If you're looking at hedges on properties in Nanaimo and Lantzville, you're mostly looking at two species: western red cedar (Thuja plicata) and cherry laurel (Prunus laurocerasus). Between them, they account for the majority of formal privacy hedges on Vancouver Island. They're both excellent choices — but they behave completely differently, and what works well for one property can be the wrong call for another.
This matters whether you're planting something new or trying to figure out what to do with the hedge you already have. Understanding which species you're dealing with changes everything about how you approach hedge trimming, how often it needs to be done, and what you'll be hauling away afterward.
At a Glance: The Key Differences
| Factor | Western Red Cedar | Cherry Laurel |
|---|---|---|
| Growth rate | Slow — 10–15 cm per year | Fast — 30–45 cm per year |
| Trimming frequency | Once per year (late July–August) | 2–3 times per year |
| Foliage type | Fine, scale-like, aromatic | Broad, glossy, 10–20 cm leaves |
| Debris per trim | Moderate — fine clippings, composts easily | Heavy — large leaves, significant volume |
| Privacy timeline | 5–8 years to a full screen | 2–3 years to a full screen |
| Pruning tolerance | Cut into green only — never into brown | Tolerates cutting into old wood |
| Appearance | Formal, architectural, crisp lines | Lush, full, informal |
| Long-term lifespan | Decades, near-indefinite | Long-lived but less architecturally permanent |
Western Red Cedar: What You Need to Know
Cedar hedges are the signature look of established Nanaimo properties. Drive through Hammond Bay, north Nanaimo, or the older neighbourhoods of Lantzville and cedar hedges line street after street — tall, formal, immaculately flat-topped. They define property lines, muffle street noise, and, when well maintained, look as architectural as a wall.
They're slow to establish. In the first two or three years, a cedar hedge plant gains perhaps 10–15 cm of height per growing season. It can feel discouraging when you compare that to laurel, which will put on three or four times as much. But cedar rewards patience. A 20-year-old cedar hedge on a Nanaimo property is genuinely a permanent feature — one that will likely outlast any other planting on the site.
The critical rule — the one that matters more than anything else in cedar care — is this: never cut into brown wood. Cedar's interior is essentially dead; there are no latent buds waiting to regenerate once that brown wood is exposed. Cut past the green growth layer and you'll have a permanent bare patch that will not recover. This is why cedar hedges must be trimmed annually, taking back only the current season's new growth. Miss two or three years in a row and the green zone retreats further from the surface, making it increasingly difficult to maintain the hedge without exposing dead wood.
The debris from cedar trimming is manageable — fine, feathery clippings that compact well and break down quickly in compost. A 20-metre cedar hedge generates a fraction of the waste that an equivalent laurel hedge does at each trim.
Cherry Laurel: What You Need to Know
Cherry laurel is the fast-track option. In a good growing season, laurel can gain 40 cm or more of new growth — which means a hedge planted in spring can provide meaningful screening within two to three years. For anyone building a new property boundary, replacing a failed hedge, or just impatient for privacy, that growth rate is compelling.
Laurel is also far more forgiving of hard pruning than cedar. You can cut into old wood, and laurel will push new growth from dormant buds along the stem. This makes it a viable option for renovation — a laurel hedge that's gotten badly out of shape can be cut back significantly and will recover. You simply cannot do that with cedar.
The trade-off is volume. Those large, glossy leaves — one of laurel's most attractive features on a fresh hedge — become an enormous amount of debris at trim time. A 15-metre laurel hedge in Parksville or Nanaimo can produce 150–200 kg of cuttings from a single trim. That material needs to go somewhere. At WCL, every hedge job includes a complete haul-out to the composting facility — we've moved over 250 kg of trimmings from a single large laurel hedge job. That's not a detail; it's half the work.
Because of its fast growth, laurel typically needs trimming two to three times during a Vancouver Island growing season: a pass in late spring after the main flush, another in midsummer, and sometimes a light tidy in early fall. That's two to three times the visits compared to cedar.
Not sure what you have? Crush a small piece of foliage. Cedar has fine, flat, scale-like leaves and a distinctive cedar scent when rubbed. Laurel has broad, oval, glossy leaves — no strong scent — and the leaf edges are very slightly serrated. Once you know the difference, it's obvious.
Which One Should You Plant?
This depends on what you're optimizing for. Here's an honest breakdown:
Choose cedar if: you want a formal, architectural look that holds crisp lines; you're not in a rush and can give the hedge three to five years to establish; you're committed to the annual trimming discipline it requires; and you want lower overall debris volume over time.
Choose laurel if: you need a privacy screen within two to three seasons; you prefer a lush, full appearance over a crisp formal look; you're comfortable with more frequent trimming; and you have a plan for what to do with the debris — or someone like WCL to handle it.
For most new properties in Nanaimo and Lantzville, if privacy is the priority and budget allows for more frequent maintenance, laurel gets you there faster. If you're building for the long term and want a hedge that looks like part of the original architecture, cedar is worth the wait.
One thing to avoid: mixing the two species in the same run. The trimming schedules conflict, the foliage types clash visually, and the growth rates will make one section dominate the other within a few years. Pick one and commit to it.
Maintaining What You've Already Got
Many Nanaimo and Lantzville properties have established hedges that have been there for years — sometimes decades. If you've inherited one, identify it before you touch it, and understand what the plant needs before deciding how to maintain it.
For cedar: is it still within its green zone on all sides? If it has brown patches at the top or on the sides from a previous over-aggressive trim, those areas won't recover. The goal from that point is to manage the green that remains without exposing more dead wood. If it's never been trimmed and has grown beyond a manageable size, that's a separate conversation — one worth having with someone who has the reach to work the full height safely.
For laurel: overgrown hedges can be brought back. A laurel that's gone unpruned for three or four years can be cut back substantially and will respond with new growth. The debris from that kind of renovation job is significant, but the plant itself is resilient.
For tall hedges of either type — anything above roughly two metres — the safety calculation changes. Working the top of a mature cedar or laurel hedge from the ground with extended-reach commercial equipment is the right approach. Ladders and tall hedges don't go well together, and the results show it.