Native Plants

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Friday - May 21, 2010

From: Charlottesville, VA
Region: Mid-Atlantic
Topic: Shrubs, Vines
Title: Plant to hang over and cover a wall
Answered by: Nan Hampton

QUESTION:

HI! this is a stumper for me! I have a 6 foot wall bracing a hill on one side and a lawn on the other. It is currently cement and I would like to find something to cover it --evergreen would be the best--and I would also like to find something to plant above that might spill over without causing root damage to the wall. I had thought of wisteria, but have been told that the roots would eventually ruin the wall. Wouldn't mind a flower, but don't want to go to orange/red/yellow colors. The house is a strong red brick. Thanks for your help, Deborah Adair.

ANSWER:

Instead of planting at the top and letting the vine spill over, you would probably be better off to plant the vine at the bottom of the wall to climb it. The roots are less likely to harm the wall if they are growing down at the bottom of the wall rather than down beside the wall at the top. Two of the evergreen vines that are attractive do have red flowers. These are Bignonia capreolata (crossvine) and Lonicera sempervirens (trumpet honeysuckle). Gelsemium sempervirens (evening trumpetflower), another evergreen vine, has yellow blossoms. Smilax smallii (lanceleaf greenbrier) is another evergreen with inconspicuous yellow or green flowers. There are several non-evergreen vines with that would be attractive, e.g., Parthenocissus quinquefolia (Virginia creeper), Passiflora incarnata (purple passionflower), and Clematis virginiana (devil's darning needles). You can see more possibilities for native vines for Virginia by doing a COMBINATION SEARCH in our Native Plants Database and choosing 'Virginia' in the Select State or Province box and 'Vine" in the Habit (general appearance) area.