Japanese Kerria

By Moya Andrews

Published September 9, 2019 at 6:57 PM EDT

If you have shady areas in your garden, you may like to try growing a shrub that is known as Kerry Japonica, commonly known as Japanese Kerria. This is a fine textured, deciduous shrub that contrasts nicely with evergreen shrubs and plants with broad leaves. It has thin bright green stems that add winter interest. The bright yellow flowers are cheerful in the late spring and bloom sporadically throughout the summer. Kerria holds onto its leaves, often turning yellow, until late in the fall.

Tips For Planting Japanese Kerria

Use it in woodland plantings where it can sucker and form colonies, if mass plantings are desired.

It can be used as a foundation planting in part shade because it combines well with hosta and ferns, bleeding heart, celandine poppy, brunnera and lily of the valley.

It is at its best in well-drained soil in filtered light and is reliably hardy in zones 5 through 9 and in zone 4 in a protected site.

Do not fertilize until plants are cut back to the ground as too much fertilizer makes them straggly and weedy.

Remember to prune out dead wood and shape them every year after they bloom. Every few years cut them right to the ground to revitalize the plants.