Lonicera caprifolium
Italian honeysuckle
Common names: Perfoliate honeysuckle, Goat-leaf honeysuckle
At a glance
- Light
- Partial shade
- Hardiness
- Hardy down to −25 °C
- Spacing
- 100 cm, rows 150 cm
- Water need
- Medium
- Origin
- Native to Germany
Photo: Meneerke bloem · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Source
Description
The Italian honeysuckle is a vigorous climber that envelops pergolas, releasing a captivating fragrance on warm summer evenings in June and July, attracting moths. Its cream‑white to pink tubular flowers are a magnet for butterflies and bees. In late summer bright red berries follow, intended for birds and not edible for humans.
Care instructions
Plant the honeysuckle with its base in shade and its crown in sun, preferably on a trellis or an old tree. Keep the root zone cool and moist, for example with a mulch layer. Prune spent shoots immediately after flowering (August, week 32) to maintain a bushy habit and prevent the plant from becoming leggy from below.
The care notes were machine-translated from German.
Soil & site
Soil pH
Soil type
loamy, humus-rich, well-drained, moist, lime-loving, nutrient-rich
Your honeysuckle likes a humus-rich, loose and free-draining soil, fresh to moderately moist. It does not tolerate waterlogging or heavy compaction. Loamy, chalky soils with a neutral to slightly alkaline reaction are ideal; plant it so that the root zone stays cool and shaded while the shoots grow into the light.
Feeding
Medium feeder
Months
Mar–Apr
In spring (March to April), work mature compost and a little horn shavings in shallowly into the root zone. A mulch layer of bark compost or grass clippings keeps the soil moist and supplies the plant in the long term. Do not feed after July, so that the shoots ripen well before frost.
Overwintering
The Italian honeysuckle is fully hardy and survives the lowland winter of Germany, Austria and Switzerland outdoors without protection. Only freshly planted young plants can you cover at the roots with leaves or bark mulch in the first winter; it is best to prune only in spring after growth starts or directly after flowering.
Propagation
Methods
- Cuttings
- Layering
- From seed
Cuttings (recommended): From June to August, take semi-ripe shoot tips without flowers, about 10 to 15 cm long, with at least three leaf nodes. Remove the lower leaves and insert the cutting into a mix of sand and seed compost. Place it in partial shade and warm (about 20 to 25 °C) and keep the soil evenly moist. After a few weeks roots form, recognisable by new shoot tips. Alternatively, in autumn to winter you can take hardwood cuttings (15 to 20 cm) and insert them directly outdoors.
Layering: From March to May, bend a young shoot growing close to the ground down to the soil, nick it lightly on the underside and cover the notch with a little soil. Fix the shoot with a wire staple or a stone; the shoot tip should stick out at the top. In autumn, new leaves show success; separate the layer from the mother plant the following spring and move it to its final spot.
Sowing (not much recommended): Collect the red berries from late summer to autumn. Caution, they are poisonous. Wash off the pulp and cold-stratify the seeds for a few weeks. Sow from spring. Germination is uneven and protracted, and the young plants grow very slowly in the first year. For garden practice, cuttings or layering are much more reliable.
Companion planting
Good neighbors
Companion planting is partly traditional gardening lore. Where the reason is known, it is given.
For your garden
Grow Italian honeysuckle yourself
Gartenkern tells you when frost is coming, when to sow and when to harvest, for your location.
Free, no time limit
Notes from real gardens
What other gardeners have written down about this variety, anonymous and voluntary.
No notes shared yet. Will you be the first to write one down?