Size Counts!

What an incendiary title but oh so true. When planning your garden, size most certainly does count. There's a wealth of dwarf perennial plants and giant perennial plants too but most often it's the trees and shrubs that gardeners miscalculate when it comes to size and space.

This is Lilac 'Miss Kim', saddled with the horrendous botanical name of Syringa pubescens subsp. patula 'Miss Kim'. You can see how I broke my own rule and just stuck with the nickname this time :-)

My 'Miss Kim' Lilac and my Physocarpus 'Diablo' (Ninebark) are both in bloom today. 'Miss Kim is just finishing up while 'Diablo' has just begun to burst into bloom. Both are specatular shrubs and wonderful additions to the home landscape.

There's just one problem with these two shrubs. I totally miscalculated the size they would reach upon maturity. 'Diablo' is lucky, it's in a spot where although larger than I expected, I can forgive it's vigorous growth and just hack it back when needed (as soon as it's done blooming it's in for a serious haircut).

Unfortunately for 'Miss Kim', she has to go. Here you can see the bed where they are, Physocarpus 'Diablo' to the far left, Lilac 'Miss Kim' front and center, totally obliviating the entrance to the garden!

Last year I took a similar photo, maybe you can see that on one side of the lilac is a charming mailbox. That mailbox is totally hidden from view now. I also have to add that I've cut this Lilac back quite a bit in the past two years.

Way back in 2005 I took a photo of the garden as it had just been replanted. My design was a square garden with a circular path in the center. It's my favorite plan, one I hope to recreate in future locations.

When looking for photos this morning to see the progression of size, I finally made my mind up. This week the Lilac will go, I'll cut it back hard and if somebody comes here in the next week and is willing to dig it up and transport it, they will be welcome to it. First come first serve!