Annals of Greenwich, Pt. 4: Boxwood Butchery
Nobody asked me, but...landscapers have a lot to answer for
Greenwich yards, from the smallest to the largest, are overrun with boring boxwood balls.
Perhaps the landscapers and their clients seek to emulate the grand topiary gardens of Europe. But in suburban settings, little boxwood balls look like green scat.
Aesthetically and practically, they are a perfect match for tiny lawns and sidewalk-to-curb hell strips. They are useless except to provide landscapers another excuse to use their expensive, noisy equipment at regular billable intervals despite the stress to plants (and humans).
It doesn’t take a horticulturist to see that most of Greenwich’s boxwood balls are in terrible shape.
While it’s OK to remove a stray branch here and there, pruners should respect the natural shape of the plant, according to New York Botanical Garden experts. The preferred time to prune a boxwood in the mid-Atlantic region is around March 15.
According to the Chicago Botanic Garden, established boxwoods need little or no pruning. Dead or diseased branches should be removed no matter the season. You should check the interior and base of the plant as well as the exterior.
Shearing, as opposed to pruning nips, reshapes the plant. In other words, it’s the type of carnage practiced by the landscapers of Greenwich. Shearing causes a a lot of stress to the plant and can cause dieback.
If you are determined to shear your boxwood, don’t cut off more than 3/4 inch, and do it in June — never past mid-August. If you shear boxwood in autumn, the new growth encouraged by the cuts will die when the temperature drops, weakening the plant’s defenses to disease. The gardens of Greenwich were abuzz with boxwood shearing this autumn, courtesy of the landscaping services.
Experts say the top of the plant should be narrower than the bottom, so that the sun can reach all parts — the opposite of the Greenwich landscaper practice.
Branches at the outer edge should be thinned so that sunlight can pass into the interior. To thin or cut deadwood, you need to get inside the plant. I’d really enjoy seeing our local landscapers use an electric trimmer inside a tiny boxwood ball. Does that make me a bad person?
If you do thinning yourself, wear safety glasses. Nothing like a twiggy poke in the eye.
Some landscapers, always oblivious to recommended practice, apply the lollipop technique to all trees and shrubs. I sometimes take classes from Plant Amnesty, an organization founded by the late Cass Turnbull to teach pruning. One landscape renovation specialist said she once discovered a magnolia bush that had been pruned into a ball. The poor thing hadn’t bloomed in years. I’ve seen maple balls and crabapple balls around town.
Truth is, carving boxwood or anything else into a ball is bad for the plant. Deprived of light and air, the plant dies from within.
Anyway, with the exception of blight-causing fungi, living creatures aren’t great fans of boxwood balls. Would you enjoy sitting in a boxwood ball garden?
The funniest sight of all: boxwood scat dressed up in burlap for winter.
Why not just let the poor little boxwoods grow into a hedge? At then least they would be a natural barrier and provide an amusing shelter for birds.
I say, dig them all up, along with the hell strips and the tiny lawns. Replace them with plants that are beautiful instead of weird.