Photinia: I WILL EAT YOUR HOUSE!
Homeowner: No, I'll keep you trimmed, and neat, and you will look like an evergreen cottonball.
Photinia: Muaaa-haaa-haaa. You have to sleep sometime. And when you do, I WILL EAT YOUR HOUSE.
Homeowner: No, I will control your growth, and keep you in this nice sunny three foot space between the irises and the spirea.
Photinia: What irises? What spirea? (burp.)
Homeowner: Wait, what happened to my ... And where is my cat? Fluffy? No, no, get away from me. Get back! I warn you, get back! Noooooooooo ---
Photinia: Nom, nom, nom. (burp).

Until my husband wacked them back to 4 feet there were 12 feet tall euonymous in front of the porch of an empty cabin at my dad's place. I planted them there 38 years ago and they have been cut back repeatedly in the last 30 years.

lol

Mia...that is hilarious...and Ohhh so true! I have some foundation shrub that if I turn my back on it for a year or two will get out of hand. It took me three years of hard pruning to get it back to a manageable size.

Mulberry..exactly. I have a friend who had the same scenario. Their house looked like a scary haunted house those bushes were so out of control. I convinced them to drastically cut them back....it looked like a bone yard in front of the house afterwards! I told them to water and keep them trimmed. *sigh* I saw the house not too long ago...it looks worse now! They never trimmed any of it....so there are dead branches that need to be cut out and rangy tops that need to be chopped down by half again.

Oh, Mia, that is soooo funny. I am sending it to some of my gardening friends... I hope, you don't mind. I will give you credit. :)

Moni

:) Sure, Moni.

We were helping my mother-in-law with some landscaping at her new house several years ago, and on our cruise through the nursery she found a red tip photinia and was immediately enamored. I tried my best to talk her out of it, and when I couldn't do that, I tried to convince her to site it well way from the house (they have 60 acres, plenty of room to plant). She believed the growing tag that said 10' max growth and insisted it go directly at the corner of the house as a foundation planting.

It eventually died (their thumbs are not very green) and I was secretly glad.

Preach! If we were planning to stay in this house for awhile I'd hire someone to relieve me of my foundation photinias (in my defense I didn't plant them there), but since we're moving in about a year I'm just going to hope the next owners know what they're in for.

I feel a small twinge of regret since I used to push these when I worked Payless cashways in Denton Tx. We sold so many of these I am surprised Denton hasn't been swallowed
Kim

I want a dozen! Where can I buy them????

Wait....if there is only ONE in that pic, then I probably only need three. Now, where do I buy them?

There are three in the pic :) you can buy them at any box store..they should be very easily found....well once they start stocking shrubs :) ....but we are not Kidding about the massive size of these ...if you want to check these out they are on Britton Rd between May and Penn.

Lisa, she knows! Okievegan is my daughter. She is just wanting a screen outside the back of her property pretty badly... and shade on the west side.

Only problem with the west side shade: she has about 48 or so inches between the house and the property line. :)

Moni

This is my view, thanks to the City of Edmond. It USED TO BE trees and flowers. :(

Ohhh, sorry! It could be worse...but that is certainly not pretty!

Crape Myrtle trees (or Rose of Sharon) could give you some shade and fit (mostly) that west area, I think. Or what about a vine on (string, maybe) trellis away from the house? Passionvine can get pretty rowdy. :)

That is actually facing north, so nothing I put there will give me any shade. I'd like something thick to block the view of the cars on second street and slow down the wind bound and determined to send my house to Oz. I used to not have to worry about anyone seeing into my bedroom, but now the neighborhood kids can stand just right outside.

I only have about two feet on the west side of my house. Can't plant anything that needs lots of roots because there is a giant concrete retaining wall that I don't want to interfere with....it keeps my house from sliding into the neighbor's.

I really want something massive on the north side. If it has thorns as well, all the better, but it's not required as I already have two knock-out rose bushes that need to be moved and could be starters in the first line of defense...provided I survive moving them. Just pruning them nearly requires calling the Red Cross to be sure they have enough blood on hand.

Ohhhh....THORNS! My neighbors down the block have a bush that would fulfill that requirement....pryacantha. It even has orange berries. Their bush is quite large...but I don't know if it is fast or slow growing, it has been there as long as I have lived here. If you have the space...the red tip photinias would fit your need there I think.

If you ever need more thorns...my The Fairy rosebush is absolutely lethal!

That looks to be an older variety of Photinia that can get that big if you are to lazy to trim it. There is a dwarf variety that only grows 4ft tall and 5ft wide. It does not have an invasive root system so it will not damage your foundation. I have held a photinia, Frasier, at 5 ft by 3 ft box planted 4ft from my foundation for the last eight years. Photinia is also unique in that you can train it to be a hedge, shrub, bush or a tree.

This post was edited by redclay4evr on Mon, Mar 24, 14 at 15:30

@okievegan
I would look into Bright 'n tight Carolina Laurel. Its a fast growing evergreen screen.

For a massive thorny barrier I want to go with the native Osage Orange/bois d'arc which was used historically before barbed wire to line fields. The branches can be interwoven to create a mostly impenetrable hedge. I started a couple last year from seed. In addition to the protection they offer, the wood has many uses as it is extremely resistant to rot and very strong. Now I just need to convince the rest of my household before I put these in the ground as the thorns are considered very nasty.

Can you move these plants this time of the year? They were planted this spring and are only 2' tall, or so. Any help will be appreciated (I live in Southeastern Oklahoma-not sure what zone it is).

I decided to train wisteria along the front of our house along guide wires across the top of our porch, to make it look pretty. In the spring, summer and fall, i have to trim that beast back at least once a week. It looks great, the wife loves the look of it, but I tell you what, it is a pain. And of course, if I do not trim it for a couple of weeks, it tries to rip off siding, climb the roof and lift our house off the ground.

gotpickled I would wager, you can. Just take as much of a root ball as you can, don't plant them any lower than they are now, and water them at least once a week for a while.

They should have the best growing options over winter, if you water them.

Moni

I'd move them now, and since they've been in the ground a relatively short while, I think they'll be fine.

Keep their mature size in mind when you replant them. They get huge, as you might have noticed in the photos that Lisa posted at the start of this thread.

As the years go by, you can keep them somewhat under control with heavy pruning, but eventually that gets pretty ugly if you are trying to keep a plant relatively small when it really wants to be gigantic.

Dawn

Fraser photinia has been getting hammered by leaf spot problems over a large area for some time now. I would not plant it anymore.