I've only been here four years, but have dug up a good part of my lawn and planted native plants, including viburnum. I mixed in lots of cow manure, and put about 6 inches of wood chip mulch on top. I fertilize 4 times a year. Everything's doing great and growing quickly. I planted some more along the side yard, with no soil amendments. The bushes that survived, are smaller than when I planted them.

I recently planted a hedge of Brush Cherry Eugenia (Syzygium Paniculatum) instead of the Sweet William. I planted three 3G shrubs of Sweet William and found that I was a slave to watering it to keep it from wilting, so I switched to the Brush Cherry that appears to grow faster with smaller leaves. Also the Sweet William smells like Cat pee when it's trimmed or brushed against.

I watched our landscapers when they planted shrubs, and their practice was to 'water in' the shrubs. They dug the hole for the 3G bush, put a cup of Milorganite at the bottom of the hole, filled the hole about 1/2 to 3/4 full of water and then placed the shrub in the hole. Then they back filled the hole, & pressed down the soil to get the air out. Then after the shrubs were installed, came back and water the line of shrubs.

It's been a few months now and I haven't lost a shrub, and other than watering a few times right after they were planted, I now rely on just the rain for the shrubs and the Brush Cherry are twice the size of the Sweet William shrubs.

I don't think fertilizer is recommended for initial plantings. Your shrubs will be going through transplant shock and do not really need the added stress. Then for the first year they will be working on establishing their root systems. To me, I think that this would be the prime time to add fertilizer as you are trying to give them the components they need for that new growth, but supposedly fertilizing during this time can actually prevent them from sending out roots seeking nutrients, and so you end up with a weak root system that needs more water. So if you feel that you must fertilize them, fertilize just outside of their drip line so they have to send roots out to seek it.

You can amend your soil with compost while planting, but don't over do it. Bear in mind that you are amending your soil, not replacing it. As they continue to establish themselves, their roots will move beyond the amended area into the regular, boring, lackluster, natural soil. Some suggest that quickly going from one soil type to another can cause stress to the plant and make it pretty much pause its growth while it adjusts to the difference. I do not have any actual experience with this, so I don't know for sure.

However, you can help keep the soil around the shrubs healthy by keeping them amply mulched with natural materials. Some people (my In-Laws included) like to go with rubber mulch because it 'stays beautiful longer', but rubber mulch provides nothing to the soil. If you go with organic mulches, they will slowly break down and feed they soil over time. So this way you will be constantly amending your soil to some degree. Similarly, do not waste money on weed cloth. Few people actually recommend it as it doesn't really work at all and, again, provides nothing to the soil. So the only real reason to use weed cloth is to later swear about the money you wasted on it. Instead you can use cardboard or newspaper as your weed barrier. Either one will create a fairly impassable barrier for most weeds and smother any existing ones and their seeds.

Eventually both newspaper and cardboard will break down and pretty much disappear, but by this time, you should have a nice thick layer of mulch to help prevent new seeds from finding the soil. The general rule for mulch is to have a layer that is 3 to 4 inches thick. Keeping the mulch thick will allow water to trickle down to the soil, but prevent the sun from quickly evaporating it. It also makes it so that if any weed seeds do manage to germinate in the mulch, they have to send their roots through the mulch to the soil and some will starve and die during this process. The ones that do not are much easier to pull from the mulch than they would be trying to pull them from the soil.

There's probably more I can add, but dinner just finished cooking and is smelling quite good and I'm having a difficult time focusing. So if anything else springs to mind, I will add it later. For now......