Pinus mugo - Mugo or Swiss Mountain Pine () ------Pinus mugo is known as a spreading, slow-growing with miniature needles) emerge in spring evergreen with ascending branches and -twigs mature to be rough (needle-scarred) and black- relatively short needles. Mugo Pine is used at brown branches with age, often concealed by the foundations and entranceways, on embankments, dense and long-persistent needles within rock gardens, as a facer shrub, as formal or Trunk informal hedges, and in raised planters. It often gets -dark gray, broken into plates on larger specimens, larger than intended, but is tolerant of pruning or often unseen as the is normally a shrub that shearing. branches and foliages to the ground

FEATURES USAGE Form Function -small- to medium-sized -foundation, entranceway, group planting, evergreen shrub (in most embankment, facer, specimen, raised planter, or cases) hedge evergreen shrub -ultimate size is highly -Mugo Pine should be used more often as an dependent upon the embankment cover, as its shallow root system and , but the smallest spreading growth habit will combine, over time, to ultimately mature at about 1.5' tall x 3' wide, create a solid evergreen cover in sunny, exposed and the largest selections in the nursery trade can areas eventually become very large (10' tall x 15' -Mugo Pine can also be used as an effective non- wide) thorny barrier hedge, and either formally sheared to -upright mound or upright flat-top growth habit, the desired height and width, or informally left alone spreading at an early age Texture -slow growth rate -medium texture Culture -thick density -full sun to partial shade Assets -very adaptable to poor soils, clay soils, sandy soils, -low branching and dense evergreen foliage occur to dry soils, soils of alkaline pH, and is tolerant of the ground moderate shearing -attractive candles (new stems) are held prominently -propagated by seeds, grafts, or rooted cuttings above the flat-topped, mounding, or rounded shrub -2 serious pests (pine sawfly larvae and pine needle -slow growth rate (an asset since it is often sited at or scale) that can be controlled with appropriate near foundations) monitoring when they occur Liabilities -abundantly available, primarily as relatively -most "dwarf" cultivars get much larger than compact cultivars in container form, but also in B&B advertised with age form for the larger selections -2 serious pest problems: pine sawfly larvae -newly emergent growth (candles) can be sheared (alarming cosmetic chewing damage) and pine needle back halfway for even more dense and formal growth scale (subtle long-term damage that leads to plant the following year decline if untreated) -can be left unpruned if it has ample space to grow in a sunny location, since it is naturally a dense and -Zones 2 to 7 low-branching shrub, but it is often sited at -Native to the Alps in Europe (where it takes on a foundations, and therefore by habit and necessity mixture of shapes and sizes that range from large regularly sheared into a shrubs to large trees [up to 80' tall]) rounded or flat-topped shape SELECTIONS Foliage Alternates -2 needles per bundle, -evergreen globed shrubs of various foliage color from 1-2" long, (Picea omorika 'Nana' [blue-silver-green], Pinus persisting for up to 5 strobus 'Blue Shag' [blue], Thuja occidentalis 'Hetz yrs., maturing to a dark Midget' [green]) green color -evergreen spreading shrubs (cultivars of Juniperus Flowers chinensis, Rhododendron, Taxus x media, etc.) -ornamentally -naturally table-topped, vased, or flat-topped inconspicuous evergreen shrubs (Pinus densiflora 'Umbraculifera') -monoecious Cultivars - Variants - Related Fruits -P. mugo 'Enci' - slowly maturing to 3' x 5', very -small cones are densely twiggy with short needles, with a table-top relatively rare growth habit Twigs -P. mugo 'Gnom' - a true dwarf form, with shorter, -attractive light green more dense needles and a flat top, slowly maturing to candles (vertical stems 1.5' x 3', sometimes grafted onto a standard