Photo: Sonnia Hill, CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Yaupon

Ilex vomitoria

Also called yaupon holly, cassina, cassena.

A native evergreen holly for hedges and screens, with glossy leaves and, on female trees, red berries that birds take in late winter.

EvergreenHedge or screenSalt tolerantWildlife valueDrought tolerantTolerates shadeWinter interestStreet tree

Type: Small tree
Mature height: 10–25 ft
USDA zones: 7–9
Growth rate: Medium
Sun: Full, Part, Shade
Soil moisture: Dry, Average, Wet
Grows wild in: The coast, sandy barrens, the forest understory and stream banks
Native range: 11 states, north to Virginia, south to Florida and west to Texas
List all 11
Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia
See what is native in your state

Hardiness zones Find your zone by ZIP code

Yaupon is the evergreen holly of the southern coastal plain, a shrub or small tree that forms thickets. Its small leaves lack the spines of American holly. It survives salt spray, steady wind, full sun and heat, so it has been planted on beaches and dunes. Its leaves and twigs contain caffeine, and yaupon tea stayed a common drink in the South into the 20th century. Along streets it grows well, even in a sidewalk cutout with little open ground. Shear it into a hedge or screen, or prune it up into a small tree with several trunks.

Size, growth and what to expect

Ratings of yaupon's pace run from slow to rapid, so our growth estimator takes the middle, about a foot and a half a year. It grows 10 to 20 feet tall and 8 to 12 feet wide, and wild ones reach about 25 feet.

Small, fragrant greenish-white flowers open in April and May. On female trees, shiny red berries a quarter inch across ripen in September and October and hang on into winter. Birds usually eat them only late in winter, after freezes and thaws. Turkeys, raccoons and squirrels eat them too. It hosts the Henry's elfin and holly azure butterflies.

It grows wild on the Atlantic and Gulf coastal plains from Virginia to central Florida and west to Oklahoma and Texas. Its home is coastal dunes, maritime forests, sandy pinelands and hammocks, and also stream banks and floodplains.

How to grow Yaupon

Yaupon grows in full sun, part shade or deep shade, and it bears more fruit and grows denser in sun. It takes sand or clay and acid or alkaline soil. It withstands drought and short floods. Plant it 15 feet from a wall and 15 feet from overhead wires, since some trees pass 20 feet. Set plants 8 feet apart for a screen. It is highly flammable, so in fire country keep it out of the space right around a house.

Saplings ship bare-root or potted. Plant them in early spring or early fall, in a hole wider than the roots and no deeper. Set the root flare at the soil line, put the native soil back in, and keep the mulch clear of the stems. Holly seed is slow. Sow cleaned seed outdoors in fall, a quarter inch deep under mulch, and expect seedlings in the second or third spring. For a spring sowing, keep it in a damp bag at room temperature for one to two months and then in the refrigerator for two to three months.

Water weekly through the first summer, then only in long droughts. Deer favor the leaves as browse, so cage young plants where deer are many. It takes heavy pruning, and a sheared hedge stays dense if it is shaped every year. Pull root suckers unless you want a thicket.

Trees are male or female, and only females bear the red fruit, so plant three or more seedlings for a male and a female. Seedlings first bear at 4 to 7 years. Scale, leaf miners and mites turn up, but none is normally serious. Eating the berries can make a person mildly ill.

Heights and zones are typical ranges for the species in cultivation; local conditions and seed source shift them.

Sources (12)