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Box shrubs

Hi guys, bought two pyramid box shrubs to go potted either side of the front door, they’re a good size, about 80cm tall. (Xmas lights on over Xmas 🎄)
They’re west facing and I was hoping for abit of care advice for them, I had two bay trees there but they succumbed to harsh wind (which isn’t often).

How do they fair with wind and winter? I’ve read about box blight and some type of caterpillars, any advice on these?

Thankyou

Posts

  • TopbirdTopbird Posts: 8,355
    I've just dug out most of the box from my garden (there was a lot). Got fed up with having to spray with fungicide to keep blight at bay (it was badly affected again this year) and this year the box moth also finally discovered our garden and the caterpillars started stripping the plants. 

    The parterre hedge looked such a mess I decided it had to go.

    I still have a couple of small hedges and 5 large box balls. They are dotted around the garden so blight spores can't readily spread from one plant to another and they are much smaller targets for the box moth.

    Fingers crossed two specimen plants on their own will be similarly small targets.

    If the plants are healthy and fully hardened off they should be ok over winter. Maybe consider having a bit of fleece ready to wrap round to prevent leaf scorching if we get another visit from the Beast from the East - but box are very hardy and tough plants and don't really need protecting.
    Heaven is ... sitting in the garden with a G&T and a cat while watching the sun go down
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