Plant: Legend of the Small® Bottlebrush

Fothergilla · Fothergilla gardenii 'Legend of the Small'

$25.00

Size: 2 gal

Light

Full Sun

Bloom

Spring

Mature size

2.5 ft tall3 ft wide

More about this plant

A dwarf native fothergilla just 2 to 2.5 feet tall and 2 to 3 feet wide, spaced 24 to 36 inches apart, with an upright habit and leathery blue green leaves that turn a blend of autumn colors. Creamy white bottlebrush flowers 1 to 2 inches long with a sweet honey fragrance open before the leaves in April and May and draw bees. It grows in sun to part sun in well drained acidic soil, tolerates compaction and wet soil, resists deer, and works as an edging or border plant, a low hedge, a mass planting under trees or a small specimen.

  • Full Sun
  • Grows to 2.5 ft tall and 3 ft wide
  • Blooms in spring
  • Hardy in USDA zones 5a-9b
  • Deciduous foliage
  • Native plant

Plant description

A dwarf native fothergilla just 2 to 2.5 feet tall and 2 to 3 feet wide, spaced 24 to 36 inches apart, with an upright habit and leathery blue green leaves that turn a blend of autumn colors. Creamy white bottlebrush flowers 1 to 2 inches long with a sweet honey fragrance open before the leaves in April and May and draw bees. It grows in sun to part sun in well drained acidic soil, tolerates compaction and wet soil, resists deer, and works as an edging or border plant, a low hedge, a mass planting under trees or a small specimen.

Flowers
Creamy white bottlebrush flowers 1 to 2 inches long with a sweet honey fragrance, appearing before the leaves in April and May.
Foliage
Alternate, simple, ovate, hairy and leathery blue green to dark green leaves 1 to 2.5 inches long with a slightly toothed upper margin, smooth on the lower half, and a quilted bumpy appearance.
Fruit
An ornamentally insignificant two seeded beaked capsule maturing in September and October and ejecting black seeds.
Light
Dappled/Filtered Light
Native range
Coastal plains of the southern United States

Plant details


Related plants

Mount Airy fothergilla in spring, white bottlebrush flowers along bare branches

Mount Airy - Fothergilla

$36–$80Multiple sizes

Aphrodite sweetshrub in a two-gallon Proven Winners pot, deep red magnolia-like bloom

'Aphrodite' Sweetshrub

$36–$54Multiple sizes

Block of Limelight hydrangeas at the nursery, hundreds of lime-green panicles

'Limelight' Panicle Hydrangea

$54–$265Multiple sizes

Lagerstroemia indica white flower panicles — species reference photo (photo Dinesh Valke from Thane, India, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

Acoma - Crape Myrtle

$32–$180Multiple sizes

Admiration - Barberry (photo Salicyna, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

Admiration - Barberry

$12–$44Multiple sizes

Alleghany viburnum in bloom, domed creamy white flower clusters over leathery leaves

Alleghany - Viburnum

$28–$150Multiple sizes

American boxwood, single large burlapped ball about four feet across

American Boxwood

$52–$1,400Multiple sizes