Been back and checked your original question on these plants - I hate to say this, but, since they recovered well when originally repotted, I can't help feeling that the time has come for them to be planted in the ground. These are large shrubs, wanting to get minimum eight feet by eight feet, and will always be only temporary residents in containers.

Oh dear, Bamboo! I have nowhere to plant them! Oh hang on, just a mo. I am soon hoping to be able to create some planting beds in my front garden which at the moment is very bland. Maybe they could go in there, if I can just keep them going a little while longer in the pots. Thanks for the advice.

These can become monsters if you do not keep them in check, we let ours six bushes go, and it took us a year to prune them branch by branch, but we persevered and they look much better by being kept small!

Thanks for the suggestion Grandmage. I'm not too hot on pruning - what would I do? If I cut them back I might be left with a load of sticks! Is that what happened to yours and did the leaves grow back eventually? I must admit I'd considered doing this but decided to ask advice first.

Well ours looked awful for about six to nine months and now they have lovely new shoots and are looking lusher, we are going to let them grow a little higher now because our bottom of garden neighbour has put up an ugly shed and our laurels are along the bottom fence, you cannot win can you?? I would put them in the ground and see, if push came to shove you could always get rid, on GW they said if you really do not like a plant then dig it out ! We have had our garden for 36 years and we are still moving things around.

I have had this problem...my neighbour also...on our Aucuba (Spotted laurel). I pruned them right back, new healthy leaves developed BUT the stems then turned black, like the leaves. This weekend I have cut the blackened branches out and binned everything as I was told that this is a virus...cleaned the saw, secateurs etc with disinfectant afterwards! I await the next episode...! LOL.

I have a laurel in my mini shrubbery that I keep trimmed .It doesn't seem to mind this. It's been there years and is between 3 to 4 feet tall. It's behind 3 dwarf conifers, and is close planted to keep it in check. They do grow ferociously tall if allowed free reign. I chip bits off it any old time.

Hi everyone - I've just returned to this question as I'm now in a position to (maybe) plant these laurels in the ground. However, they really don't look very well and I'm wondering whether to bother. I'm reluctant to plant something that doesn't look good on the grounds that it's a lot of effort! If I plant them, should I also prune them? And if I prune them I'll be left with a load of bare sticks, so how long will it take for them to grow new leaves? Hmmmm. I really don't know what to do for the best. Would love your advice!

Unless you really need to block your view or have cover then I wouldnt bother Jan. There are some lovely shrubs/plants at the GC. that you can buy also there are some far prettier than Laurel!! Laurel are usually very tough and take a lot of killing, you could try to prune them quite hard and if they dont look good then replace.

Not sure I'd bother either - I had one years ago that did a similar thing, in the ground, and it never grew properly, so I binned it. And they are quite boring really, okay for screening, and in shady places, but otherwise I'd not bother.

Well I think you've just convinced me not to bother and to get something new instead. Although i don't agree with them being boring - when mine were at their peak they were lovely, very attractive with their spotted leaves. Oh well, we're all different I suppose! Thanks very much for the advice, much appreciated.

They can look good in pots like that, but then they always want more room - and I think they remind me of old fashioned shrubberies in parks when they're full grown in a garden, that's probably why I think they're boring - they're certainly ubiquitous.

I agree Jan that they are nice as are mine and they are just the plain green ones but secretly I prefer something with a flower.

Just to add...both my neighbour's and my own laurel recovered well, have loads of berries, lush foliage....but doubt if I'd go though all that if it happened....again!
Having said that, I do like the variegation! LOL.

We had this discussion on the 14th of June last year. The Laurel in the mini shrubbery is at least 20 years old and about 1 metre tall. It now has flower buds all over it. After it has bloomed it is pruned back a few inches with a recharcheable miniature trimmer. It is close planted with Juniper, Mahonia, Thuya and 2 Camellias. My Hellebore avatar is situated in front of this planting in the shade mostly. Later on it will need another hair cut, as they grow rapidly after flowering. The garden centre guided me on this planting suggestion. It has been a success.

Thank you everyone for your help. I still haven't decided what to do! I've just created three borders in my front garden which need filling and they will cost a fortune to fill up so I was keen to use these laurels to save a bit of money but didn't want to go to all the effort if they were just going to look terrible. However, one of the laurels is much better than the other so maybe I'll plant that one but not the other. Izzy, nice to hear that your laurel recovered well, that's encouraging.

Dorjac, we cross-posted. Thanks for your comments, it's answered another question for me about whether I can keep the shrub to a restricted size, as I certainly don't have space for it to get as big as it maybe would like to. But it will have a lot more space than in its pot.

Hope it transplants successfully Jan. They are tough old things, Laurels and can get huge. I think Four Seasons said in one of their blogs on their beautiful close planted garden, that almost any shrub can be kept to the size you want with clever pruning, and not being afraid to cut things back at the right time.