Nellie Stevens Holly

#TeachingTuesday: Nellie Stevens Holly

This week our crews learned about Nellie Stevens holly. The scientific name is Ilex x ‘Nellie R. Stevens’.  The ‘x’ in between the genus and cultivar name means it is a hybrid between two different species, in this case, English holly and Chinese holly (Ilex aquifolium and Ilex cornuta). It can be grown as a large shrub, or it can be limbed up and grown as a tree. It likes full sun to partial shade, and well-drained soil. Unlike most hollies, it can produce a nice crop of berries without a male holly tree nearby, but it will produce more with a male. 

Maintenance

Nellie Stevens holly has a natural pyramidal shape, so if left alone, it requires very little maintenance or pruning. However, many people prefer a neat sheared look, which requires regular pruning to maintain. There are several considerations to think about when planning when to prune Nellie Stevens holly. Hollies bloom on old wood, but hollies are not grown for their flowers. The berries, which develop in the fall and persist through the winter, are what people want to see. As long as you don’t prune too much of the old branches and only shear the new growth, the berries should grow just fine. Avoid pruning too late in the season, because it could trigger new growth that won’t have time to harden off before cold weather.

ID Tips

• The leaves are alternate, like all hollies.
• The leaves are thick, evergreen, slightly blistered and generally have 5-7 sharp prickles. Looking at the backside of the leaf, it looks a little bit like a turtle.
• In winter, the branches are loaded with bright red berries along the stems in between the leaves.
• You can tell it apart from a Burford holly because the Nellie Stevens leaves are larger, and Burford holly leaves typically only have a single prickle, one at the tip of each leaf.
• You can tell it apart from Fortune’s osmanthus because the osmanthus has opposite leaves (in pairs along the stem).