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Corylus avellana is better known as the ever-popular hazel. This deciduous shrub is widespread throughout Ireland, often found growing in hedgerows or as an understorey in oak and ash woods.

The Woodland Trust has no hesitation in recommending hazel as the perfect addition to any garden. It’s a bushy, multi-stemmed shrub which generally won’t grow more than six metres in size. This makes it suitable for even the more modest-sized garden. While wonderful as an individual shrub, hazel can also be used to form a hedge, making the perfect living boundary.

Hazel has rather distinctive oval, almost round, leaves. The light green leaf is slightly hairy, has a rather wrinkled appearance, a pointed tip and a jagged edge.

The shrub is perhaps, however, best known for its colourful spring catkins (tight clusters of tiny flowers). The male catkins are striking; they are bright yellow in colour and hang down, it is said, like ‘lambs’ tails’. The female catkins are much smaller and look more like leaf buds, with protruding red tufts (or styles). The fruit grow from these small bud-like structures and ripen in October as brown, hard-shelled and highly desirable hazel nuts. The nuts are a popular source of food for a range of contenders, including mice, squirrels and some larger birds.

Things you may not know about Hazel:

Hazel bushes are often coppiced – that’s cut right back to a stump. The bush does re-grow, and the slender, strong, timber provided has a wide range of uses, from fencing to basketry.

The hazel has always had special, perhaps mystic associations, and is thought to ward off evil spirits.

A hazelnut carried in the pocket is believed to keep away rheumatism and back pain.

You may or may not believe in its ability to ward off harmful spirits and keep rheumatism at bay. But whatever your view, you’re sure to adore this shrub. With its distinctive ‘lambs’ tails’ and edible autumn hazel nuts, hazel surely deserves a place in any gardeners' corner.

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