Plant: Gold Dust - Aucuba

Aucuba · Aucuba japonica 'Variegata'

$30.00

Size: 3 gal

Light

Full Shade

Bloom

Spring

Mature size

6 ft tall6 ft wide

More about this plant

Gold Dust aucuba is a slow growing broadleaf evergreen shrub with a dense, rounded habit and large glossy, leathery leaves flecked with yellow, which is what brightens the deep shade where it is normally planted. NCSU records it at 4 to 6 feet tall and wide. Small cross shaped purple maroon flowers open in spring and, on female plants with a male nearby, are followed by showy red berry like drupes that ripen in fall and hold through winter. Give it partial to deep shade in soil rich in organic matter that stays moist but drains well; in full sun the leaves scorch. It tolerates heavy shade, pollution, drought and poor soil and works as a hedge, a screen or a container plant.

Full Shade
Grows to 6 ft tall and 6 ft wide
Blooms in spring
Hardy in USDA zones 7-10
Evergreen foliage

Plant description

Gold Dust aucuba is a slow growing broadleaf evergreen shrub with a dense, rounded habit and large glossy, leathery leaves flecked with yellow, which is what brightens the deep shade where it is normally planted. NCSU records it at 4 to 6 feet tall and wide. Small cross shaped purple maroon flowers open in spring and, on female plants with a male nearby, are followed by showy red berry like drupes that ripen in fall and hold through winter. Give it partial to deep shade in soil rich in organic matter that stays moist but drains well; in full sun the leaves scorch. It tolerates heavy shade, pollution, drought and poor soil and works as a hedge, a screen or a container plant.

Flowers: Purple-maroon, 4 petals, 4 sepals, cross-shaped with white anthers.
Foliage: Opposite, simple, elliptic-ovate to elliptic-lanceolate, dentate, leathery and glossy leaves flecked and spotted with yellow.
Fruit: Red, ellipsoid, one-seeded, berry-like drupes to about half an inch that ripen in fall; female plants need a male pollinator to fruit.
Light: Dappled/Filtered Light, Deep Shade
Native range: East Asia and Japan