Friday, November 27, 2009

Ilex verticillata - Winterberry

Ilex verticillata – Winterberry

A deciduous Holly. One of my favorite shrubs. Grows wild in this area the one in the video clip is in my road side garden. Most of my property is natural forest and there is a clump of this shrub growing in the dense part of the wood. I dug this bush up and moved it to the roadside years ago when it was just a small plant. At that time I didn't know that Winterberry was a true Ilex a member of the Holly family so like all hollies it has male and female plants and you need one of each to get the nice red berries. When this plant was almost full brown it started producing a few berries every year, only five or so, which proved it was female and evidently a small amount of pollen was being carried to it either on the wind or by insects. A few years ago I went to a garden center and bought her a mate and ever since then it has produced a load of beautiful berries that stay on the bush almost all winter.