous so that is the plan there
and then I had a sweet little fire light tidbit that uh I went ahead and stuck here on the corner
because one can never have too many hydrangeas so we've got Fire Light tidbit right here of course
that's a great panicle hydrangea and it's going to be on the smaller side so it'll fill in quite
nicely right here and be really sweet now this is not going to be the last planting we doing
this bed oh no no because there's constantly new plants arriving I'm finding new plants that I
want to add in so I am intentionally leaving holes right this is not going to be a oneandone that is
not gardening we are going to be coming back here in the spring in the summer and I'll be adding in
little things as we go along now uh my sweet boly Jackson brought up the machinery and and the land
and sea for me but he kind of he kind of blocked my view so we're just going to work with the best
way we got here coming along um this is definitely going to be the biggest most open area that's
going to probably get the most sun right here remember we do have these hardwood trees but some
of them are quite small they will develop and get bigger as time goes on again thinking I'm going
to start in the back with my tallest and then we're going to work our way forward back there
in the back you're going to see that we have an evergreen this is soft serve and soft serve is a
false Cyprus a Camara ceris and I am on the border of being too warm for her but we're going to give
it a whirl y'all uh soft serve is going to be like 6 to 10 ft tall 5 to Six Wide beautiful Evergreen
by its name it is a soft to the touch so that will be really nice to give me some height Evergreen
structure there and then in the two black cans on either side those are the classic Limelight
hydranges you may remember that we did the Lim lights um on the very back of the signature garden
and so we had two left over I think these will be really fun of course limelights again classic pan
hydrangea that will um get to be in that 6 to 8T range and just be stunning now I can prune
them however I want as far as like the other ones that I have at the at near the creek I have them
limed up from the bottom nice and full and will be absolutely stunning I am a huge fan of the Rainbow
Rhythm dayes here we have the brand new this is storm shelter and this is going to be such a fun
day lily it's only going to be 24 in tall uh but look at that beautiful flower on it absolutely
stunning with that purple and that lavender with that really pretty yellow throat going to love
it so I put them in a group of three so that they will grow together and um essentially be like one
big huge massive Clump together and then on this side to kind of mirror that same shape we did some
a bilas this is the mucho gusto ailia it is a new one it is of course now this is January so
it's looking a little looking a little rough right now uh but gorgeous classic colors on it this is
only going to be about 2 and 1/2 to 3 ft tall but it can be 3 to 5 wide so that's going to be super
fun nice Evergreen even though in the winter time um for us remember we're in North Carolina a Zone
8A abilas will be Evergreen however they're not going to be as Lush right of course that is just
kind of the obvious all plants don't look unless you're a chamia they don't look so great in the
winter time so we did a group of three right there for those and then finally what we're going to add
you can see those two last little pots and yes I did put them exactly in line with these trees
those are my last two little puffer fish that Proven Winners sent me um in last year so I
thought this would be a really fun way to kind of separate physically these beds right so it is one
massive bed but within that bed we have different areas so we've got the puffer fish CL gorgeous
panicle hydrangea big huge blooms on it um 3 to 5T tall and wide so this will fill in this area
quite nicely so uh Cece and Alyssa are here so we're all going to work together Jerry's going
to be here in just a second get on the machine and we're going to get all of these babies in
the ground uh we're going to probably plant this in summer record time I've got my biotone and then
I do have like I said nice big thing of the land and sea compost because the soil here is horrible
classic red North Carolina red clay Horrible no no organic matter whatsoever so we are going to
add some both a little bit to the hole and then around each plant and then we will be good to go
not going to water today remember North Carolina very wet Winters we're in about starting tomorrow
we're going to get like four or 5 days worth of rain so I do not need to water these plants
at all so we're just going to get the machines going and get these babies in the [Music] ground
today's project is complete my friends I'm telling you when you've got big machinery and lots and
lots of Helping Hands the project goes by super fast uh so all the plants are in the ground and
they look great in their new home I know that we're going to probably get a lot of questions
about this this planting in late January why are you planting in late January can you do that are
the plants not going to be harmed um which is a is a is a rightful concern so this is where being a
student of your own garden is super important now if you're like a lot of the country and
you're under you know feet of snow and you have or and or have any kind of snow on the ground
obviously you're probably not going to be out here installing shrubs and trees into your garden
that is the beautiful thing about being in North Carolina right the southeast United States Zone
8A our Winters are cold like this morning it was 16° however uh in a couple of days we're going to
hit like 70 something so our temperatures don't stay cold for an extended amount of time like
other parts of the country we definitely get cold but it may be for two nights and then you're back
up and you're nice and warm again so it's this constant up and down um the said the our ground
never freezes we dug all those holes the ground was not frozen whatsoever however there were some
plants that I had grabbed up off of the production shrub lot that were left over um from one of our
plantings and I had kind of just stuck them there so they were frozen the abilas were frozen the
dayes were frozen everybody else um I'm not sure about the soft serve I didn't plant the soft serve
so I'm not sure about that everybody El Bel was either up here or down at the Pines where they're
a little bit more insulated The Roots were not frozen so what does that tell me okay the plants
are going to be more insulated in the ground than they were sitting in their Nursery pots out on the
shrub lot it is not going to hurt the plants even because the roots were Frozen They're not going to
die they are very cold hearty and it didn't stay that cold for that length of a time to kill them
so they will be okay so if you are like me and you are in a warmer Zone and your ground does not
really freeze you don't have snow on the ground then yeah you absolutely can go ahead and plant
some uh shrubs trees perennials now I will say also that I chose not to plant my my warm weather
plants my eona my Denim and Lace uh my sedums those kinds of things I'm going to wait until it
gets a little bit warmer and we go into that more active growing season and then I'll get them in
the ground it's just kind of knowing your plants right knowing your plants these are all very cold
hearty they're going to be more insulated in the ground here than they were exposed out in the
nursery pots so there you go I do love this little corner right here this might be kind of my instant
favorite with the beautiful of that Evergreen of the Greensboro red chamelea I can Envision
the uh the Japanese m that Crimson Queen and then it'll be really fun to have a nice kind of Pop of
white with some pink with that fire light tidbit right there still plenty of room if I wanted to
come back through here and put some low growing perennials I certainly could do that definitely
have more room um to add plenty of plants in here but everybody just looks great right so you've got
the day lies sound of my heart we've got the two Limelight hydranges then the soft serve
false Cyprus mucho gusto ailia these are going to grow and they're basically going to look like one
massive plant with your abilas this is definitely going to be more of a southern plant because they
do like it warm to prune them we're going to do that as we leave winter and go into spring these
are small so I'll just give them a little bit of a trim but they bloom on New Growth and ailia really
really respond well to being pruned like once a year so we'll again to just give them a little bit
of a haircut since they're little and they will be um really really fun to watch grow and then last
but not least what we added were the two puffer fish that'll be in line right here I really think
that's going to be fun because it is basically going to really kind of put um a dividing wall
between the beds over there and then open us up and give this area right here lots of really
pretty um new room and kind of make a garden with in a garden so as always we hope you have found
this fun informative and inspirational uh yeah even in North Carolina late January we still get
to plant now come August and July I'm going to be wishing I was in Michigan and Maine and wherever
you are that's cold and you have cool nights then we're going to switch places I don't want
to switch places with you now I like I like being here and still being able to Garden your around
anyway it's time for lunch Jenny's getting a little hungry we'll see you on the next video bye
friends