Privet Forest?

[Shorty54]

My wife picked this up for me....I think a re-pot on a slab in the Spring might make for a nice starter forest.

 

[Shorty54]

Can a admin move this to Forest? I was unaware of that option and am unable to delete this post.

 

[jk_lewis]

I think a shallow oval pot will be a better choice than a slab. Privet don't represent the kinds of trees that you'd see on a bare rock. Good luck and have fun with the CONTINUOUS maintenance this will need. We don't call these "weeds" on a whim.

 

[Geo]

Looks great. Best of luck.

 

[GrimLore]

I shallow oval as Jim said. There are few that could pull that off on a slab as John G can. They are high maintenance and don't be surprised if you have to trim them two times a week. Nice plants though! Curious if there is a label telling the cultivar and origin?

Grimmy

 

[jk_lewis]

These don't come in "cultivars" (man-made versions of the species). That is Ligustrum sinensis, pure and simple and 100% exotic and invasive weed.

 

[GrimLore]

Ligustrum sinensis

Thanks and thanks for the correction as I was looking for the species name. In various nurseries here there seems to be what are at least a few different plants simply labeled Privet with no other information.

Grimmy

 

[dick benbow]

coupla thoughts as you begin the work of establishing a forrest. Once new growth hardens off you may want to try and get some smaller diameter trunks started by clipping and rooting some new trees. I find to create depth of field in forrests you need atleast three different sizes of trunks. While this new collection is young and vigorous you should remove the largest leaves to try and create more of a uniform look to the leaf size on all the trees.

Keep in mind there is a reason why folks use privit as hedge material. It uniformly fills open spots with filler growth. So you will have to be diligent in keeping ( as John naka suggests) open spots for a bird to fly through....

In the japanese mindset you'll want to have an uneven number of trees in your final forest planting.recently I had a class in forrests where students had two groupings of trees in an oval pot. one of 3 and the other of five.....(perfect) until one student questioned and asked doesn't 3 and 5 equal eight? LOL

Over the years of working with forests it pays to have individual replacement trees in the three diameters readily available incase a tree dies and needs to be replaced. But nothing wrong with keeping a dead tree in the grouping to add more realism to the struggle of life in the forrest. Kinda up to your own discretion.

I have see some artists use small figures of forrest animals (bunnies, deer) that add a touch. Again up to your dicretion. Best of luck

 

[GrimLore]

Spring might make for a nice starter forest.

You might consider getting a few smaller of the same so you can create a believable forest. You can still do the initial planting as you wanted then and propagate more as you go along...

Grimmy