Holly hedge plants

Holly hedge plants (Ilex aquifolium) description

Ilex Aquifolium, commonly known as English Holly hedge plants have an abundance of showy red berries that adorn the glossy green foliage in the autumn/winter, following the small spring flowers. Although Ilex aquifolium needs to be pollinated for berries to occur, this normally happens naturally in a hedging situation. Holly hedging is of great interest to wildlife, offering berries for birds to feed on and dense, evergreen foliage for a year-round shelter. Mistle thrushes in particular jealously guard the berries of any Holly tree that they make home, and are vocal protestors should another bird come near! Ilex aquifolium is also a source of food to many species of invertebrates, including the caterpillars of beautiful butterflies such as the Holly Blue.

It is important to note that we also stock Ilex aquifolium 'Alaska' which is another variety of Holly hedging, similar to Ilex aquifolium, but with a few added benefits. Ilex aquifolium 'Alaska' is hardier and bushier in habit with softer, brighter leaves and stems. Ilex aquifolium 'Alaska' hedges produce more berries and overall is a superior variety of Holly in all aspects except that it isn't native. If you specifically require the native holly variety, please let us know. Ilex aquifolium (English Holly) can be recognised for its purple stems and darker green, more prickly leaves.

Common uses of English Holly

Ilex aquifolium makes a striking feature in any garden and forms a good windbreak, intruder deterrent and privacy screen. It also makes the perfect shelter for wildlife providing protection from predators and from the elements, encouraging more native species to your garden. Due to the hardy nature of Holly hedge plants, including tolerance of pollution, they can be used for both coastal and city planting. As Ilex aquifolium is a native species, it also works wonderfully when planted to create an English cottage garden theme or for informal planting, as Holly hedge plants are a fantastic low maintenance choice.

Combine Holly hedging with

Ilex aquifolium can be grown as a standalone shrub or specimen tree, providing a vibrant colourful addition to your garden. It can also be mixed with other native hedging species to create a diverse hedge, adding an important evergreen element to the native mix.

Growth rate of Ilex aquifolium

Holly hedges plants have a slow growth rate of approximately 10-15cm each year. They will create a thick, decorative display reaching a height of up to 4m.

Care advice for Holly hedges

Ilex aquifolium only requires a light pruning once or twice a year, depending on the desired appearance. It is best to shape your Holly hedging when young in the springtime, and once matured, your English Holly can be pruned at any time. We recommended lightly trimming in either late winter or early spring. Please view our Hedging Care Advice page for further information.

Suggested planting density for Holly hedge plants

For information on the specific planting density of English Holly, please see the product table below. In the 'No. Per Metre' column, you will find our recommended plant density for each individual plant species and root type. You can find out more about hedge planting density here.

Holly hedge plants are available to buy year-round as Pot Grown and Cell Grown plants. Root balls are available for pre-order from late summer and delivered from early autumn. Bare rooted Ilex aquifolium is delivered between November-late April/early May and can be pre-ordered from mid-summer.

Nearly all of our Holly hedge plants are UK grown by experts with years of nursery growing experience. When we do find it necessary to source Holly hedging from outside the UK, we make every effort to ensure our suppliers are unbeaten on quality. At best4hedging, we endeavour to make certain that your Holly hedge plants arrive in the freshest condition and are of the highest quality, whilst sustaining our great prices. Rest assured, you can buy Ilex aquifolium online with total confidence in the service and products that you will receive.

• Orders £85 & over (ex. VAT) to mainland UK are delivered FREE* (Exceptions apply - see below for Scottish Highlands etc)
• Orders under £85 (ex. VAT) to mainland UK £9.95
• At an additional cost, we can deliver to Scottish Highlands & Islands, which we classify as including AB (Aberdeen) and DD (Dundee) postcodes, as well as Ireland, Channel Islands, Isle of Wight and Isle Man. The exact delivery cost is order specific and will need to be quoted by one of our team, so please contact us on 01257 261 243

*For some plants that are too heavy or too tall to be packed in cardboard boxes we use pallet deliveries. In these circumstances, we require a minimum order value of £200 (ex VAT) for free delivery, or you can make a contribution towards the delivery cost. Look out for the information on product pages which explains this further where applicable and if your order is for less than £200 (ex VAT) please call or email us to agree upon a delivery contribution. This requirement only applies to those plants where it is clearly indicated on the product page

Pallet deliveries are always undertaken on an 18-tonne vehicle (similar in size to a standard refuse vehicle). If for any reason you require a smaller vehicle please contact our sales team who can arrange this for you. There will be an additional surcharge applied for small vehicle deliveries

Delivery Timescales

99% of our orders are dispatched within 3 to 5 working days of receipt and most the day after the order is placed. We can do “next day delivery” on many of our products for an additional £12 (incl VAT) but please call on 01257 494 491 before placing your order to check.

We can also deliver on a specified date to suit you. Please indicate the date you would like to receive delivery in the notes section of the checkout (or place your order by phone) and we’ll do our utmost to meet that date.

Occasional hiccups can occur (such as broken down vehicles) and although we are very experienced in logistics we cannot be held liable for costs incurred or inconvenience due to late deliveries - see terms and conditions for more information.

You will receive an email or telephone call confirming the dispatch of your order 24/48 hours before it arrives with you.

Exceptions to our quick turnaround timescale

Pre-orders - if you have placed an order that includes products on pre-order, then they will be dispatched to you as soon as they are available. If your order includes pre-order bare roots or root balls you will be notified once they are being dispatched (root balls from mid to late October and bare roots from early to mid-November).

Root balls - lifting root balls involves the use of complex, heavy machinery, this lifting is carried out twice a week in the root ball season so we do still have a prompt turnaround timescale but if your order has just missed one lifting, it will be a few days before we lift again. We are always happy to confirm when we can deliver to you before you order. The benefit of this method of supplying root balls is that they are always fresh and therefore have a higher success rate than root balls that are stored out of the soil.

Weather conditions can affect dispatch - bare root and root ball plants are not lifted if the ground is too cold (it damages the roots) and the delivery of all plants can be affected if the water supply is frozen (because we water all plants before packing). Extremely hot weather can also be challenging and occasionally we hold backorders for species that are particularly vulnerable. We ask our customers to be mindful of bank holidays when couriers are not active.

We'd like to stress that although there are exceptions, the vast majority of our orders are dispatched extremely quickly and we are proud of our logistics developed over many years of delivering plants to tens of thousands of customers.

Returns

We inspect plants carefully before dispatch but accept that very occasionally things may go wrong. 
You can return your plants (within 14 days) for a refund or replacement (we’ll help with the process of returning). If your plants arrived damaged then returns are free of charge. However, we ask that you inform us as soon as possible. If you’d like to return your plants because of a change of plan or if we do not agree that the plants are significantly damaged (the loss of a few leaves in transit or a loose pot on arrival, for example, wouldn't be harmful to the plants), then we may ask you to pay the full or partial return costs if you still wanted to return them. We’re very reasonable and always aim for complete satisfaction as demonstrated by our amazing Feefo customer reviews which can be viewed here.

Should you wish to return any products that you have over-bought, no longer require or purchased in error you will incur both a return cost (different charges for pallets and Boxes) and the original cost of delivery incurred by Best4hedging. Please contact the Service team for charges and/or to organise a return. Plants will be subject to a quality control check from our Nursery upon return before any refund is authorised and processed.

Please note that in the case of damaged plants, if you have not notified us of a problem within 14 days of delivery, we consider you to have accepted the plants and Best4Hedging has no further liability for them should they fail.

You can read more about our returns policy in our terms and conditions here.

You can buy with confidence from best4hedging.

We accept all major credit and debit cards. We have also partnered with PayPal to provide a further, secure payment option.

You can order online or over the phone by calling our dedicated Sales & Advice team. 

If you have any further questions in regards to payment, please do get in touch. You can read our Terms & Conditions here.

Call our Sales & Advice team on 01257 261 243

Email us at [email protected]