Viburnum Standard

In the right background of this picture you can see this enormous Doublefile Viburnum that I bought 16 years ago as P.T. Pink Beauty Viburnum. There is nothing pink about this shrub. Don't let that tricolor Beech tree in the fore ground fool you. The viburnum has these elegant limbs spread in layers with beautiful white doublefile blooms on it every spring. A gorgeous plant no doubt. 

As it has aged it is putting out new plants all around the mother plant. As I walked by a couple of years ago I noticed that the stems of one of these plants was straight up peeking above one of the mother stems. 

I says to myself, 'this would make a really nice standard plant with that straight stem'. So I dug it up and put it into a nice big pot. I trimmed back the stems and waited.

The next year it had started filling in fairly well.  No blooms of course but it was filling in.

Through out last summer and this past winter it was blown over several times. Poor thing. I tried putting rocks on top of the soil to give it more heft. I finally took mercy on it and transferred it into a heavier pot. So far with all these spring days with ferocious big blows it has stayed upright.

I believe that in thanks for this upgrade it bloomed beautifully through Easter this year. 

I feel like it is quite the success. I hope it lives long in its new pot. I intend to treat it like a bonsai in that I will trim the roots to keep it in this pot. It is now beginning to set fruit on these little short stems. I hope to see the birds that come to eat those berries this fall.  

The Mother plant is tucked back almost into a corner of the garden where I can't view it closely so this will  give me the opportunity for close surveillance. 

When I look at this with a critical eye I realize that this shrub isn't the best for trying to make into a ball since it's natural form is to have tiered limbs. But the blooms and the naturally straight trunk sold me. 

I have another standard I made with a honeysuckle. I think I have shown you that one before. I can't help myself. I think it is such fun to have these beauties. Maybe I will end up with a lollipop walk. 

How about you? Do you have any standards in your garden?  Do you make your own or purchase them, such as those beautiful rose standards. I don't grow roses very well so I doubt I will try one of those but I will be looking at all the shrubs in the garden to see if there might be another candidate for a standard.