Spotted Laurel Hedging

Aucuba Japonica Variegata Hedging

Spotted Laurel, Aucuba japonica Variegata, is an excellent evergreen hedging plant for poor soil and shady sites.
Spotted Laurel is good for hedges up to about 4 metres high.

View our selection of evergreen hedging or see our full range of hedging plants.

Spotted Laurel hedge plants are only delivered pot-grown, year round.

Choosing a size:
When you are ordering Spotted Laurel plants for a hedge, we generally recommend that you use plants that are graded at 60/80cms. They are cheaper than large plants, easier to handle and they will establish well in poor conditions.
Use larger plants if you want a taller hedge quickly or for instant impact as a specimen shrub.
All our hedge plants are measured by their height in centimetres above the ground (the roots aren't measured).

Spacing a Spotted Laurel hedge:
Plant Spotted Laurel hedging at 2 plants per metre, 50cms apart.

General description of Spotted Laurel plants:
One of the Japanese laurels, Spotted Laurel is large shrub or small evergreen tree. Its large, tough, pointed leaves are mid green with cream markings.
Spotted Laurel is usually grown as a hedge and it is also a good specimen for a shady corner. This is also the most drought tolerant of the laurels (when it is established) and does in dry spots under other trees.
It is a superb screening plant and its heavy, pollution tolerant leaves are an effective noise barrier.
As it matures, it sends up shoots from the base that make an old Aucuba hedge almost solid in the middle.
This make it equally suited as roadside hedging or screening in a nudist colony.
All parts of Spotted Laurel are poisonous to humans and livestock.
The Aucuba berries are eaten by some birds but taste very bitter to us, so children are at no risk of eating one.

History & uses of Aucuba japonica Variegata:
This Japanese plant was introduced to Britain in 1783.