Has anyone grown rhubarb as a landscaping item? I'm asking why because I recently came into a lot of Victoria rhubarb crowns, and I don't have enough room in the veggie garden for all of them. Even if I pot one or two, I still have plenty. Never having grown the stuff, I don't really know what the plant looks like... and I have one of "those" HOAs that object to veggies that you can see from the street. Unless it is really attractive, that is, and they don't realize that it is being grown to harvest...? Any suggestions? Thanks.
I just moved one (because my daughter stepped on it five times within a half hour after I said, "be sure not to step on that!") into a flower bed. However, they grow similar to an elephant ear plant with pretty red stems.
my landscape around my entire house is all edible plants :)) so in my opinion you sure can grow rhubarb as a landscaping item.
You can always google for images of rhubarb of course. I find them average attractiveness. they are consistent in the way they look throughout entire season. They have large leaves and red stems. If you don't use up stems, the excess ones will lay on the ground and rot, to make room for new shoots from the center. Rhubarb can take up a lot of space. Mine definitely don't have room in the veggy garden. They like sun, but mine grow very well in the shade where they enjoy extra moisture to produce extra large stems.
I work downtown Chicago, and I've seen many edible plants used for landscaping, including rhubarb and all kinds of herbs. City people walk by and don't even know they are edible, because they don't know how parsley or dill or rhubarb grow, they only see them bunched/packaged on supermarket shelves.
When we first bought our house we lined the east side of the garage with rhubarb. We couldn't afford hosta and the bonus was this was edible and free from my MIL.
I liked the look of it. We let it flower since it was as much edible as ornamental. We have since moved the rhubarb out to a sunny spot in the country on some property we bought and added a succulent bed where it was.
Rhubarb can add a lot of interest to a landscape with the dark green extra large leaves and the pretty red stems. I love how it looks when it comes up, too. Very attractive crinkled leaves unfold as the plant grows. Beware though, only the stalks are edible. The leaves are toxic.
