Hey Ann, long time no "see". :) I don't know if silver eleagnus (winter blooming eleagnus) is hardy in your zone but it makes a wonderful hedge. I've got it as a secondary hedge behind the leyland cypress so when that goes, there's still some privacy left. The first plants of it that I planted (gulp) 7 years ago are 10' tall now and they were only 1 gallon specimens then. I've rooted countless others since then as it's really easy to do. Stick a trimming in the ground in fall and it's taking off the next spring. A big bonus is that it blooms in late fall and smells divine. My black bamboo is supposed to be a runner, but in 5 years, it's barely grown 4' in width. It has matured enough to reach 15' high and the canes turn black though. It's lovely! A mixture of it and some white striped passalong clumping bamboo is the basis for a future "Japanese are" if I live that long. LOL! Another neighbor has some shorter holly planted boy/girl boy/girl in a close enough configuration that it all looks like it has red berries in winter. Only problem with it has been the invasion of the honeysuckle. Crawling around under a holly trying to get to the root of they honeysuckle is BAD job! Even on a "single point" holly! LOL! The absolute cheapest hedge you can grow is probably cedar. The ones I planted 16 years ago on this property are now 20' tall and totally screen the neighbors on one side. They were just tiny "bird droppings" plants that I harvested from the woods at the back when I planted them. Those are probably lining your property everywhere waiting on you to either mow them down or brushkiller them. The quick hedge would be the silver eleagnus in larger containers and plant the tiny cedars 15' away and then you'll have a 2 layer hedge with enough room to get in and weed out the blackberries and oak seedlings. Or, there's always poke salad. It's hopeless to weed out anyway, so go with the flow and use it's invasive evil properties! :)

Hello, Bart! I'm always pleased to talk about my garden, and glad to hear about yours. There are several different ligustrums common in Italy. The two I like are the common, small-leafed hedging privet, I think the botanical name is Ligustrum obtusifolium, and California privet, L. ovalifolium, with slightly larger leaves of a fresher green, and needing a bit more water. There are other privets around, including a large-leafed one that reaches tree size; there's a yellow-variegated form I often see: this variety doesn't do anything for me, it's rigid for my taste. And L. japonicum, with very glossy dark green leaves like a camellia, common as grass in Florida, not as well adapted as others to my garden, though I have three chlorotic plants due to DH's activities while my back was turned. Two other common evergreen hedging shrubs are photinia or red-top, another old friend from Florida, and, chief of all evergreen hedging shrubs, English laurel, lauroceraso, Prunus laurocerasus. The photinia wandered into our garden by accident and at least in shade is more drought tolerant and all-resistant than I would have given it credit for. It has rather pleasant foliage. English laurel is horribly over- and misused. It doesn't like full sun or being kept too low, but I've seen a hedge 10' x 6', under a big old oak, that was honestly handsome. I had to battle a hedge of English laurel at my old house in Washington and I'm not fond of the plant. I could say more about my experiences with evergreen shrubs and hedging shrubs, but I don't know what you would be interested in hearing, and also am not in the best of health at the moment. Is your blue salvia the native S. pratensis? We have that, and I agree you have to watch it, but it's handsome and tough. It grows by the side of the road and in neglected fields here. The red one I'm familiar with but am not sure of the name, but I dislike masses of bright color in bedding schemes. Culinary sage is good-looking, except in winter when it gets shabby; it flowers handsomely and has good foliage and fine drought tolerance. Mine self-seeds. The cultivar 'Ictarina' can take just about anything and is the prettiest yellow-variegated plant I know. I have the highest opinion of S. greggii for a dry garden, for beauty and for toughness. There are a lot of fabulous sages out there. What I have have all been passed on to me by various gardening friends. The Petrovic roses were entirely satisfactory and I recommend the nursery, however you have to make a big order to justify the shipping and import charges. It's worth it. The selection of varieties of wonderful. I wasn't able to organize myself this year for another large order, but am hoping to be able to do so in a year's time. I adore all those once-blooming old roses, even though we need a cool spring for them to bloom well. I'd put them all down in the shade garden if I could, but there's just not enough room for them. Gean, we had wax myrtles in Florida, too, but they're not even listed in Dirr's Manual. I'm always suspicious of plants from the eastern U.S. for my garden here, as rainfall patterns are so different in the two places. The Pacific Northwest is climatically much closer, of course. I've been working clearing and even planting a couple of things down in the woods below the shade garden, and getting excited about the potential for a whole different flora than what grows out in the sunny garden. It's already pretty there, and I've hardly even begun planting yet. Melissa

Was there any kind of land disturbance in the area of the shrubs - construction, new hardscape, any kind of disturbance? Sounds like they are dying back. I have similar symptoms on a little holly that I had to move. It was fine for a while and then suddenly the leaves became brittle as you describe and the plant is dying, perhaps dead. Even though there is plenty of water, something can be happening to the roots to prevent the plant from taking in water. Some ideas are animals tunneling beneath the plants like voles, something eating the roots like grubs, a competing nearby tree such as a maple taking up the water supply, bark damage preventing uptake of water or nutrients. Look at the stems closely. Do they show some shriveling? Any stems like this can be cut back. Do you see signs of any kind of pest? Do you see webbing? Do you see any markings on the leaves like white stipling above or below. Any scale attached to the wood? Also look for cankers, splits or bark damage on the stems.

Hi there, I know it's a year later, but I was wondering how your ligustrum are doing. (They look like japonicum to me too.) My first thought is winterburn, because 1) the time of year, 2) the damage appears to start at the tips, which is typical of winter damage, and 3) the north facing wall which gets cold, dry wind. So let us know if they recovered. I'm in zone 7a (Washington, DC area), 2 zones warmer than you, and I get winter damage on my ligustrum japonicum. They're tough trees though so hopefully yours made it. That winter was a really cold one and particularly had a lot of wind - at least in my area. Cercospora leaf spot hits later in the year, in the heat of the summer; and I think it starts with the older, lower leaves, rather than all over. I could be wrong about that though. But I'm pretty sure that February 21st was too early for it to hit. I see the sooty mold too, although there is not that much there, so you might have some scale too. But I don't know, that doesn't look like scale damage to me. What do you others think?