Add Some Distinctive Twigs To Your Winter Garden

When the flowers and leaves have all disappeared, you are left with a lot of bare trees. The difference between beauty and bland in your winter landscape falls onto the branches of what’s left standing through the winter season. Choosing shrubs and trees with distinctive twigs can be a great way to add some extra character to your winter garden.The following shrubs are all very adaptable, hardy, and fast growing. What make their twigs so distinctive are the various characteristics they hold. Some may have bright glossy colored bark other papery type bark. Still others may have corky wings or curling, contorted shapes. They make great additions to a garden, looking lovely next to a conifer, broadleaf evergreen, or ornamental grasses.

These shrubs can easily be turned into a “homemade” colorful hedge to border your home and garden. Using a single large shrub, decorate the base with a bed of vinca or other evergreen ground cover. Also, planting a row of red-twig dogwoods, or burning bushes would make a rainbow of colors against the white snow and dark evergreens. Sun highlights the beauty of these colorful twigs as it would be best to plant them in an area that gets full sun for a spectacular view.

And with that, let’s get right into it and learn about some of the distinctive twigs we can add to our winter garden!

Red-Twigged Dogwoods - Cornus

These shrubs are easy to grow, care free and undeniable for winter color. Siberian dogwood, another type, has gorgeous bright coral red wings, forming in ‘clumps’. Most shrub dogwoods will grow 8 to 10 feet in height, spreading much wider than that, but can be kept small if desired by annual pruning. Dogwood shrubs grow wild in the wetlands and are very care free, tolerating poorly drained soil but thrive in any average garden soil if given the chance. They do need watering during temporary droughts. They will do well in full sun, part sun, or in the shade. A problem that arises with these plans is their inability to handle humidity. This will cause leaf spots and a good way to avoid them is to plant in an area with good air circulation.

Dogwood shrubs have often have the most colorful bark on young shoots. Once they are three or four years old, the bark will thicken and turn a dull grey color. Cut all the stems to the ground every year in around mid spring, just as the leaf buds begin to swell for the best results. Then in a few weeks new shoots begin to grow, straight up and tall by midsummer and look excellent all winter long. Though, this does mean there will be a bare place in your garden for a month or so and you will not get to see the creamy white flowers and white or blue berries, only blooming in the second year of growth. The best way to perform your pruning is to compromise, cutting only 1/2 to 1/3 of the stems every year.

Burning Bush - Euonymus Alata

The burning bush gets its name for its fluorescent fall foliage, and deserves a close look during the winter months. Alata means wing and is talking about the “wings” projecting from the twigs. An unpruned burning bush can grow up to 10 feet tall and wide with a graceful vase like profile and bunches of overlapping branches. Requiring, sun, part sun or shade the burning bush will adapt to most soils. It can be pruned into formal hedges but its original identity is hidden. The burning bush looks best in its natural shape and is a care free plant.

Harry Lauder’s Walking Stick/’Contorta’ - Corlus Avellana

A unique shrub, in early spring thin 3 inch catkins will dangle from every twig for sever weeks, has lively, brown barked shoots that curl and spiral in every direction. The ‘contorta’ makes a great centerpiece for a winter garden. It will grow up to 6-8 feet tall and wide, with large, crispy leaves in the summer. This shrub requires full sun, average soil and will need to be watered. Usually propagated by grafting, these plants have under stock that may sucker repeatedly. It would be wise to cut any straight shoots directly back to the base as soon as growth appears.

Seven Sun Flower - Heptocodium Miconioides

The seven sun flower was an unknown species in American gardens ten years ago. However, this fast-growing shrub is now available at many nurseries. The larger stems have a shaggy tan and rust colored bark. It grows in a fountain shaped clump, sometimes 10 to 15 feet in height with large glossy leaves. The plant blooms late in the summer with small white sweet smelling flowers grown in clusters of seven. It needs full sun with average soil; care free, but for best results prune older stems to the ground in early spring.