I just purchased my first boxwood, I’m in corpus christ texas, temps are still in the 80s 90s. What is the soil mix you recommend, n wat are the horticultural habits of this Bush. Is it a broad leaf evergreen and do you treat it like an oak.
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It’s a shrub and not a very rapidly growing one at that. It back buds fairly easily even on old wood. I let mine grow and directionally prune when possible and use guide wire to pull branches into position. Branches can be very stiff and brittle so be careful. They like water but do not like being constantly drenched. Mine is in development so I thin out growth, prune out what I dont want in spring before it begins to push. Then I let grow all year.
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What kind of soil a 1 1 1 mx ?
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Equal parts pumice, lava, akadama.
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Thank you appreciate it
It is indeed quite slow growing, taking up to 60 years to reach its mature dimensions if planted in the ground.
If left to its own devices for long enough, boxwood reverts to a small-tree type of growth. There is a very mature boxwood at the back of my garden that has fully encircled a mature common ash tree and then proceeded to climb up. I’ll have to measure it one of these days. Based on the history of the property, it may have been planted anywhere between 1621 and the 1950s.
Judging by more recent boxwood shrubs on the property, small ones grow to a decent enough size after 8 to 10 years in the ground. Using google street view, some of my boxwood went from a sparse 1’ shrub to a dense 6’ ball in 8 years.
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