Day 142 - The Glory of Coral Bark Maple

Coral Bark Japanese Maple -Acer palmatum 'Sangokaku', hardy in zones 5-8, offer a good portion of the country a highly underused container plant. I use them often in my winter container plantings and come spring, move them from the planter into the ground in some landscape design. The impact that they give against a light colored wall is striking. This planting is cushioned in with miniature boxwoods, layered with yellow pansies and winter creeper -Euonymus fortunei 'Coloratus'. Properly watered and given a bi-annual feeding of compost tea or Espoma Plant Food, you could easily keep this in a container for several years, only changing out the pansies in the spring to a summer annual like calibrachoa. Coral bark maples like partial shade so protect them from afternoon sun.