Bye bye Photinia: This colourful low-maintenance wonder will take over the hedges in our gardens from 2026

In recent years, anyone visiting a new housing development will have seen the same sight: red Photinia hedges, clipped into perfectly straight lines to create living privacy screens. Fungal diseases are now affecting this standard choice so severely that gardening professionals expect a genuine replacement boom as early as spring 2026. Another shrub is waiting in the wings – colourful, hardy and remarkably easy to care for.

Why the Photinia hedge has suddenly become a problem

Photinia, commonly grown as the ‘Red Robin’ variety, was long regarded as the ideal successor to Thuja: evergreen, fast-growing and producing striking red new growth in spring. It has replaced older conifer hedges in countless front gardens after those fell out of favour because of fungal infestations and environmental criticism.

Entomosporiosis benefits from changing conditions

The gardening sector is now facing a familiar scenario. Conditions across many parts of Central Europe have changed markedly in recent years, with milder winters, longer wet springs and fewer proper periods of frost. These conditions favour a fungus that specifically weakens Photinia: Entomosporium maculatum, which causes the disease known as entomosporiosis.

At first, the disease is barely noticeable. Tiny red dots appear on the leaves before quickly turning brown. These marks develop into actual holes in the leaf tissue, photosynthesis declines, the foliage turns yellow and drops prematurely. What may look like “a little stress” in the first year can result in dramatic losses during mild winters.

In just one damp, mild season, Photinia hedges can lose 15 to 30 percent of their leaf mass – and they can scarcely regain this loss visually.

The visible effects on affected hedges

Garden owners see the consequences clearly: the once-dense red screen suddenly becomes patchy, entire sections lose their foliage, and shoots grow long and bare, with leaves remaining only at their tips. Anyone trying to make such a hedge dense again can quickly enter a cycle of:

• frequent pruning to encourage new shoots