PRUNUS LAUROCERASUS CHERRY LAUREL

This past January, the two of us were up in Grand Rapids, Michigan for the Great Lakes Trade Expo. While not to the scale of the old CENTS show, this is a wonderful trade show to attend in the middle of winter, and well worth the effort to visit and learn.

We’ve always loved getting the catalogs from the growers and nurseries to learn about new plants and refresh on tried-andtrue ones. Sadly, but understandingly, the printed catalog seems to be fading into history, as the cost of printing increases along with the need to stay nimbler.

We visited each of the nurseries to poke around, looking for any plants we’d be unfamiliar with, in effort to nerd-out and learn about them. At one of our favorite nurseries, Eshraghi Nurseries (Oregon), we stumbled upon a plant that just may be a wonderful addition for us still in zone 5 (experiencing temperatures below -10° F).

Prunus laurocerasus (Cherry Laurel) is an evergreen shrub in the cherry family, native to Southeast Europe and Asia Minor, It has been used in Western European gardens since the mid

1500s and has also found extreme popularity in the southern states, especially the Carolinas and Georgia.

It is with good reason this plant has high popularity, especially a few select cultivars. Leaves are thick, dark, glossy-green, staying on the plant year-round. Straight species can grow to massive sizes but most landscape plantings will be of classic cultivars, such as ‘Otto Luyken’, which maintains a compact 4 to 5 foot meatball in no need of sheering.

Cherry Laurel’s flowers are incredibly fragrant in spring, in dense racemes between 2 and 5 inches long, shooting out from the shrub. This adds great ornamental appeal in contrast to the dark glossy leaves. Fruits following the spring flower are not so ornamental, reminiscent of our native Black Cherry (Prunus serotina). continued on page 24 continued from page 22

It is common to find ‘Otto Luyken’ at home in giant masses (100 plus plants) in commercial plantings in the south, as it builds a dense, weed free backdrop to annual plantings at shopping centers. We’ve found it along the highways, in North Carolina plantings, at exits in the median, looking incredible. This shrub is just as at home in a residential landscape, providing a strong evergreen background to plants that can keep the show going into later spring and early summer.

Unlike many plants in the Rosaceae family, Cherry Laurel is not nearly as susceptible to insect and disease issues. Careful siting in well-drained soil – not heavy clay – and a good amount of sun will lead to minimal pest concerns.

So, back to why we’re so excited with what we saw at the show? Eshragi has developed/trialed three new cultivars that are holding up to at least -15°, holding onto the majority of their leaves through the winter, which should cover nearly all of us in Ohio!

One of these options, ‘Green Goblet’, is a cute little meatball that should stay under 30 inches, with yellow-green new growth highlighted in front of the deep-green, older leaves. It also seems to be OK with more shade in our colder climates than any previous cultivars of Cherry Laurel. This could become a great replacement for our overly used Boxwood, as just as the rest of the species, this will take heavy pruning quite well for your hedge designs.

Another option, ‘Volcano’, has really neat, dark-red new growth on the leaves, reminiscent of improved cultivars of Pieris. Growing a little bigger – into the 5-foot-tall and 4-foot-wide range, this plant can also be used as a hedge/ formal pruning or left to its own to provide a perfect middleof-the-border plant.

Finally, ‘Greenfinity’ resembles the yellow-green new growth found in ‘Green Goblet’ but will more than double the size coming in around 8-feet-tall and 6-feet-wide. Pop these beautiful evergreens in the back of the border, let them do their flowering in the spring then stand backdrop to all the other cool flowers you can add in front of them.

To be fair, we have seen ‘Otto Luyken’ happy as can be in Cincinnati, as well as in Columbus. We’ve even seen it in gardens along the lake (north of where we live), always teasing us that while they may be North, they get the buffer of the lake keeping them just warm enough.

We have tried to push ‘Otto Luyken’ in our own garden, and with such lucky timing as two horticulturists can hope for, this experiment was in 2014 when we had lows around -11° at the start of the year. We likely would have had better success in 2020 when we didn’t see any negative temperatures, but we didn’t get that lucky.

It feels better to attempt this species again now that there are cultivars showing stronger cold hardiness for those of you trapped in the pockets of zone 5 in the north of the state. And listen, those of you that have been growing ‘Otto Luyken’ for years now with no problems… let us have this fun little victory!

Jim Funai, PhD, is full-time faculty at Cuyahoga Community College, a NALP accredited associate of applied science in hoticulture degree program. He has a PhD in Landscape Engineering and Forestry and is a Licensed Arborist. Shelley Funai is Grounds Manager at Stan Hywett Hall and Gardens in Akron, Ohio, which offers a historic estate designed by Warren H. Manning and a beautiful manor house museum. She is Landscape Industry Certified in Ornamental Plant Care.