Grow and Care for Sweetshrub

Grow sweetshrub in part shade with moist soil that drains. It is Calycanthus, also called Carolina allspice. It is not spicebush — that is Lindera benzoin, a different shrub.

Give it part shade and moist soil that drains

Sweetshrub wants the same kind of ground it uses in a moist woodland: loam that stays evenly moist and still drains. Part shade is the reliable setting. [1] eastern sweetshrub takes full sun to deep shade, but in shade it grows taller and opener, with fewer flowers. Afternoon shade helps in a hot climate. [2] It is not a salt plant. A short dry spell is survivable once the shrub is established, but sandy ground without water stalls it. [3] Site it near a path or a patio so the spring flowers can reach you. Match the kind on Types of Sweetshrub.

Water the first season, then only in a long dry spell

A new shrub still needs water until the roots leave the nursery ball. Soak the root zone, then check a few inches down before you water again. [4] Once it is established, water in a long dry spell. Do not treat a brief shower as enough in the first summer.

1. Soak the root zone after you set the plant. Check a few inches down and water again when that soil starts to dry.
2. Keep the root zone moist through the first growing season. Do not let a new shrub dry out between soaks.
3. Once it is established, water only in a long dry spell. Sandy ground still needs more help than loam.
4. Mulch about two inches over the root zone. Keep bark off the stems so the crown stays dry.

Grow a compact kind in a large draining pot if you need one

A large pot can hold a compact sweetshrub on a patio. The mix must drain, because a soggy pot is where root rot starts. Michael Lindsey is the compact eastern form if you need a smaller plant.

1. Use a large pot with a drainage hole. A small cup dries too fast and then stays wet at the bottom.
2. Fill it with potting mix, not garden soil. Set the root ball even with the mix.
3. Water when the top inch is dry. Pots dry faster than a bed, so check more often in heat.
4. Repot every two or three years, or plant the shrub out when the pot is packed with roots. See Planting Sweetshrub for the in-ground hole.

Lift a rooted sucker if you want more plants

The sure home method is a rooted sucker. Seedlings vary in fragrance, so a named plant is better cloned from a sucker or a cutting than from seed.

1. Dig a sucker that already has its own roots at the edge of the clump.
2. Cut it from the parent and keep those fibrous roots intact.
3. Replant it at the same depth and keep the soil moist through the first season.
4. If you have no sucker, take a firm July cutting, scrape one side, dip it in rooting hormone, and stick it in sand. Keep the sand moist until roots form.

Not spicebush — and not wintersweet

Sweetshrub is Calycanthus. Spicebush is Lindera benzoin. Wintersweet is Chimonanthus. Summersweet is Clethra. They are not the same plant and they do not take the same care.

• Sweetshrub (Calycanthus) — large maroon or white strap-tepal flowers in late spring, urn-shaped seed pods, and spicy bark when you scratch it. Carolina allspice is this shrub, not a cooking spice.
• Spicebush (Lindera benzoin) — small yellow flowers before the leaves, red berries in fall, and a different family. A spicebush tag is not sweetshrub.
• Wintersweet (Chimonanthus) — winter flowers on bare wood. See How to Grow Wintersweet if that is the tag you have.
• Summersweet (Clethra alnifolia) — midsummer bottlebrush spikes and wetter acid ground. Strawberry bush on a tag can also mean Euonymus americanus, which is not this genus.

If a new shrub flags in a dry week, soak the root zone once, then check a few inches down before you water again.