Castle Rouge Blue Holly (Ilex x meserveae 'Castle Rouge')
EYE-leks ex mez-ERV-ee-ay 'Castle Rouge'

Evergreen Perennial Shrub
Add a touch of elegance to your garden with Castle Rouge Blue Holly, featuring striking dark green foliage that turns deep burgundy in winter. This resilient evergreen thrives in diverse conditions, making it a stunning choice for year-round beauty!

Redefining blue holly, Castle Rouge® blue holly stuns with a shock of winter color. Its base color is a glossy dark green. New growth tinges the green with a red-burgundy glow. It adopts a dark burgundy winter coat, an elegant note in any winter. This male plant pollinates the female members of the Castle series and beyond, but with handsome foliage, it doesn’t need to be stuffed into an out of the way spot like most other male pollinating plants. Use it in a mixed hedge or as an element in a foundation planting.

Pros

  • A blue holly male pollinator with pizazz
  • Pretty winter coloring 
  • Year-round interest
  • Fall Interest
  • Winter Interest
 

Plant Data

Mature Size 5 - 8 feet tall. 4 - 5 feet wide.
Sun Exposure Partial Sun - Full Sun
Moisture Tolerance Medium -
Zones 5a - 7b (Usually hardy to -20° F)
Tags Container, Edging, Evergreen, Fall interest, Formal Garden, Foundation, Full Sun, Good for Accents, Good for Asian Garden, Good for Beginners, Good for Hedges, Good for Mass Planting, Grown For Attractive Foliage, Insignificant Flowers, Low Maintenance, Medium, Modern Garden, Native to North America, Partial Sun, Perennial, Shade Tolerant, Shrub, Specimen, Thrillers, Tolerant of Acidic Soil, Tolerant of Loamy Soil, Tolerant of Sandy Soil, Well-Drained Soil, Winter Interest, Woodland Garden
Bloom Period Spring
Flower Color White
Foliage Color

Commonly Planted with...

Azaleas, rhododendrons, ferns, hostas, heucheras, boxwoods, ornamental grasses, lavender, creeping thyme.
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Pricing and Availability History

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Field-Grown vs. Greenhouse-Grown Plants

Plants which are well-adapted to our local climate are most often field-grown (outside). Field-grown plants are generally cheaper and have the advantage of already somewhat acclimated to our cold winters, but that means they’re not artificially far along in the spring and tend to bloom at the normal time in our area.

Spring annuals and tender perennials are typically grown in Greenhouses so they can be ready and luxurious exactly when customers want them. Some perennials are also “forced” into early bloom in greenhouses. In May, there can be a very big difference between field-grown and greenhouse-grown plants of the same type. The latter typically look good right away (so they’re a great choice where that’s important), but we typically pay a premium for it.


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To secure the best prices for club members and make sure we know the current plants available from each nursery, we take orders only a couple of times a month.

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No Pricing or Availability Right Now

We order from a rotating cast of the best nurseries in the Great Lakes region. It looks like we've offered this plant in the past, but the nurseries we're working with this week don't appear to have it in stock at the moment.

Our goal is to bring as many plants together under "one roof" as possible, so we'll try hard to make it available again in the future!