Try it during the winter, or some other time when the top is completely firm. If you dig it when there is tender new growth that will probably wilt and shrivel.

Plant sold under this name is probably actually one called 'Skylark'.

Thanks bboy.

Is it really 'Skylark'? If it is, thats wonderful news for me, according to what I read online, skylark is more compact than Victoria.

How can I tell the difference between skylark and victoria, if at all?

Mo

They look the same and the Timber Press book CEANOTHUS says it is suspected that 'Victoria' and 'Skylark' are the same introduction. Without more information nobody may ever be able to establish with certainty that they are not two separate introductions that look alike. However, based on how it is put in CEANOTHUS and what I have seen sold under both names I'm inclined to use the name 'Skylark', the assumption being that 'Victoria' is a re-naming of a plant first grown as 'Skylark'.

Some cultivars have acquired multiple synonyms over the years, as though myriad attempts have been made by commercial interests to appropriate them for their own use.

In other cases it will not have been known that a plant already had a cultivar name.