Juniperus virginiana 'Canaertii' (Eastern Red Cedar)

Juniperus virginiana 'Canaertii' is a showy eastern red cedar cultivar which offers an attractive growth habit and texture, with scaly foliage covering trees up to 20-35' tall and 8-15' wide, making for an excellent medium to large juniper for specimens, privacy screens, and wind breaks. With its feathery green scale-like foliage at maturity, and needle-like young foliage, 'Canaertii' junipers lend elegance, texture, and upright appeal to the landscape, but this cultivar is much more hardy than its delicate looks would suggest. Juniperus virginiana 'Canaertii' is tolerant of poor, dry soils including especially rocky sites and those polluted with black walnut phytochemicals; eastern redcedar is additionally resistant to both drought and soil erosion, with its dense, fibrous roots making it a great addition to breezy sites as a where soil displacement from the wind might be an issue.

As a dioecious plant, male redcedars will produce pollen cones through the spring and summer while female plants produce berry-like structures in the late summer and fall; named for Belgian horticulturist Frederic Canaert, the 'Canaertii' variety is an all-female variety, producing showy berry-like cones with a blue-gray appearance. These berries add an additional pop of color for ornamental appeal, and serve to feed a huge variety of foraging birds throughout the northeast and mid-Atlantic. Dense foliage and branching habit makes 'Canaertii' perfect for grouping to form a border hedge where birds can nest and find plenty of shelter from the elements and, in addition, while they don't produce flowers, juniper trees also make an excellent addition for pollinator garden borders, where butterfly larvae can feed on their foliage. 'Canaertii' junipers are not at all picky about soil type, as long as their sites are relatively dry and well draining, and these trees make for an excellent native inclusion in a variety of garden and landscape locations.