Silverberry
Elaeagnus ebbingei
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… for silvery winter foliage and perfumed autumn air
Common name: Silverberry
Botanical Name: Elaeagnus ebbingei and E. pungens 'Fruitlandii'
Design Tips: Enhance an evergreen scene with a single silvery specimen or plant in mass for a windbreak, bank cover, barrier hedge or fast growing 'wall' to screen unsightly views. Can be groomed into formal hedging, but will contribute an elegant uncultivated feel to naturalistic gardens if grown without shearing.
Form and Size: This mounding, dense shrub can grow 6 to 10 feet high.
Flowers: Clusters of half-inch creamy-white bell shaped blooms would go unnoticed in fall if it were not for their heavy fragrance, which perfumes the entire yard.
Foliage: The thick 1 to 2 inch leaves are an olive green, muted with a downy silver cast and contrasted by silver undersides. The dense scaly foliage is resistant to diseases, deer and insect pests. There are also variegated cultivars of Elaeagnus with silver-margined leaves, a yellow streaked form and one with yellow-gold areas on green leaves.
Water Needs: After the first year of new-plant-irrigation, it becomes a drought-resistant shrub in hot sites or dry shade, even tolerating poor soil, as long as it is well drained. When established, the plant will adapt to either drought or regular irrigation.
Soil: Silverberry is well suited to a lean soil, since it promotes the growth of nitrogen-fixing bacteria, the same as peas, beans, mesquite trees and bluebonnets.
Light: The solid greenish forms are sun-durable versatile shrubs for either full sun or partial shade. The variegated varieties prefer shade to part shade in hot climates.
Hardiness: Cold hardy in USDA Zones 6-10.
Grooming: Gangly new branches known as "whips" soar above an established bush in spring and autumn to produce a scrambling height. The lanky new branches can be trained to create living arches, left to sprawl naturally, or trimmed off to maintain an established size. Pruning the wiry new growths in fall will not forfeit the next year's fragrant autumn blooms, since blooms occur on older branches. For a groomed, but tidier than natural formation, hand-trim rather than use hedge trimmer to maintain the plant's natural grace.
Snippets: Elaeagnus ebbingei and E. pungens 'Fruitlandii' cultivars produce fewer thorns, less fruits (ergo less invasive seedlings) than other varieties. The dense branches and leaves provide a wildlife habitat in the garden.The shrub will also tolerate container culture for year-round greenery and autumn fragrance in small gardens.
Cultivated, photographed and written by
Maggie Ross McNeely in Fort Worth, Texas
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