The Korean spindle is bearing distinctive fruits in the Woodland Garden.
Many members of the genus Euonymus are invaluable in the garden for their unusual fruits and vibrant autumn colour. This one, E. oxyphyllus, is a native of temperate Asia, and was introduced to our gardens in 1895. It grows to form either a shrub, or a small tree up to 8m in height, and has distinctive slender, terminal shoots, and ovate, toothed leaves, which take on red-purple hues in autumn. Greenish cream flowers are borne in cymes, and in autumn spherical, deep pink fruits split to reveal orange arils (fleshy seed coats). E. oxyphyllus is one of 175 species of deciduous, semi-evergreen or evergreen trees, shrubs or climbers, mainly from Asia. Most species have opposite leaves and produce cymes of small flowers during spring and summer.