How about a honking big hosta?

How large is the tree, and how much of the line is going to be shaded out in the relatively near future? A mature Acer rubrum is a fairly nasty thing to garden underneath, but hostas should be all right particularly is they get established early.

You can find anything with google nowadays. So I read your post, dear mad (if I may be so informal), and found right off, a nursery in GA that has a whole page of "giant hostas", 36"wide and 48" high.

I'd prefer to have a nice flowering shrub, but that shade will be getting wider and denser; and I don't want to trim the maple because it's an excellent curtain between me and my neighbor.

If I give up on flowering plants I could probably put in an ilex crenata (they do well in the darker shade) or an inkberry (ilex glabra): not pretty, but it'll fill the empty space.

How about several aconitum (monkshood) perennials? They are deep blue. Hey (just brainstorming here) - how about an evergreen such as an ilex and in front of it, some blue 24" H shade-loving perennials?

And BTW, mad, you were right about the non-survival of my rose "Cl. Dainty Bess"( I posted that on a different forum). How do you know so much?

Carol

The only close contender I can think of is Clethra for the color and season, but deep shade may be too much shade. It also prefers moist soil, but can tolerate dry too, so that part may be okay, but still risky. If it blooms in that location, the fragrance is awesome. I look forward to it all season.

A nice big blue hosta should look great with the hydrangeas. Big Daddy or Bressingham Blue are two I am familiar with.

My monkshood does not tolerate the shade at all. I put it on the edge of my shade garden, which gets a moderate amount of afternoon sun. But it hasn't bloomed in 3 years. I'm planning on moving it to a sunnier spot very soon.

I like going to the white flower farm web site since I like the search function there. When I ran a search for full shade tolerant shrubs, I came up with a Japanese Cedar that blooms white.

Here is a link that might be useful: Japanese Cedar

One largish shade tolerant perennial is Cimicifuga AKA Actea which blooms for a couple of weeks in early fall with white bottlebrushes. There are cultivars with dark reddish foliage that are decorative all season. Variegated Solomon's seal has subtle spring flowers, but they aren't the main reason for growing the plant. Its arching green and cream foliage is lovely. My Georgia blue veronica makes a lovely groundcover in substantial shade, blooming mid-dark blue now and then keeping tidy foliage the remainder of the season. There are some ferns that are drought tolerant, but I don't know what they are off the top of my head.

I like using Missouri Botanical Garden's plant search even though they are a bit warmer than I am, and they also have pages devoted to problem areas. Plants for dense shade:
http://www.mobot.org/gardeninghelp/plantfinder/Resultspsp8.asp?pspid=9

Plants for dry shade:
http://www.mobot.org/gardeninghelp/plantfinder/Resultspsp8.asp?pspid=10

Here is a link that might be useful: Missouri Botanical Garden's plant search

Thanks for the many good ideas! I may have to go with a giant hosta such as Big Daddy, since it would give me the 24-26" height. Clethra (I have one) tends to grow 6 or 7 ft. high here, so that won't work. Cimifuga is an interesting idea, if it can truly handle deep shade and yet bloom.

Carol

clethra also comes in "dwarf" varieties. 'Hummingbird' was the original dwarf, but some complained still too big so then 'Sixteen Candles' came out even smaller.

Actea is good idea also. 'Hillside Black Beauty' is a popular cultivar that doesn't green out as much as some.

Carol,
The problem is not the Hydrangea, it's the maple. Root competition from that maple will make most anything perform at far less than its potential. Bressingham Blue and Big Daddy are great hosta suggestions, but unless you find someone to give you a huge division of one, a young plant can't compete with the maple roots. Clethra might work as it's native and vigorous, blooms mid summer and comes in white and pink and it's very fragrant. Bees love it.

If it were me, I'd take a chain saw to that swamp maple. Do you really want it?

Steve

IME, H. arborescens is equaly, if not more, shade-tolerant than Clethras. It's undisputedly the most shade tolerant of all hydrangeas.
And they blooms in white :-)

Hmmm. The area under the maple does get early morning and late afternoon sun, and has dense shade from about 10 AM to4 PM. So if that's enough sun for another kind of hydrangea, I'll go with h. arborescens "White Dome" which will match the blue mopheads in height but will have white lacecap type flowers. So then the line of shrubs will have a consistent form and mass. And I found they have it in the online catalogue of a good nursery I go to in Westport MA.

Yes, stevemass, I know the maple loves to sneak nourishment out of nearby planting areas by growing shallow roots. But if I conscientiously fertilize and water under the tree, this new shrub might work. (And of course the maple tree will get even bigger.)

I can't cut down this maple. I put it in about 15 years ago to be a good visual barrier between me and my neighbor. So far it's about 25 ft. tall. When it leafs out it completely blocks the view of their very large and tall house.

So thank you, ego45. H. arborescens White Dome it is.

Carol

Sun-wise, from 8-10am + 4pm-till dusk will be more than enough for any H.arborescens to bloom, but I'd think more thoroughly before chosing 'White Dome' as a cultivar of choice. Don't take me wrong, there is nothing wrong with WD itself, but IMO it's a very nice filler for the natural setting or could be used as a mass planting, but not for a formal (one line) planting, especially in combination with mopheads.
Perharps new H.arborescens 'Incrediball' (which will be widely available this year) will live to the hype (strong canes) and if so, it should work much-much better than WD in your case.
Good luck.

Ego45 there you! We've missed you on the Hydrangea board. Have you seen Ostrich? I emailed him but haven't heard back.