Contact: Diane Relf, Extension Specialist, Environmental Horticulture
Posted April 1997
Many different greens are used for holiday decorations in table arrangements, wreaths, door plaques, and garlands (roping). Some of these may be collected from the home landscape, while others are commercially harvested and shipped to local nurseries and florists. The following list includes greenery most often used.
Broad-leaved Evergreens
Holly, both green and variegated, is very traditional, particularly with the added color of red berries that are borne on the female tree. Skimmia is an attractive, southern shrub with exquisite green foliage and clusters of vivid-red berries from the female plant. Skimmia foliage is quite elegant all by itself in an arrangement, and it is less uncomfortable to handle than the prickly holly leaves. For smaller, bushier, green foliage, Boxwood remains a perennial favorite.
Needle-leaved Evergreens
Virtually any of the needled evergreens - pine, fir, spruce, cedar, juniper, yew, and hemlock - may be used as cut greens. They offer a wide variety in foliage color, texture, and size for any decorating need.
White Pine is a traditional green with a soft, graceful, bluish-green appearance. Another popular commercial choice is the fragrant, forest-green Princess Pine. Junipers offer a long-lasting green or silver-blue foliage that may have the added benefit of blue berries. A traditional green is Red Cedar (a juniper) although its branches are typically rather sparse. Better choices for a lacy foliage are the true cedars. Deodar Cedar offers a graceful, medium green; Blue Atlas Cedar is a bluish gray-green; and Cedar-of-Lebanon (Incense Cedar) branches are dark-green to chartreuse at the edges with a wonderful fragrance. Be careful using cedar when the small male (pollen) cones are present; these may open in warm air to release lots of messy pollen. This can be prevented by spraying the cones with lacquer or acrylic before arranging.
Firs are the short-needled greens. Douglas Fir is the traditional commercial green, with needles spiralling around the stem. Noble Fir has a greater needle density in a rich blue-green color and very good tolerance of hot, dry indoor conditions. Silver Fir is another commercial green that features rich-green needles with silver undersides. White Fir has medium-green needles that lie flat along the stem.
Canadian Hemlock is popular as another short-needled green, having needles that lie flat along the stem. However, it tends to drop its needles fairly soon after cutting. Carolina Hemlock is a little more long-lasting indoors and often has more cones on the branches.
Guidelines for Cut Greens
(Originally published by Alan R. McDaniel, Extension Specialist, and Jenny Shuster, Extension Technician, in The Virginia Gardener Newsletter, Volume 8, Number 12.)
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