Boxwoods

After years of banishment from the most-desirable landscape list, the venerable boxwood is returning to favor.  Sturdy cultivars, able to provide a stately landscape note while avoiding the mysterious decline and moldering smell of the past, are now starring in the hedges and front walks of Virginia homes from Haymarket to Grundy.  Most of the old plantings at homes in Virginia were two cultivars, “English” or Suffruticosa which is a smaller plant and the other, “American” which is larger and a deeper green.

The flaw, it appears, is not in the boxwood but in us, the home gardeners who subject the shrub to unfavorable conditions, soggy situations, treating it with unsuitable fertilizers or pruning it into an impenetrable globe whose dense circumference keeps any sunshine or air from reaching the center.  English boxwood generally does not do well in full sun or in unprotected areas and often falls to a disease known as “boxwood decline.”

Lynn Batdorf, curator of the National Boxwood Collection at the U.S. National Arboretum in Washington, D.C. and registrar for the American Boxwood Society, calls this the “basketball” syndrome. “Obviously, the basketball has a hard shell that prevents anything from reaching the inside,” he said. “The boxwood looks beautiful, dense and full on the outside—an effect we all love.” But sooner or later, he said, the boxwood that seals in the interior like a basketball will have a branch turn brown, then another, until the whole plant is suffering from the maintenance of that impermeable barrier.

American boxwood is more tolerant of sunny sites than English and has thrived for long years in many of the large estates.  English is superb when planted under high dappled shade in well drained sites, but it does poorly in exposed environments. 

There are hundreds of cultivars that each have their own tolerances for sun and moisture.  The boxwood is actually not a native of England or American but has adapted well in parts of England and also in this country, primarily in the mid-Atlantic states. Two major collections, one at the Virginia arboretum in Boyce (at the northern end of the Shenandoah Valley), and at the National Arboretum in Washington, D.C. are within the reach of most HOMEstyle readers.

The trick, says Paul Saunders of Saunders Brothers, a nursery in Nelson County, is not repeating the same mistakes that prevented your boxwood from thriving just where you thought it would look best. “In other words,” said Saunders, “You take your licks and go on.”

Saunders is a good example of his own philosophy. When the beautiful English boxwood around his 19th century Piney River home turned brown and died years ago, Saunders set out to replace them with types of boxwood that would have the same grace and refreshing green color but would thrive in the soil and climate of Nelson County. “There’s life after English boxwood,” he said.

Other problems are caused by environmental changes: “There was a Virginia estate that lost 29 beautiful boxwood because of the loss of one tree.” The resulting direct sunlight weakened and eventually caused the death of the planting.

Saunders, with his sons, now has a massive boxwood collection in Piney River. He recommends discussing the best boxwood choice for your particular planting situation with your local nursery before investing heavily in boxwood plants. One thing all boxwood have in common, he says: “The deer don’t like it and won’t eat it unless they’re absolutely starving.”

Saunders, 74, became fascinated by the stately boxwood 61 years ago when he stuck 77 boxwood cuttings into a red-clay hillside. “I couldn’t have been prouder when 25 of those cuttings lived,” he said. Bitten by the boxwood bug, Saunders’ interest continued. His father and grandfather, were orchardists, and young Saunders became a nurseryman as well.

Saunders Brothers, his business, raises peaches and apples and grows hundreds of varieties of trees, shrubs, perennials and annuals for nurseries. In the mid ’90s, he and four of his seven sons began the National Boxwood Trials, aimed at evaluating the best choice of boxwood for varying micro-environments over the eastern United States. As the results came in from the trial gardens all over the country, Saunders began concentrating on growing the best boxwood for popular use.

Saunders mentions a few favorites:  Green Beauty, the plant he chose to replace the centuries-old English boxwood at his family home, is growing in the full sun and Piney River dense clay. It’s a slow-growing variety but faster by far than the hedge it replaced.

Justin Brouwers, a compact and delicate-leaved cultivar, has replaced some of the boxwood that were lost at Mount Vernon, the home of President George Washington.  Both Saunders and Lynn Batdorf mentioned Dee Runk, an upright variety with a graceful pyramid shape that bears up even when burdened by snow.

Vardar Valley is another Saunders favorite, a bluish plant with textured foliage that has been widely planted at the White House, Saunders said.

Besides planting the boxwood cultivar that bests suits your own individual conditions, Saunders has another piece of advice for once it’s in the ground: “Don’t fuss over it,” he said. “Over-pruning, over-feeding, and over-watering are not the key to beautiful boxwood. Remember, these plants are here for centuries.”

Resources

• Information on these varieties, including a boxwood guide, is available from the Saunders Brothers Web site at www.saundersbrothers.com.

• Visit the American Boxwood Society Web site at www.boxwoodsociety.org.

• Lynn Batdorf’s Book, The Boxwood Handbook,  A Practical Guide to Knowing and Growing Boxwood, is available through the American Boxwood Society Web site.

• Mature specimens of boxwood varieties can be seen at the U.S. National Arboretum in Northeast Washington and the State Arboretum of Virginia in Boyce, near Winchester, as well as at the Saunders Brothers nursery on selected dates.

• Virginia Tech materials on boxwood

American Boxwood
www.ext.vt.edu/departments/envirohort/factsheets/shrubs/amboxwd.html

Avoiding Winter Damage
  www.ext.vt.edu/departments/envirohort/articles2/wintrdam.html

Boxwood In The Landscape
  www.ext.vt.edu/pubs/envirohort/426-603/426-603.html

Boxwood Leaf Miner
  www.ext.vt.edu/departments/envirohort/articles/woody_ornamentals/bxwdlfmn.html