Dee, a couple plants that come to mind are bog rosemary Andromeda polifolia (Andromeda glaucophylla) & Japanese iris which will grow in standing water. Ferns should also thrive. This might be a good area for ostrich fern with its spreading tendencies. Virginia bluebells also grow naturally along streams...but, I'm unsure if they will tolerate actually being in standing water? Maybe around some rocks that would provide some drainage?

Clethra is also native to wet areas & would be lovely in late summer. I also believe red-twig dogwood (also the yellow-twig) grow in very wet areas. Salix integra Flamingo (Flamingo Willow) would be beautiful in that area. OK, I'm out of ideas. lol

The lasagna method will work great since the excess water will greatly help in breaking down all of the organic matter. The moisture should wick its way up through the layers (osmosis?). It would be an easy way to extend the right hand border. As far as ongoing mulching...with all of the trees around, I'd consider just allowing the falling leaves to remain on the ground & treat the bed areas as Ma Nature would.

Left of the shed (standing water?)...that's tougher. I don't have any experience in that area so will let others make suggestions.

Tricia

PS Very pretty setting, BTW.

Thank you Tricia, for reading the entire post, lol, and for your quick reply. I will look into some of the plants you suggested.

Hmm, as an aside, I was considering posting here as to why my redtwig dogwoods aren't thriving - you may have just answered that! They are in a very hot and somewhat dry area. I guess I need to water more often!

Thank you,
Dee

It is pretty. If there are no water or drainage pipes nearby, perhaps she could plant a weeping willow?

Bogs are acidic, fens are alkaline, and swamps are generic squish. Fen plants won't particularly work in bogs, and vice versa. I have a fen, and have to be careful about bog plants because many won't handle the lime.

Two inches of elevation change can make a big difference depending on the plant. It also helps to try to plant woodies bareroot.

Lasagna-ing a swamp is called fill. Yes, it can work, but can take an awful lot of stuff because the settling is so undesirable. Our vegetable garden is raised beds on top of the swamp, and a certain amount of water wicks up through the fill. There are also plants that take off almost overnight because they hit the water table. So far we haven't found a downside to either of these issues, even with garlic. We don't plant cacti there, though.

As for weeds, my swamp weeds the truly vicious thugs that they tell you to never, ever let near a wetland - phragmites, purple loosestrife, cattails, and some red-twig dogwood just to keep things interesting. Any sort of effective weed control here falls into fantasy land. Jewelweed doesn't even register as a weed.

Winterberry will grow wild in those conditions, as will cinnamon fern, and blue flag iris.

I wish I had a site like that. Native plants (to zone 3/4 area) that would do great are: pussy willow, cattails, marsh marigold (aka cowslips or caltha), red-twig dogwood, larch, lady slippers, forget-me-nots interplanted with siberian iris, rushes--corkscrew, horsetail. In zone 3/4, these aren't really invasive--maybe for you--although this sounds like a small wet area, not a true "wetland". If you google "rain garden" there is a lot of new information on boggy sites. Hmmm, maybe viburnum or cranberry. You will need your mud boots!

Also look at Carexes and sedges, Sanguisorba canadensis, Iris virginica ( or is it I. virginiana, not sure), Leucojums (for bulbs that handle very wet areas), Lobelia syphilitica (the blue Lobelia). Ostrich ferns can get 6 feet tall in standing water-- I've seen them. Quite a sight. Great Solomon's Seal can handle a lot of water, though maybe not standing water, and can also get 6 feet tall. Amazing sight. I wish I had a really boggy area.

Thank you everyone! Now I have a few ideas to go with.

As far as lasagna beds, the thought of raising the level of the soil never even crossed my mind. I just don't want to have to take up all that grass! IMO, the lasagna method is the easiest way to prepare a bed.

Leslie, your photos are gorgeous! (What kind of camera do you have?) Do you happen to have a wide view, or an overview of this garden? I'd love to see how the individual pictures fit together to get a better sense of what you've done.

I particularly like the Bowles Golden Sedge - and I'm not a huge fancier of grasses. But this one is quite nice. I can tell I'm starting to be more open to grasses in general by the reaction I have to photos (usually oohs and aahs!)

Gotta run at the moment because of the vicious thunder storms outside - my computer just made a sizzling noise! Yikes!

:)
Dee

Dee,

Sorry, but I don't have any of the work shots of this bed in my Photobucket account. The camera is an older digital, one of the first with 5 Megapixels & a 10x Zoom. It's a Sony DSC-F707 and it is bigger and heavier than the ones out today.

I'll try to give you some idea of the garden with the photos I have in Photobucket, but it's really hard to give you a wide shot of this bed because there is another bed on the slope above. These two beds are separated by a narrow grass path & fit together like puzzle pieces. Here's the best I can do:

Here's a picture of the top bed that fits into the 2nd bed. You can see the slope, but it is steeper than the picture shows. This is as far back in the yard as I could plant normal drainage plants.

The wet bed is behind the portion at the right bottom of the picture in the corner of the yard, forming a triangle which is about 20 ft long on one side & 15 ft at the rear with a curved-in front edge. The bed continues on & then narrows in the middle portion (& gets higher) then widens & lowers again at the far corner, which is often very damp but does not lay in water. I repeat some of the same plants in the 2nd corner for continuity, but can add things like pines & Cotinus here, which would die in the wet corner bed.

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Here's a shot of the grass path going the other direction from the 1st picture & towards the wet garden. Don't be fooled by the grass, this can sometimes be a muddy mess & it is quite slanty. We've added some stone crossings & stepping stones in problem spots.
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Further down the path - the large round green shrub is the Buttonbush. This is considered a floodplain tree/shrub & was planted here because this area often lays in water, but less now than ever before, possibly the plants take up some of the moisture, possibly its just been droughtier the last few seasons.

After bloom in late June, I prune the buttonbush up, leaving about 5 main stems, & it makes quite an elegant small tree. At this point there is about 8 ft behind the BB to the fence, which contains some older variety yellow daylilies and a mature Itea Henry's Garnet, offset slightly is the first of two Physocarpus Diablos on somewhat higher ground, which can just be seen in the upper left part of the picture.

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Here is an early spring picture before everything has grown up. By the end of June you really cannot see much into this area except that little peek between the shrubs that I previously posted. It's a true hidden garden. LOL. BTW, the camera squashes everything, this area is over 15 ft deep at the 2nd Diablo.

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The little entry paths are about level with the grassy area. The crossing paths are about 4-6 inches below grade & the drain itself is about a foot down & is UGLY. The orignal paths made a sort of Giraffe shape, two legs, a wider body across then a long neck sweeping to the back. We added a few paths and stepping stones where needed as time went on. The gravel underneath the egg rock is 6-8 inches deep, sometimes more, & acts as a sort of French drain. Anyway, with some trial and error the water runs away pretty fast these days. The paths are mostly invisible these days because of all the plants, but do provide access for pruning & planting.

Inside this area there are currently 12 primroses, 3 large clumps of hybrid daylilies between shrubs along the back, a spreading clump of ditch daylilies in the water path, a large spreading clump of obedient plant, 3 Bowles Golden Sedges, a 3 ft circle of Cardinal lobelia, 6 ostrich ferns, one 4 X 4 ft Itea (just removed a 2nd to another part of the yard), one Clethra Hummingbird, a 4 ft X 2 ft clump of 6 ft tall Helanthus Lemon Queen, another mature Miscanthus grass, Purpurescens... well you get the idea. The plantings in this area have varied a lot over the years & experimenting has been such fun. I'm currently growing some Rozanne Geraniums around the edges of the upper grasses...who'd a thought that would be possible here. I used to slosh around in boots in there.

Okay, the sun is shining today (for now - more thunderstorms to come later on) so I guess it's safe to use the computer, lol! Wow, what wild weather yesterday - and my daughter was one town over, maybe 15 miles away, and when I mentioned the storms, she looked at me blankly and said, "What rain?". Talk about hit-or-miss storms!

Anyway, I want to say thanks to everyone for your suggestions. I am too lazy to work outside today so I plan on spending some time researching the above suggestions.

A BIG thank you to you, Leslie, for all the time, effort and thought you put into your posts. Design is really my weak spot, so it is a tremendous help to see visuals, and I appreciate your help.

Ah, ladychroe, weeping willows! My, how I have always loved this tree! And never had the spot for one. Since this area of my friend's yard is fairly wooded, I don't think she will go for another large tree, but after you mentioned it, I can't help but wish I had an area like this to plant one in!

Funny, my friend, who loves her gardens but is not really into gardening itself, kind of despairs over this area, and here we, gardeners-at-heart, all wish we had an area like this in our yards, lol! (Or are happy we already do have one!) I guess an area like this represents not only one of the many challenges we like to face, but also represents one of the many opportunities to try and experiment with plants.

Thanks again!
:)
Dee

Came across this site. Has a great plant list.