Hi,

I have a bunch of beds around our yard. We dug the beds several years ago and put in a shrubs, but mostly planted lots of flowers and invasive ground covers. sigh...

I need to add shrubs in various beds, each with their own set of issues. So, if you don't mind, I'd like to pick your brains about the mess we have created.

Weedy beds #1 and #2: We have a few sunny beds with hydrangeas and butterfly bushes. The soil has been invaded with zoysia grass (thanks to our neighbors) and some invasive cheap ground cover I bought.

We're ripping out the ground cover and digging deep to get rid of the zoysia, a fight we know we'll never truly win.

We want to add smallish shrubs to take up some of the room in the beds and add winter interest (some evergreen too?). The beds are not wide.

Are there dwarf shrubs indigenous to NJ that we can plant in front of the hydrangeas and butterfly bushes.

We also need to put in some taller (but not wide) shrubs near the back of the beds against the fence.

If you can help me with this sad garden bed issue (and a few more beds we're dealing with), I'd greatly appreciate it.