Kodiak® Black Bush Honeysuckle

For intense color and rugged nature, order a reliable shrub that is worth its weight in gold! The Proven Winners® Kodiak® Black Diervilla (Diervilla rivularis 'SMNDRSF') is an easy solution to even your worst landscape challenges! It is a rugged high performer for full sun, part sun, or shade locations. Kodiak can take just about any soil type, as well. Kodiak® Black is rarely damaged by deer. It's disease-resistant, pest-free, and truly easy care! This versatile plant is a rare gem!

Best of all? It's absolutely breathtaking!

Kodiak® Black Bush Honeysuckle is a deciduous, multi-stemmed shrub with a dense nature and mounding habit. It features extraordinary dark, burgundy-black foliage! You'll love the way the clusters of yellow, trumpet-shaped blooms stand out against the dramatic leaves!

From early summer through the fall, each delicate blossom features protruding, white stamens for an additional decorative note. The effect of the yellow against the deep, contrasting color of the leaves is gorgeous. Butterflies, honey bees and Hummingbirds love them, too.

The foliage color is most intense in spring and fall, with autumn tones deepening to a burnished purple. Kodiak® Black Bush Honeysuckle provides that arresting display, exhibiting deep burgundy hues so dark that they're almost black in tone. The glossy foliage is most impressive in full sun (or part shade), and Kodiak® Black Bush Honeysuckle is one of the best shade-tolerant shrubs you'll find on the market today.

This native cultivar may be called "Bush Honeysuckle" but it is not invasive! It simply spreads politely and keeps to itself without jumping any borders. Dwarf Bush Honeysuckle thrives in sun or shade, and is a sound ecological choice. Growing 3-4 feet in height and spreading 4-5 feet wide, these vigorous and incredibly adaptable shrubs thrive throughout USDA growing zones 5 to 7.

Planting and Application:

You can even grow these in outdoor containers as your Filler plants. Use several Kodiak® Black plants around your centered Thriller or focal point plant. The deliciously dark foliage is bound to make your Thriller pop! Or use the dramatic dark foliage as the Thriller and skirt it in Spillers like golden Creeping Jenny, soothing green Blue Rug Juniper, or equally dark and dramatic Black Scallop Ajuga!

Savvy property owners know that low-maintenance plants are a great idea! Why not use this sun and shade-tolerant shrub as the mainstay of your easy-care garden design? Consider this your "go-to" landscape solution to cover ground and fill wide, open areas with knockout color. Modern homes can use these shrubs en masse in wide planting beds. Save a little room for a few bright flowering accent plants, and you'll be ready to relax in your space.

The foliage color is sophisticated enough to hold its own in high-end formal landscapes. But it's absolutely charming in Cottage gardens or as accents in modern courtyards, as well. Leverage their rich, dark leaves to add depth to all of your plantings, and you'll tie the entire design together.

Allow it to create natural-looking drifts for a very appealing look with a touch of visual drama! The only thing you'll really have to do is plan for Kodiak® Black to reach its full mature spread. Plant them 3 ½ feet apart on center, measuring from the center of one to the center of the next. They'll grow together and touch.

Use Bush Honeysuckle as a mid-sized, low-maintenance groundcover to add depth to the look of your garden beds. Stop trying to mow a dangerous hillside by planting these flowering shrubs instead! Halt soil erosion on those same hills or along the upper banks of a water feature, stream or pond. Allow these durable plants to spread out in a mounded form. They'll fill in your wide, open areas with brilliant color, butterflies and songbirds!

Use Kodiak® Black as an accent shrub throughout your butterfly gardens, and around Rock gardens, and because of that dramatic fall color, it’s especially wonderful to use where you'll see it during halftime at your Football Watch parties or around the fall firepit!

Include these all along the mid-ground of your mixed shrub border or as low hedges. They'll make a fantastic contrast in front of flowering trees and taller shrubs. Use them as a solid backdrop for smaller perennials in a Butterfly Garden. Of course, you can also add them to your foundation planting for a bold, deep foliage accent. What could be more captivating? The eye can't help but be drawn to such a dramatic color, so different from the expected greens and bright flower tones usually present.

Have you heard of Black Gardens? They are a trendy take on the traditional Moon Garden, using a reverse of the traditional all-white garden border. Kodiac Black should definitely be considered for these unusual, restful retreats.

Wherever you place them, be sure to snip them regularly to include the lush foliage in your cut flower arrangements! We'd call Kodiak® Black Bush Honeysuckle a "plant it and forget about it" plant if it wasn't so pretty! You'll notice these plants every day, although you won't have to fuss over them!

• Bright Yellow Flowers Draw Butterflies
• Dramatic Burgundy-Purple Foliage & Stems
• Native Cultivar is Well-Behaved & Not Invasive
• Great Soil Stabilizer for Slopes & Embankments
• Create Fantastic Focal Points, Hedges & Backdrops With Very Little Maintenance

#ProPlantTips for Care:

For the best foliage color, plant it in full sun where it will get 6 or more hours of sun a day. However, it will also perform well in partially shady areas. We've seen it do well even in shade situations. Provide a consistent, moderate amount of water on a regular basis for best results. It is adaptive to a variety of soils and quite hardy. Every other year, add a top dressing of a three-inch layer of arborist mulch. You'll keep the root system cool and moist. Mulch between plants also helps keep new mass plantings weed-free. 

You can easily keep them manicured with regular pruning in early spring to shape or shorten them. Or, let it do its thing for a more natural look. Should you need to prune, do so in the late winter or early spring.

• Grows Well in Full Sun, Part Shade or Full Shade
• Wide Range of Well-Drained Soil Types
• Regular Moderate Moisture Needs
• Prune If Needed - Late Winter or Early Spring
• Deer Tend to Leave it Alone

Kodiak® Black Bush Honeysuckle is one of the Proven Winners® series so you can be assured of its performance in your own yard year after year. Order enough to complete your project today from NatureHills.com and gain the most versatile, adaptable flowering ornamental shrub possible!