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Ozothamnus coralloides (Coral Shrub) - A slow growing cushion-forming evergreen shrub that can grow to 1 foot tall by 2 to 3 feet wide with thick stems of small diamond-shaped leaves. These leaves are imbricate against the stems so that only their rounded dark green backsides are visible but between each leaf shows through the white wooly hairs present on the side of the leaf pressed against the stem, giving this plant its distinctive bicolored, gray and green, coral-like appearance. The pale-yellow flowers can appear in summer near the branch tips but are sunken in amongst the leaves.
Plant in full sun to light shade in a well-drained soil and irrigate occasionally. It is hardy to 10 to 15° F.
Ozothamnus coralloides comes from New Zealand's South Island where it is an uncommon sub-alpine species found in the Kaikoura Ranges southeast of the Marlborough Strait. It is also called whipcord shrub or Marlborough Helichrysum. We got this plant from Native Sons Nursery in 2012 and while we really loved the look of this plant, it is so slow growing that we found it impractical to continue with and discontinued producing it in 2015.
Information displayed on this page about Ozothamnus coralloides is based on our research conducted about this plant in our nursery library as well as from information provided by reliable online resources. We also include our own observations made about it as it has grown in the nursery gardens and other gardens visited, as well how the crops of this plant performed in the containers in our nursery field. We will also include comments received from others and welcome hearing from anyone who has information about this plant, particularly if it includes cultural information aiding others to better grow it.
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