damp shade loving plants? ideas please!

can anyone help me, we have a brand new house with a large garden that has some trees at the bottom. i have just been to the end of garden in rain and found that over christmas all the grass has dissappeared!! so think we may need to plant some clump forming perenials to make it a woodland area. but i have never done this before and wondered if any of you wonderful folk have some tried and tested ideas??
many thanks

 

First of all, there are few plants which will grow in stagnant water, so make sure that even if the area is damp that water cam flow through it. Dig a test pit say about 2 feet by 2 feet and go down as far as you can. It may well be that there is a layer of hard soil below the surface which is impeding drainage. If water does not accumulate in your pit, or drains very quickly then the dampness may be temperary. If the water does not drain away, then you would need to dig over the whole area to a good depth and add drainage material (gravel of all different sizes is best.) If the water drains away slowly then ou may well be able to grow damp loving shade tolerant perennials.
You could try any of the ferns, Osmunda regalis or Struthioptera are the biggest of the northern hemisphere types. Then there are the Toad lilies, various Seneccios and of course Gunnera.

 

Would a willow work? One of those bendy type ones would look lovely.

[ 11. January 2006, 06:14 PM: Message edited by: lisa0307 ]

 

Elder will also remove a lot of moisture out of the ground but you say you have some trees there already. Any idea what they are?

If it is really boggy all year then you could try making a pond with reeds and water margin plants. Otherwise as Palustris has said you will need to improve the soil and drainage. It's almost imposible to get grass to grow on wet soil in heavy shade and it's a fair indication of the underlying problem.

 

A Pond isn't a good idea if you have a high water table at the bottom of the garden.

[ 11. January 2006, 08:52 PM: Message edited by: lisa0307 ]

 

the trees are a small oak, a may blossom tree and a small willow, also several japanese maple that my darling other half shoved in before i had a chance to plan anything bless him! i am going to go out and have a dig later as there was an astilbe but that has died and it was doing very well. do not want a pond as i have young children with a water fetish and think they might get in... thanks for the tips though. very possible the builders just buried their aggregate as i have dug up an awful lot of rubbish in the vegetable garden! including several seven -up bottles..

 

If it's that wet your maples probably won't do terribly well in all that water, best to put then in pots until you've decided where they're going.

 

May I suggest that you leave the Astilbe alone - they do well in damp partial shade - and always die back in the winter, re-appearing in late spring.

Sounds like you've got a nice woodland going at the bottom of your garden - so I'd go with the flow and encourage it going for for woodland plants, winter aconite, english bluebells or the small scilla - and of course ferns. Consider a couple of the white barked birches to add a ghostly effect in winter.
If the soil is on the acid side - you could try some rhodies - add a few rocks and some wood piles to get covered in moss mmmmmm.