Not only for hedging, boxwood can also become a bonsai. Super adaptable to containers, any species of this genus is easy to care for and maintain and becomes a handsome bonsai or topiary. If you are in making your first bonsai, try boxwood.
Wintergreen boxwood is an outdoor plant that is tough and resilient and withstands the sun as well as shade. However, in its natural environment it grows under the canopy of trees so it is better if you place the plant in partial sun. As boxwoods don’t tolerate severely cold temperatures protect the plant in winter.
Wintergreen Boxwood is a variety of Korean Boxwood it is hardy all the way to zone 4 and grows in most of the US. It can grow a lush attractive evergreen specimen shrub or hedge. It is usually kept at 3 feet tall at maturity. It can be grown in the landscape or containers. It is also easy to clip into topiary style plants as well.
Listed below is a plant summary of Wintergreen Boxwood.
Plant Hardiness Zones 4-9
Mature Width 3-4
Mature Height 3-4 ft.
Soil Conditions Average, well-drained
Sunlight Full sun to partial shade or light shade
The history of Wintergreen boxwood to the United States is quite interesting. When European settlers came to America they brought with them their favorite plants, and among them was boxwood. Those who settled in colder areas and planted them, must have been disappointed that they often turned brown and died in part – or completely – in the cold of American winters. It was only when Americans started to bring plants back from Asia that help arrived. In Korea a boxwood was found that looks almost exactly like the European type, but which is a lot hardier, thriving in areas as cold as zone 4, where winter temperatures plunge to minus 30 degrees. The Koreans also clipped their boxwoods, often into irregular ‘cloud’ shapes, and shapes like boulders, rather than the perfect geometry of European trimming.
