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Companion plants for Blue Atlas Cedar

13 years ago

No - my Blue Atlas isn't lonely. The house we purchased has a very lovely Blue Atlas Cedar that's about 25' feet tall in the center of a large circular planting bed. The previous owner planted Goldmound Spirea around the perimeter of the bed. I think the yellow green leaves of the spirea are rather garish and don't complement the silver blue tree.

I was hoping to find a dwarf evergreen with dark leaves that would look better with the Atlas and provide a pleasing contrast. I have lots of boxwood on the property and would rather plant something with a darker green leaf. The fellow at the nursery recommended euonymous japonica 'Microphylla' or a dwarf holly but he didn't have any at the time and offered to order them for me.

Any suggestions? Everyone here is so knowledgeable that I figured this would be an easy request.

Featured Answer

greenmachine10

13 years ago

Well the way I see it is that the question should be do you want an evergreen or conifer? I will assume that since you are posting here, you are looking for a conifer though I may be wrong. So, here is a rather good suggestion. Coenosium gardens (that I posted a link to) has a rather extensive selection of mini conifers and personally I would look through their 2010 catalog (on their website) which happens to include pictures of about 90% of their stock. I would narrow it down to which ten plants interest me best and try to find them somewhere closer, since I see that you are in jersey. I happen to have the same problem, I'm in ny and would much rather find something locally and avoid needing to get something shipped from one coast to the other.

Here is a link that might be useful: coenosium gardens

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Comments (6)

mcmann
Original Author
13 years ago
Greenmachine - thank you for the link to Coenosium Gardens - they do have some possibilities and I'll have to start my list. As to whether I'll go with a conifer or an evergreen I'm open to either. I posted my query here because my primary focus is enhancing the Blue Atlas and since this is the conifer forum I hoped there would be others here who have more experience and can offer some suggestions that haven't occurred to me.

Whenever I visit this forum I'm always amazed at how knowledgeable everyone is and I always enjoy viewing their photos. I should thank all of you for your informative posts.
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kaitain4
13 years ago
Its hard to know without seeing pictures, but I'm assuming you have a sunny and a shady side to this bed with a 25' tree in it, correct?

I would go for a mixed planting. On the shady side you could have hostas, rhododendron, ferns. A red-leaved weeping Japanese Maple would provide a nice color contrast. On the partly sunny to sunny side azaleas, dwarf nandina, smaller grasses, especially something with striped leaves would be good. Chamaecyparis 'Gold Mop' would provide a pleasing gold contrast, and there are a number of smaller conifers that might fill the bill. Globe shaped Picea orientalis 'Barnes' or Picea abies 'Little Gem' might be nice. You should probably check your local garden centers if you want larger specimens - the mail order stuff is usually quite small and may take forever to fill in a large area.
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dcsteg
13 years ago
If your nursery man will special order for you...go for it.

To get started try the Iseli link provided and down load the full catalog. I am not saying you should order their plants as there are other nursery's out there that also provide a nice mixed selection of plants. On the other hand I don't know of any retail nursery that does not order from Iseli and to be able to piggy back your order with theirs is a plus.

You can then browse to your hearts content and make your own decisions as to what plants you want to complement your Blue Atlas Cedar.

Dave

Here is a link that might be useful: Iseli PDF e-catalog
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mcmann
Original Author
13 years ago
Thanks for the additional comments. I can easily see where a mixed bed would be much more interesting. And the Iseli catalog is like standing in front of the candy counter - I want one of each. I really enjoyed the photo of the 'ready made for your zone' preplanned Garden Packages. Even with the plants simply arranged in the parking lot they look intriguing.

Thanks for your help.
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Embothrium
13 years ago
Yellow was a good idea, if not too strong. In fact, the 'Aurea Robusta' cultivar of Atlas cedar has yellow and blue right together on the tree itself.

Otherwise purple and pink are good with blue.
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