Garden Plants Questions About Rain Garden Plants For Shade

What type of Mulch should I use for my shade garden?

I am doing a 20'X20' shad garden in the corner of my backyard and next to the house. I am doing plants all along the edge of this and around the tree in the middle, but a lot of it will be open to be walked on by people and my 2 dogs.

I want a mulch that will look good, be able to hold it's place and not shuffle around with activity/rain, last a good while, and not get my dogs messy when they are on it.

Right now I am looking at shredded hardwood, but if there are better suggestions out there I would like to hear. Also, should I put a weed stopper fabric underneath it?

Apple Mint Plant. How do you bring out the smell? Helllppp?

Did I get a dud plant? It doesn't smell. I planted it maybe 2 months ago and I now see that it's begun to spread from the little 3 inch basic plastic pot they come in. (I think because of all of the rain it began to grow). Anyway so what should I do? I took off a leaf and put it in my mouth. Nothing, but a funny feeling on my tongue from the furriness of the leaf I guess. I wonder if it's actually an apple sage (is there a such thing) vs. apple mint?

It's in partial shade (in the early mornings the sun shines on it and then the mini tree in the garden has leaves that shade it most of the day) I've taken off a stem and I planted it in the old plastic pot container and I think it's begun to root. I'm placing that in full sun (but the leaves started to get burned, so I have it under the shed)

Okay so what's going on? I need to bring out the smell. I got a Kentucky Mint plant but for some reason (perhaps lack of sun or the roots stayed wet too long) and it died. But that smelled very strong. This I don't smell much.

A 'what went wrong' poem. Will you c/c?

My thoughts are in a tangle like neglected vines;
weeds are taking over in the garden I grew.
Every seed I planted was sewn for love of you,
I gave them water and waited for your sunshine.

Spring came; the rain fell, and little shoots sprouted;
I tended them ever-so-gently and they thrived.
I gave them a bit more shade when Summer arrived.
I cleared a few away when they grew too crowded.

The harvest moon shone full and my garden flourished;
all through fall and into winter it gave me yield.
And so a dream I'd always had was then fulfilled,
Love was rooted deep and at last, rightly nourished.

Winter came, devoured happiness like a dirge;
In my garden-spot, nothing will ever emerge.

What plant/shrub/tree would you recommend...?

Hi,

I have a corner in my garden which is often in shade, and whilst I'm no gardener I would describe the soil type as quite clay-like in consistency because it seems to retain moisture and sticks together, as opposed to being more dry and grain-like elsewhere in my garden.

I would like a shrub or such like which would not grow higher than 4 or so feet, and would provide a bit of interest/colour.

What would those of you with some experience recommend? I'm in Scotland so we do get lovely weather in the summer, but it's unpredictable - we get a lot of rain too, and frosts/light snow in the winter.

Thanks in advance for your suggestions.

can anyone help me with a analysis of a poem!?

its called Examiner by F.R. Scott

The routine trickery of the examination baffles these hot and discouraged youths
Driven by they know not what external pressure, they pour their hated self-analysis, through the nib of confession, onto the accusatory page

I, who have plotted their immediate downfall, I am entrusted with the divine categories: A, B, C, D, and the hell of F

The parade of prize and the back door of past, in the tight silence, standing by green grass window, watching the fertile earth graduate its sons with more compassion

Not commanding the shape of stem and stamen, bringing the trees to pass by shift of sunlight and increase of rain

For each seed, the whole soil; for the inner life, the environment receptive and contributory

I shudder at the narrow frames of our textbook schools in which we plant our so various seedlings

Each brick-walled barracks, cut into numbered rooms, black boarded, ties the venturing chute to the master's stick

The screw-desk rows of lads and girls, subdued in the shade of an adult, their acid sub-soil, shape the new to the old in the ashen garden

Shall we, shall we open the whole skylight of thought to these tip-toe minds, bring them our frontier worlds and the boundless uplands of art for their field of growth?

Or shall we pass them the chosen poems with the footnotes, ring the bell on their thoughts, period their play, make laws for averages and plans for means, print one history book for a whole province and let 90,000 read page 10 by Tuesday?

As I gather the inadequate paper evidence, I hear across the neat campus lawn the professional mower's drone clipping the inch-high grass.