ID and advice...

Hi guys.
A wee bit of background first - a long time ago, in a garden far, far away (except from Zigs, who only lives up the road...) a lady made a lovely garden with nice little shrubs and paths and little rocky bits...
Fast forward some years and these unattended small shrubs are now straggly emaciated giants with bare branches except for the tips that try to peer above the crocosmia and bindweed - and the host of plum trees that have grown from plums falling from the main tree...
Anyway, most plum trees dug up and chucked on the bonfire and the crocosmia, Buddleia, bluebells and dandelions have all been uprooted, along with something that may once have looked quite nice - all the leaves arranged at right angles to one another in a nice little square... but I digress... there are a few pictures (below) of some survivors of the purge in another part of the garden... they are a little large but I don't really want to lose them... ID and advice on whether they can be pruned back without murdering them would be appreciated... :D

Thank you :D

 

First one is Crinodendron.
Agree with Marley on hebe and Weigela, or as my neighbour once said Wiglea.

The others to me are the kind of nondescript things that aint worth growing

 

So the "Hebe" is one of the things I've been tearing out and chucking away... not because I don't like it, but because it had struggled so much to keep it's head above the scrub that when I cleared the weeds away it basically flopped onto the dirt gasping like a fish... so I put it out of its misery... The one in the pic is a nice big ball that is bothered by brambles and bindweed but they are do-able... there is another example around the front that is struggling though... can it be pruned back?

 

I know one of them is some sort of reddish honeysuckle... Some of the wee flowers in pic 2 actually belong to the honeysuckle... but its own flowers are tiny purple things that smell divine :D

Thank you for your assistance....
so far...

 

Does anyone else think that No. 2 might be a Pittosporum? That'd be worth saving.
JS, when the Weigela has finished flowering, you could prune the old flowered stems out, and perhaps a couple of the oldest stems at ground level. Try to leave the new shoots...they'll flower next year

 

The description of "Pittosporum tenuifolium 'Elizabeth'" fits very well - including the small well-scented flowers... The Weigela is at least 3m tall - it's a big bugger!
I think they were all planted with a view to being nice little shrubby-type things, and now they are almost trees... They don't look too bad...

Anyway, a wee quickie...

What are these? I left a patch of ground to grow wild this year and a forest of these things have appeared - pretty but no scent...

 

The Pittosporum is 'Irenne Patterson', if necessary it can be cut back as hard a you like and will recover, similarly the Weigelia. The flower above is Gladiolus byzantinus.

 

If you like scented plants, JS....these would do well in your climate...
Buy Abyssinian gladiolus (syn acidanthera or callianthus ) Gladiolus murielae
beautifully perfumed!

 

The Gladioli look nice to be honest, although they do appear to be growing wild...
So a few more piccies... :D
So number 1 is a wee tree thing growing up the top of the garden - I tied it to the wall to straighten it up as it was falling over - that could probably do with a wee prune as well maybe...
#2 is a long straggly tree thing growing beside the Weigela - is it worth keeping?
#3 is one of the few plants remaining in the back bit 0 the flower looks a bit like a hydrangea - which I am not keen on...
#4 was a big bushy thing till I took the hedge trimmer to it... and now it is a short unbushy thing. It was variegated and had white small flowers I think...
#5 is a Pieris japonica... I know this because it still has the tag round its trunk... it is currently being accosted by rosemary, sage and bindweed as you can see in the pic - should it be pruned down or left?

 

Pictures on left.....
1) Salix
2) Hydrangea
3) A close up would be helpful please. Pieris?

Pictures on right....
1) Weigela and 'long straggly tree thing' - is there a top to it with leaves to identify?
2) Pruned shrub. Again a close up of the leaves would help.

Jack when id is needed it's often difficult to tell without close up shots of foliage or flowers what the plant is as we can't see it in the 'flesh'.

 

The tall thing next to the Weigela looks like a cotoneaster. Has berries, and attracts bees, but not a particularly attractive garden plant.

 

Picture 4, the second on the right, is a spirea. They can look nice if properly pruned. Allow it to grow into a nice arched shape, and then don't prune the top, just remove a few of the oldest shoots from the base every year.

 

Looked it up - that's the baby alright... at the moment it has no room to flourish, so it is one straight stem - but the lap fencing between my garden and the "Bramble Queen"'s blew down in a storm so it may get a bit more room unless I get the fence back up sharpish...