Euonymus Fortunei Emerald Gaiety

Euonymus Fortunei Emerald Gaiety is a hardy, reliable shrub with year-round foliage to bring colour to your garden in all seasons. It has received the RHS Award of Garden Merit (AGM) for its usefulness to UK gardeners.

The Euonymus genus is often referred to as the Sprindle or Spindle Tree. Brought from China in the nineteenth century, Euonymus Emerald Gaiety is prized for its evergreen foliage. Its small, glossy, rounded leaves are a deep emerald green with an irregular creamy white margin. In winter, the white edges take on a pinkish hue, adding more colour variety.

Euonymus Fortunei Emerald Gaiety is reliably winter hardy throughout most of the UK, making it an excellent choice for gardeners everywhere! A plant will grow to a maximum height of 0.5 to 1 metre and spread of 1 to 1.5 metres over a period of 10 to 20 years. If planting as ground cover or a hedge, plant 3 to 5 per metre. Euonymus Emerald Gaiety needs little pruning to maintain vigorous growth, but you should cut out any plain green-leaved shoots back to the main stem. However, if you want to maintain it as a formal hedge, it will tolerate more regular pruning by clipping back new growth in May and then again in September.

Euonymus fortunei Emerald Gaiety will grow in any well-drained soil in either full sun or partial shade. It can be planted in a south, east, or west-facing aspect, in either a sheltered or exposed position. Care should be taken to avoid planting Euonymus Emerald Gaiety where it could spread unchecked into a woodland area. It is deer and rabbit resistant. Tolerant of salt, it is a good choice for planting in coastal locations.

Euonymus Fortunei Emerald Gaiety has long been used as a reliable low-maintenance ground cover for problem spots, and it is certainly still a great option for that use. It can provide erosion control on a dry slope. It also is an excellent choice for a low hedge, responding to regular pruning with dense growth, topping out at 1 metre high.  Planted next to a courtyard wall, Euonymus Emerald Gaiety will climb up it, providing a year-round foliage show. It can also be planted in a pot on a patio. At the top of a retaining wall, it will spill down, softening the edges.

Euonymus Fortunei Emerald Gaiety is an excellent foliage plant, which will serve you equally well as a specimen plant in a courtyard setting, or as a tough groundcover in a problem spot!