Best Perennial Shade Plants For Your Shade Garden

Choosing the best perennial shade plants for your shade garden can sometimes be a challenging task. Many shaded areas of the landscape have moist to slightly damp soil and very little sunlight.  While this will limit your selection of what plants will not only grow, but also thrive in these conditions.

Select plants from this perennial plants list, and your shaded garden area is sure to become one of your favorite parts of your landscape. 

For shade gardens with moist soil, plant an assortment of potted and bare root ferns.  Autumn Brilliance Ferns are evergreen with green to bronze foliage to brighten up dark areas. Larger growing ferns, like the Cinnamon and Royal ferns can add a tropical feel. The Ostrich fern is known for its edible fiddleheads, which to many is considered a culinary delicacy. For a low growing ground cover, plant the Arborvitae fern.

A favorite of perennial shade plants is the Hosta. The Golden Tiara hosta produces beautiful foliage of lime green with lighter golden green edging.  Hosta Patriot is a variegated green leaf hosta with creamy white outer margins. For large spaces, plant the Sum and Substance and be amazed with its huge blue green leaves. If you’re limited in shaded space, the Blue Mouse Ears hosta is a tight low growing variety that will grow nicely along the garden edge.

There are many natives that can be added to your perennial plants list for your shade garden.  A good choice, especially if you are a beginning gardener, is the heuchera or coral bells, as they’re commonly called. Bright leafed heucheras are the Electric Lime, Southern Comfort, Georgia Peach and Cajun Fire. These evergreen perennial plants are long-lived and colorful additions.

The Lenten Rose or Hellebore is another evergreen perennial that adores lightly shaded areas. Plants this tough garden plant and enjoy the beautiful blooms produced in late winter to mid spring. Hellebores bloom at a time of the year when little else is in color.

Add these shade loving plants to your perennial plants list as choice plants to begin your shade garden. As your garden plants grow, you will want to fill in blank spaces. Feel comfortable in testing plants for the area, too.

Finding the best perennial shade plants for your shade garden is an ongoing process. Plant plants that you enjoy watching grow and appreciate how they add character to an otherwise dark garden area.

Tips for Growing Fern Plants in Shade Loving Gardens

When you think of fern plants, the first thing that comes to your mind is their long attractive leaves. Fern plants are interesting for many reasons. They can thrive in the shaded areas to great heights, texture and color. Ferns flourish better in a woodland garden that requires at least partial shade. When grown in a sunny garden, they will require protection from the hot afternoon sun. 

Ostrich Fern Fiddlehead (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

If your have a large maple or an oak tree in your yard, the fern plant would be one of the best shade-loving plants you will want to include. There are different types of fern plants that can be grown indoors as well as outdoors. The indoor fern plants might need a little bit of more watering while the outdoor fern plants can thrive well in predominantly shady lawn and garden areas.

Ferns are among the few species of non-flowering plants. They reproduce by means of the spores that found underneath their leaves. Ferns come in different shapes and sizes. Their height can range from a few inches to as much as 6 feet tall.

Some of the popular types of fern plants are Lady Fern, Cinnamon Fern, Maidenhair and Japanese Painted Fern. Two unusual ferns are the arborvitae fern, which really isn't a fern, and the true ostrich fern, which produces edible fiddleheads.

Popular evergreen ferns are the Autumn Brilliance and Christmas Ferns.

Generally, ferns prefer soils with more moisture content but not too watery. Some types of ferns will freeze during the winter. It is important that you choose your fern based on two things: the climate in your area and the type of landscape (shaded or sunny).

Tips for outdoor ferns:

One important thing you need to know is that over exposure to sunlight might dry out the ferns. Therefore, it is best to plant the fern plants in the shady areas of your garden. Let the place be mildly shady but not completely shaded. Ideal shades would be those from the tall trees creating a woodland feel with filtered light. Ferns like maidenhair grow well in dappled shade.

Test the quality of the soil before planting the ferns. They generally prefer soil that is more acidic than alkaline. If your soil is alkaline then you might have to get some fresh soil that is more acidic and plant your ferns in it. A suitable soil can be prepared by adding peat moss and sand in the ratio of 3:1 and mixing it up with the fresh soil.

Planting the ferns is simple. Just dig a hole that is more or less the same size of the fern pot and plant the fern in the hole so that the plant sits just above (approximately 1 to 2 inches) the ground level.

Ensure that the soil has good amount of moisture content but continually damp or wet. At times when there is heavy rainfall or excess humidity, see to that the moisture content doesn’t change drastically. The best way to combat such extreme climatic conditions is to bring the ferns indoors. If they are maintained at a temperature of not more than 60 degrees then they will maintain the moisture content that is required for their growth. What if the temperature is on the lower positive range? In such cases, you might allow the ferns to freeze temporarily. Once the climate gets back to normal, add more organic manure to the soil and replant them back in the outdoors.