These shrubs usually need 6 hours of morning sun in the summer in order to flower but need protection from hot afternoon winds. Looking for an evergreen for the shade? Click on the link to ‘Broadleaf Evergreens’ and you will find many choices.
Abelia
Edward Goucher Abelia
Abelia x ‘Edward Goucher’
Height: 4-6′
Spread: 5′
Compact shrub with lacey arching branches and trumpet-shaped lavender-pink flowers with a barely visible orange throat appear in showy clusters summer through fall. It is deer resistant but irresistible to hummingbirds and butterflies.
Kaleidoscope Abelia
Abelia x grandiflora ‘Kaleidoscope’
Height: 2- 2.5′
Spread: 3- 3.5′
Bright, golden yellow variegation on medium green leaves along with brilliant red stems creates a striking kaleidoscope of color. A low, compact selection that works well as a foundation plant, low hedge, or for use in patio containers.
Mardi Gras Abelia
Abelia x ‘Mardi Gras’
Height: 2-3′
Spread: 4-5′
Compact, low growing flowering shrub with colorful green and white variegated foliage and pink new growth. This low maintenance shrub is long-blooming with pink flowers from May to frost.
Pinky Bells Abelia
Abelia x ‘Lynn’
Height: 2-3′
Spread: 3-4′
Grows as a tight and tidy mound of glossy foliage, bearing extra large pink-violet blooms all summer long. New growth flushes red for an extra-colorful display. Excellent choice for edging beds or for strategically siting at corners or curves.
Prostrate White Abelia
Abelia x grandiflora ‘Prostrata’
Height: 1.5- 2′
Spread: 4-5′
Popular semi-evergreen shrub with graceful, arching branches highlighted by clusters of fragrant white flowers. Spreading variety useful as groundcover, bank planting or low foreground shrub.
Rose Creek Abelia
Abelia x chinensis ‘Rose Creek’
Height: 2-3′
Spread: 3-4′
Lustrous leaves with a pinkish cast develop on crimson stems, mature to dark green and transform to a wonderful combination of purple and green in winter. Showy clusters of small, fragrant, white flowers emerge from rosy pink sepals in summer. Its compact size makes an excellent foundation, container or low hedge plant.
Allspice
Aphrodite Sweetshrub
Calycanthus x ‘Aphrodite’
Height: 5-6′ Spread: 5-6′
Big summer fragrant flowers look like a deep red magnolia. Very long blooming. Large, lush shrub provides lots of coverage – ideal for privacy. Continuous Bloom or Rebloomer
Hartlage Wine Sweetshrub
Calycanthus × raulstonii ‘Hartlage Wine’
Height: 8′ Spread: 9′
Large maroon-pink flowers cover this sweetshrub in late spring or early summer. This large shrub has superb glossy foliage and strong growth.
Beautyberry
Early Amethyst Beautyberry
Callicarpa dichotoma ‘Early Amethyst’
Height: 3-4′
Spread: 3-4′
Massive quantities of small, ornamental, amethyst-colored fruits appear along the slender, arching branches, following the clusters of small, pinkish lavender summer blooms. Green foliage gives way to gold fall color.
Profusion Beautyberry
Callicarpa bodinieri ‘Profusion’
Height: 6′ Spread: 6′
A superb shrub valued for its abundant clusters of long-lasting, violet-colored berries that cover the branches in fall. New growth has a bronze tinge. Small, purple-pink flowers appear in summer between the large green leaves. Prune in late winter to early spring to encourage new growth.
Sugar Shack Button Bush
Cephalanthus occidentalis
Height: 3-4′
Spread: 3-4′
Knobby button-like red fruits. Fragrant white blooms in midsummer, rich burgundy fall foliage, and a pleasingly rounded, symmetrical habit. Thrives in damp and boggy soils and appeals to butterflies.
Azalea
Bollywood Azalea
Rhododendron hybrida ‘Farrow’
Height: 2′ Spread: 3′
Bright showy magenta flowers in spring, and attractive variegated foliage all season long. Season-long color. Semi-evergreen. Attracts butterflies.
Canon’s Double
Azalea x ‘Cannon’s Double’ (Exbury hybrid)
Height: 6′ Spread: 4′
An extremely hardy selection that produces a mass of multi-layered petals in spring with stunning peach, pink, and cream coloring. The very dark green foliage develops red-bronze highlights in the fall.
Cheerful Giant
Azalea x ‘Cheerful Giant’ (Exbury hybrid)
Height: 6′ Spread: 4′
A mounded deciduous shrub that is covered with clusters of golden yellow, double blooms in mid spring. The petals are frilly.
Dawn’s Chorus
Azalea x ‘Dawn’s Chorus’ (Exbury hybrid)
Height: 6′ Spread: 4′
An extremely hardy selection with lush, semi-glossy, olive green foliage and reddish orange buds that open to fragrant, frilly, light pink, funnel-shaped blooms with a deep yellow blotch. The small mounding form is excellent for massing in shrub borders.
Golden Flare
Azalea x ‘Golden Flare’ (Exbury hybrid)
Height: 6-8′ Spread: 4-6′
An extremely hardy selection that provides a massive display of vibrant golden yellow single blooms with lush, bronze-tinged green foliage.
Golden Lights
Azalea x ‘Golden Lights’ (Northern Lights hybrid)
Height: 6′ Spread: 4′
An extremely hardy selection that provides a massive display of brilliant, golden yellow single blooms in late spring. The small mounding form with lush, bright green foliage is excellent for massing in shrub borders and perennial beds, or for use as a vibrant flowering foundation plant
Klondyke
Azalea x ‘Klondyke’ (Exbury hybrid)
Height: 6′ Spread: 4′
Vivid orange buds open a bright yellow-golden. Couple this with attractive bronze foliage and it makes for a showy plant throughout the growing season.
Mandarin Lights
Azalea x ‘Mandarin Lights’ (Northern Lights hybrid)
Height: 5′ Spread: 5′
Bathed in stunning clusters of lightly-scented tomato-orange trumpet-shaped flowers with a orange flare at the ends of the branches in mid spring before the leaves. It has green foliage throughout the season. The narrow leaves turn an outstanding purple in the fall.
Northern Hi-Lights
Azalea x ‘Northern Hi-Lights’ (Exbury hybrid)
Height: 5′ Spread: 5′
Its fragrant blooms are creamy white to pale yellow with a vivid yellow blotch and age to yellowish white. Its leaves have some resistance to mildew and turn red and burgundy in fall.
Perfecto Mundo Pink Azalea
Rhododendron x ‘NCRX3’
Height: 2-3′ Spread: 2-3′
A neat, rounded shrub that’s covered with double pink blooms in spring, when other azaleas bloom, but then after a brief rest, begins blooming again in mid summer and continues through frost.
Red Sunset
Azalea x ‘Red Sunset’ (Exbury hybrid)
Height: 6-8′ Spread: 4-6′
A hardy selection that produces a massive display of deeply colored, fiery red blooms in late spring. The mounding form with bright green foliage
Rosy Lights
Azalea x ‘Rosy Lights’ (Northern Lights hybrid)
Height: 4-6′ Spread: 4-6′
An extremely hardy selection which provides a massive display of exceptional rose-colored blooms in early spring, on a mounding form with lustrous green foliage. Excellent for use as an accent plant
Weston’s Millennium
Rhododendron viscosum ‘Millennium’
Height: 3′ Spread: 2 1/2′
Fragrant, deep red flowers with a pale orange flare are set off by blue-green, mildew-resistant foliage. A late bloomer; flowers don’t open until early summer.
Weston’s Parade
Rhododendron ‘Weston’s Parade’
Height: 5′ Spread: 5′
Stunning clusters of fragrant hot pink trumpet-shaped flowers with an orange blotch from late spring to early summer, which emerge from distinctive scarlet flower buds before the leaves. Coppery-bronze-spotted forest green foliage throughout the season. The glossy narrow leaves turn shades of orange and coppery-bronze in the fall.
White Lights
Azalea x ‘White Lights’ (Northern Lights hybrid)
Height: 4-5′ Spread: 4-5′
Bred to withstand temperatures of -30j degrees F. The flower buds are delicate pale pink and open to a 1 3/4″ fragrant, white flower with a slight yellow blotch. It has a rounded spreading habit.
Diervilla
Bush Honeysuckle
Bright yellow flowers in early summer. A durable native plant that thrives in sun or shade, is drought-tolerant, deer-resistant, and can even grow in dry shade.
- Kodiak Black Diervilla rivularis ‘SMNDRSF’
- Kodiak Orange Orange Diervilla x ‘G2X88544’
- Kodiak Red Diervilla sp. ‘G2X885411’
Deutzia
Chardonnay Pearls Deutzia
Deutzia gracilis ‘Duncan’
Height: 3′
Spread: 3′
Numerous pearl-like buds open to attractive white fragrant flowers in spring. When the flowers have faded, it continues to shine with its bright yellow foliage. Great for landscape use and small enough to use in containers
Creme Fraiche Deutzia
Deutzia gracilis ‘Mincream’
Height: 1-2′ Spread: 1-2′
Bright white star-shaped flowers on variegated green leaves makes a nice compact, low growing ground cover.
Nikko Blush Deutzia
Deutzia x rosea ‘Nikko Blush’
Height: 2′ Spread: 4-5′
A delightful new hybrid from the National Arboretum, this blushing beauty will herald spring with a profusion of soft pink blooms. Its compact, low-growing form is perfect for foundation plantings or as a low hedge. Green willow-like leaves on arching branches display deep burgundy fall color
Yuki Cherry Blossom Deutzia
Deutzia x ‘NCDX2’
Height: 1-2′ Spread: 1-2′
A shower of elegant pink flowers creates a carpet of color. Great for mass plantings because of its neat, mounded habit and burgundy-purple fall color, this tough, adaptable plant makes an excellent groundcover.
Yuki Snow Flake Deutzia
Deutzia x ‘NCDX1’
Height: 1-2′ Spread: 1-2′
Deep green foliage compliments the white blooms. The bloom season begins in early spring and lasts through the summer. Can be used as a filler in containers. Consider planting as a border plant, ground cover or as a stunning focal point. This plant does well with mass planting.
Fothergilla
Dwarf Fothergilla
Fothergilla gardenii
Height: 2′ Spread 2′
Slow-growing, compact, mounding, deciduous, dwarf ornamental shrub that is native to moist lowland coastal plain bogs. Bottlebrush-like spikes bloom in spring before the leaves appear. Only the male flowers have color (showy white filaments and yellow anthers). Flowers are aromatic and leaves are thick blue-green. Leaves turn often brilliant shades of yellow, orange and red in fall.
Mt. Airy Fothergilla
Fothergilla major ‘Mount Airy’
Height: 3-5′ Spread: 3-5′
A deciduous shrub with deep blue-green leaves that have spectacular range of fall color. Showy, honey-scented, bottlebrush-like, white flowers appear before foliage emerges in spring. A beautiful addition to the landscape in semi-shaded mixed shrub borders, or as a background shrub, or hedge plant.
St. Johnswort
Hidcote Hypericum
Hypericum x ‘Hidcote’
Height: 4′ Spread: 4′
Compact, deciduous shrub features rose-like, waxy, cupped, golden yellow flowers with numerous, prominent, dark yellow center stamens. Flowers are unusually large, slightly fragrant and bloom throughout the summer.
Sunburst Hypericum
Hypericum frondosum ‘Sunburst’
Height: 2-3′ Spread: 4′
Small, dense, upright, mounded deciduous shrub that is noted for its large showy golden yellow flowers and attractive blue-green foliage. Flowers give way to reddish-brown narrow ovoid fruit capsules that ripen in September and persist well into winter.
Sungold Hypericum
Hypericum patulum ‘Sungold’
Height: 2′ Spread:2′
Bright yellow buttercups cover this densely branched low hybrid shrub from early summer to mid fall.
FloralBerry™ St. John’s Wort
Hypericum inodorum
This series of St. John’s Wort was bred for the cut flower industry. That’s why they have such showy, consistently-colored berries.
- Floralbeerry Sangria ‘Kolsan’
- Floralberry Pinot ‘Kolpinot’
- Floralberry Magical Pumpkin ‘Kolmamoc’
- Floralberry Chardonnay ‘Kolmapuki’
