Bottlebrush
Callistemon citrinus
Wants sun and a spot out of the wind; on wet ground it goes backward rather than forward.
- Type
- Shrub · Perennial
- Botanical family
- Mixed / other
- Foliage color
- Green
- Flower color
- Red
- Sunlight
- Full sun, in a sheltered spot.
- Watering
- Handles drought once it has settled in.
- Feeding
- A low-phosphorus feed in spring.
- Frost tolerant
- Yes
- Flowering
- May
- Pruning
- A light trim after flowering, and nothing more.
- Mar–May Bud Break
- May–Sep Flowering
- Sep–Dec Growing
- Jan–Mar Growing
- Plant spacing
- 6 ft 7 in
- In-row spacing
- 6 ft 7 in
- Between rows
- 8 ft 2 in
- Square-foot density
- Not suited to SFG
- Root system
- Woody and fibrous
- Working depth
- 12–24 in
- Can reach
- 3 ft down where the soil allows
- Spread
- 10–13 ft across, about 1.5–2× the width of the plant
- Shallowest pot
- 20 in of soil
A shallow woody framework with the fine feeding roots in the leaf litter above it. Those feeders are mostly under the outer half of the canopy rather than against the stem, which is where water and feed should go.
The habit is Bottlebrush’s own; the figures are what that habit usually comes to at this size, not a measurement of this species. Roots follow the soil either way: a compacted pan, a high water table or heavy clay stops them well short of any of it, and deep open ground lets them go further.
- Cats and dogs
- Confirmed safe
We say a plant is safe only where a named poison-control reference names that exact species and records it as non-toxic to both cats and dogs. Most plants are on nobody’s list, and their absence here is not a judgement about them. This is a record of what those references say, not veterinary advice, and it cannot account for your own animal, the quantity eaten, or a plant treated with anything.
Not the Aesculus parviflora also sold as bottlebrush, which is a different plant.
- Scale insects Immobile brown or white bumps fixed to stems and leaf undersides, sucking sap and weakening growth. Wipe off with a damp cloth or dab with horticultural soap; watch for the sooty mold that follows.
- Root & crown rot Root rot where the soil sits waterlogged
- Frost damage Frost damage to the young growth
Beneficial predators that hunt this plant's pests — grow their favourite flowers nearby to recruit them. companion plant
- Hoverfly SyrphidaeHunts Scale insects
Bee-mimicking flies whose legless larvae graze aphid colonies clean while the adults pollinate. A ribbon of shallow, nectar-rich flowers kept in bloom all season recruits wave after wave of them.
- Ladybird (lady beetle) CoccinellidaeHunts Scale insects
The gardener’s favorite ally: adults and their alligator-shaped larvae each eat thousands of aphids, plus scale, mealybugs, and other soft-bodied sap-suckers. Grow flat, open flowers for the adults and never spray a colony that ladybird larvae are already working.
Lavender, Rosemary, Cistus
Shrubs, like this one.
The Cottage Garden Companion — the gardener's herbarium at cottagegardencompanion.com