As important in the long term as selection of plants that suit your soil is the careful consideration of their likely ultimate size, particularly of trees and the larger shrubs -everything always grows bigger than you expect. There may be a tendency today to treat a small garden as you might a room, ‘redecorating’ or refurnishing it after eight or ten years, a task often carried out anyway if the property changes hands. Nevertheless, we all have some responsibility when we contribute major items, such as trees, to the local landscape – whether rural, urban or suburban – for these being suited to their surroundings and able to go on providing a framework for the garden for many years. We may not live long enough to see a tree in maturity or we may move on to another garden, but someone will have to face any problem our tree may cause, such as blocked drains from invading roots, impoverished soil, damage to house foundations, exclusion of light from the windows or heavy shading of the garden, or even merely the blocking of gutters with copious quantities of autumn leaves. Had a smaller tree been selected or a more appropriate site chosen, perhaps none of these problems would have arisen.
In urban gardens many of us have inherited difficulties caused by planting carried out by our predecessors a hundred years ago or more, when few trees other than forest species of ultimate large size were available. The noble stature of such trees as oak, beech, lime, even sycamore, are still much admired and valued by architects today as part of the urban scene, but they bring their problems. In ordinary gardens it is better not to plant these major trees, which are best suited to parkland or a few really spacious gardens where there is room for them to grow to their full stature without being heavily pruned or lopped, with the loss of their natural grace and beauty. Where such trees exist, some compromise may be reached, by having a few branches removed, the heads thinned and shaped, and crowns lifted – work for a skilled tree surgeon with the technical know-how, sophisticated equipment and an artistic eye.
Today there are many delightful small trees to choose from, and we can keep to those with an eventual height of say 4.5-9m (15—30ft), or at most to medium-size trees with eventual height of 10-18m (33-60ft), in small gardens in urban areas, and particularly near buildings.
For such important plantings, make a careful study of ultimate sizes, spread and shape when considering how they are to be placed and spaced. In later years it may be better to remove every other tree (or to suggest doing this to those who buy your property) rather than rely on heavy pruning or lopping, which so spoils the natural form and beauty of individual specimens. Most garden trees, such as cherries (Prunus), ornamental crab (Malus), rowan and white-beam (Sorhus), thorns (Crataegus), should be spaced initially, allowing for mature growth, at least 6-8m (20-26ft) apart. With sensible planting of a variety of medium to large shrubs in between them, trees at this spacing should have adequate room to develop shape and form.
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