Eleagnus...am I being too optimistic?

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Chills Saint Clair Shores, MI(Zone 6b) Apr 04, 2007

I'm sorely tempted by Eleagnus Pungens 'Maculata' in the Arrowhead Alpines catalog (btw this has to be the best catalog I've read in a while, if for nothing else than some of the unusual descriptions the author composes when he's bored and wants to know if anyone really reads plant descriptions).

I am not afraid of the plant for its reported weediness, or its thorns. I am wary because most sources quote it as being less hardy than my zone would require. (I prefer not to spend good money on a plant and devote the time to it and then have to dig its skeletal frame up for disposal the following spring).

Please tell me, am I foolishly wasting my time considering this plant or do I have a chance of it surviving from year to year with minimal protection (I'll put up a burlap frame around it, if that is all it will take).

~Chills

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gooley Hawthorne, FL(Zone 8b) Apr 05, 2007

According to the USDA, http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=ELPU2 , it's become naturalized in the Southeast from Kentucky to Florida, and in Massachusetts! If memory serves, the mildest zone in Massachusetts is 6b. (Okay, maybe 7a on Cape Cod.) Plants for a Future says zone 7, though I take their values with a grain of salt: sometimes they are pessimistic, based seemingly on results of British horticulture. PfaF also cites sources saying the foliage (it's evergreen) can be damaged by severe wind chill. See http://www.pfaf.org/database/plants.php?Elaeagnus+pungens .

Okay, that's the species, not the cultivar or selection you mention, but it's encouraging. PFaF implies that the cultivars are not that different from the species.

What can happen? So it might lose leaves, or at worst freeze back to the roots in a cold winter with insufficient snow cover. As far as I know, anything in that genus is very hard to kill. Maybe that burlap frame will cut the wind chill enough to spare the leaves.

But that's just my fool opinion. I'm the guy who plants the weirdest things here in 8b... sometimes they survive. Personally I'd go for it. You might want to wait for a second opinion.

Mark., despite neglect my E. multiflora is thriving, though it's a bit too warm for it here


This message was edited Apr 5, 2007 12:15 AM

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