Shop Products
Houzz Logo Print
yeto_gw

please help identify shrub from Charleston battery

yeto
13 years ago

Would anyone know the name of the shrubs that are planted between the Palmetto trees on the Charleston battery. They grow in clumps approx. 1-2 ft. in diameter and have shoots that almost look like bamboo. They have pink flowers.

Thanks in advance for any help,

yeto

Comments (8)

  • lsst
    13 years ago

    I know Oleander is planted between the palms. I have seen both pink and white.

  • yeto
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    Thank you for your help. I live in the low country and plan to make a hedge across the back of my yard. Do these make a good hedge?

    Thanks,
    yeto

  • lsst
    13 years ago

    I personally like them but they are very poisonous.
    If you have small kids you may want to reconsider.

  • coorscat
    13 years ago

    Oleanders make a great privacy hedge. I grew up in South Texas where they are a very common part of the public and private landscape. My parent's house had a privacy hedge of oleanders between their house and the neighbors when I was growing up. They do require some heavy pruning every so often because they can become very large. They also live forever....those oleanders are still at my mom's house and looking good (and my kids are in their 20's. Yes, they are poisonous.....but so are many other common plants...just teach the kids that if it isn't food it doesn't go in their mouth.

  • yeto
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    Thanks for all the replys.

    Is there a good place online to order Oleanders?

    Thanks,
    yeto

  • jay_7bsc
    13 years ago

    Unless you particularly enjoy shopping for horticulture on the Internet, oleanders are readily available at the garden centers of the big box retailers. As others have said, teach children not to eat vegetation unless it is known to be safe for human consumption. _Nerium oleander_ is deadly, if consumed or inhaled. Everyone needs to be aware of the several deaths of members of a highway road crew near Brunswick, GA, who died from the fumes of an oleander bonfire they created many decades ago. They breathed its smoke, keeled over, and are now pushing up daisies.

  • trianglejohn
    13 years ago

    Entire families have died when they used fallen oleander twigs to roast marshmallows while on a camping trip. It truly is one of the most toxic plants around. I don't have any kids so I will be growing some in my new yard.

  • jay_7bsc
    13 years ago

    During the Cold War, a Russian agent knocked off a British spy in London by surreptitiously pricking his skin with a lethal weapon concealed in the tip of an umbrella and coated with the powdered flesh of _Ricinus communis_ seeds. I wonder whether the Russians included _Nerium oleander_ in their horticultural aresenal? Or would Jonathan Swift have dosed those eighteenth-century Irish babies with _Nerium oleander_ or _Ricinus communis_ before throwing them into the stew pot, had he known of their existence?

Sponsored
Through The Garden, Inc.
Average rating: 5 out of 5 stars21 Reviews
#1 Landscape Design Build Firm Serving Virginia/Maryland & DC Area