Squeeze Box Inkberry Holly
Ilex glabra 'SMNIGLA'

Height: 5 feet
Spacing: 3 feet
Sunlight: Full sun / Partial shade
Hardiness Zone: 5a

Description:
This excellent upright evergreen shrub features a tall, narrow pyramidal habit and glossy green foliage. As a male variety, it is used to pollinate female inkberry hollies, making it an important addition where fruiting varieties are planted. It works well as a small evergreen hedge or as a container specimen in milder climates.

Ornamental Features:
Squeeze Box Inkberry Holly has rich green evergreen foliage on a plant with a refined pyramidal habit of growth. The small, glossy, narrow leaves remain green throughout the winter. While it does not produce berries, it provides essential pollen for nearby female inkberry hollies.

Landscape Attributes:
Squeeze Box Inkberry Holly is a multi-stemmed evergreen shrub with a distinctive and refined pyramidal form. Its average texture blends into the landscape but can be balanced by one or two finer or coarser trees or shrubs for an effective composition.

This shrub requires occasional maintenance and upkeep and is best pruned in late winter once the threat of extreme cold has passed. It is a good choice for attracting birds. Gardeners should be aware of the following characteristic that may warrant special consideration:
- Suckering

Squeeze Box Inkberry Holly is recommended for the following landscape applications:
- Accent
- Mass Planting
- Hedges and Screening
- General Garden Use
- Topiary
- Container Planting

Planting & Growing:
Squeeze Box Inkberry Holly will grow to be about 5 feet tall at maturity, with a spread of approximately 3 feet. When planted in masses or used as a bedding plant, space plants about 3 feet apart. It tends to be slightly leggy, with a typical clearance of 1 foot from the ground, and is suitable for planting under power lines. It grows at a slow rate and under ideal conditions can be expected to live for 40 years or more. This is a dioecious species, meaning male and female plants are separate, and this variety serves as a pollinator for fruiting female inkberries.

This shrub performs best in full sun to partial shade and prefers moist to wet soils, tolerating occasional standing water. It should be fertilized periodically with a specially formulated acidic fertilizer during the growing season. It requires rich, acidic soil and may develop chlorosis in alkaline conditions. It is highly tolerant of urban pollution and benefits from winter mulching in exposed or colder locations. This is a selection of a native North American species.

Squeeze Box Inkberry Holly makes a fine choice for the outdoor landscape and is also well suited for use in outdoor pots and containers. Its upright habit makes it ideal as a thriller in the spiller-thriller-filler container combination when planted near the center of the pot. It is also large enough to be grown alone in a suitable container. Plants grown in containers may not perform exactly as indicated on the tag and typically require more frequent watering than those grown in the landscape.